Digital Technologies – General Capabilities
General Capabilities equip young people with the knowledge, skills, behaviours and dispositions to live and work successfully now and in the future. General Capabilities support and deepen student engagement with learning area content and are best developed within the context of learning areas.
Opportunities to develop General Capabilities in learning area content vary. The General Capabilities are identified in content descriptions when they are developed or applied through the Technologies content.
Go to General Capabilities for further information and to access the learning continuum for each general capability.
In Technologies, students develop critical and creative thinking as they imagine, generate, iterate and critically evaluate ideas. Students analyse problems, refine concepts and reflect on the decision-making process by engaging in systems, design and computational thinking.
Students think critically and creatively while considering how data, information, systems, materials, tools and equipment (past and present) impact on our lives, and how these elements might be better designed and managed. Experimenting, drawing, modelling, designing and working with equipment and software helps students to build their visual and spatial thinking and to create solutions, products, services and environments.
Technologies gives students the opportunity to become discerning users, productive creators, critical analysts and effective developers of digital solutions. Development of digital literacy allows students to operate and manage digital systems and practise digital safety and wellbeing while investigating, creating and communicating. As students develop digital literacy skills, they build their understanding of how to utilise digital tools when designing digital solutions. Students learn how to operate specific digital tools to help them realise their design ideas. This may occur when investigating needs or opportunities or researching and analysing information. It also occurs when students generate and communicate design ideas, processes and solutions, and when they develop plans, schedules and processes and collaborate online to create innovative and enterprising solutions.
Technologies develops students’ capacity to understand and apply ethical and socially responsible principles when managing projects and collaborating with others and creating, sharing and using technologies. Using an ethical lens, they investigate past, current and future local, national, regional and global technological priorities. Understanding the protection of data, intellectual property and individual privacy helps students to be respectful creators.
Students explore complex issues and consider possibilities and ethical implications. They learn about safe and ethical procedures, and consider the rights of others and their responsibilities in using sustainable practices. Students learn to appreciate and value the part they play in the social and natural systems they live in.
The Technologies curriculum provides students opportunities to consider how diverse communities select and apply technologies, including their impact and potential to transform people’s lives. It enables students to explore ways that people use technologies to interact with one another when cultures intersect. Students can investigate how cultures, identities and traditions influence the design of products, services and environments. They have opportunities to design solutions to challenges that may involve reflecting on cultural and linguistic diversity and navigating intercultural contexts.
In Technologies, students develop literacy by interpreting a wide range of practical texts including technical manuals and specifications. They evaluate content in diverse formats, analyse data and reports and navigate complex information. Students learn to use technical symbols, icons and terminology, adapting language for both general and specialised contexts. They produce purpose-driven texts such as annotated drawings, software guides and project plans tailored to specific needs and audiences.
In Technologies, students develop the capacity to interpret and use mathematical knowledge and skills in a range of real-life situations. They use numbers to calculate, measure and estimate; interpret and draw conclusions from statistics; measure and record throughout the process of generating and iterating ideas; develop, refine and test concepts; and cost and sequence when making products and managing projects. In using software, materials, tools and equipment, students work with the concepts of numbers, geometry, scale, proportion, measurement and volume. They use three-dimensional models, create accurate technical drawings, work with digital models and use computational thinking in decision-making processes when designing and creating best-fit solutions.
Students develop personal and social capabilities in Technologies through engaging in project management and design activities in a collaborative environment. They show initiative in their learning, apply design thinking skills and make informed decisions independently. Working in teams, they develop cooperation, leadership, conflict resolution and resource-sharing skills. Embracing innovation and risk fosters resilience as they navigate uncertainty.
Students also cultivate social responsibility by considering the impacts of decisions on people, communities and environments. They deepen empathy and respect by understanding diverse user needs and reflect on how digital tools and environments such as social media affect their wellbeing, applying appropriate strategies to both face-to-face and digital environments.