Abstract:
The incorporation of local history into school curriculum is an example of place-based education. Place-based education fosters students’ connection to place and encourages greater mutual engagement between students, schools and their local communities. It helps students to engage with the world by understanding the uniquely local historical narratives of their own place, and how these articulate to national and global narratives. While a focus on place and the local is not a panacea (McInerney, Smyth & Down, 2011) for meaningfully engaging students with history in the classroom, the assertion that the discipline of history “has become placeless” (Harrison, 2013, p. 218) problematises the significance of place in current history curriculum developments. This assertion prompts a closer exploration of what happens when history curriculum is standardised at a national level. Are local history narratives and their significance to national and global narratives at risk of being overshadowed or even lost in the Australian Curriculum? What impact could this standardised curriculum have on teachers’ professional agency, and student agency to know and become part of local history? Will the review of the Australian Curriculum increase these risks? This paper presents a critical analysis of the Australian Curriculum History curriculum and available Australian Curriculum review data to explore these questions.