Cross-curriculum priorities
Cross-curriculum Priorities support the Western Australian Curriculum to be a relevant, contemporary and engaging curriculum that reflects national, regional and global contexts. Cross-curriculum Priorities are incorporated through learning area content; they are not separate learning areas or subjects. They provide opportunities to enrich the content of the learning areas, where most appropriate and authentic, allowing students to engage with and better understand their world.
Opportunities to apply Cross-curriculum Priorities to learning area content vary. All three Cross-curriculum Priorities have relevance and meaning to the Humanities and Social Sciences curriculum.
Humanities and Social Sciences is the primary learning area in which students explore and deepen their knowledge of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the world’s oldest continuous living cultures and First Nations peoples of Australia.
This learning area provides students with the opportunity to understand the histories of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, which involve occupation of the Australian continent for more than 60 000 years. Students understand the enduring impacts of colonisation on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ cultures and impact of the doctrine of terra nullius on ownership of and access to Country/Place. Importantly, this learning area includes the significant contributions of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ histories and cultures on a local, national, regional and global scale.
Students appreciate and celebrate the diversity of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ cultures. They understand how these cultures are based on special connections to Country/Place, and have unique belief systems and ways of being, knowing, thinking and doing linked to these physical and spiritual interconnections. The development of these understandings includes exploring contemporary issues that demonstrate the dynamic nature of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ cultures.
This learning area develops students’ knowledge of citizenship that positions Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples as the Traditional Owners of Country/Place and highlights how native title law recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples’ rights and interests. Students examine the sophisticated social organisation systems, protocols, kinship structures, economies and enterprises of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
To study this learning area, students use primary and secondary sources, including oral histories and traditional, culturally appropriate sources to see events through multiple perspectives. This allows them to empathise and ethically consider the investigation, preservation and conservation of sites of significance to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
In the Humanities and Social Sciences curriculum, students investigate the diversity of cultures, values, beliefs, histories and environments that exist within and between the countries of the Asia region. They learn about how this diversity influences the way people interact with each other, the places where they live, and the social, economic, political and cultural systems of the region as a whole. Students investigate the reasons behind migration from Asia to Australia and develop an understanding of the experiences of people of Asian heritage who are now Australian citizens. Students can learn about the shared history and the environmental, social and economic interdependence of Australia and the Asia region. In a changing globalised world, the nature of interdependence between Asia and Australia continues to change. By exploring the way transnational and intercultural collaboration supports shared and sustainable futures, students reflect on how Australians can participate in the Asia region as active and informed citizens.
The Humanities and Social Sciences curriculum helps students develop the ability to question, think critically, solve problems, communicate effectively, make decisions and adapt to change. Students respond to the challenges of sustainability through an understanding of the key historical, geographical, political, economic and societal factors involved, and how these different factors interrelate.
The learning area provides content that supports the development of students’ world views, particularly in relation to judgements about past social and economic systems, and access to and use of the earth’s resources. Students are given opportunities to integrate their study of biophysical processes with investigations of the attitudinal, demographic, social, economic and political influences on human use and management of the environment. The curriculum prepares students to be informed consumers, to act in enterprising and innovative ways, and to perceive business opportunities in changing local, regional, national and global economic environments. Students explore contemporary issues of sustainability, and develop action plans and possible solutions to local, regional, national and global issues that have social, economic and environmental perspectives.