Year 5 resources aligned with
the Australian Curriculum
The Australian Curriculum (2016) has devised the Technology curriculum in two strands; Design and Technologies and Digital Technologies.
The Australian Curriculum website defines the two subjects as the following;
'Design and Technologies in which students use design thinking and technologies to generate and produce solutions for authentic needs and opportunities' and
'Digital Technologies, in which students use computational thinking and informations systems to define, design and implement digital solutions'.
The first resource is constructed upon the Design and Technologies Knowledge and Understanding descriptor ACTDEK023: Investigate characteristics and properties of a range of materials, systems, components, tools and equipment and evaluate the impact of their use in which the students examining the materials and systems used in a public use system that affect the way people live.
The supporting Processes and Production Skill that has been selected to complement this is ACTDEP025: Generate, develop and communicate design ideas and processes for audiences using appropriate technical terms and graphical representation techniques. This will call upon students to generating a range of design ideas for products, services or environments using prior knowledge, skills and research or analysing and modifying design ideas to enhance and improve the sustainability of the product, service, environment or system, (ACARA, 2016).
The second resource is structured using the allocated Digital Technologies Knowledge and Understanding descriptor ACTDIK015: Examine how whole numbers are used to represent all data in digital systems.
The complementing Process and Production Skill is ACTDIP016: Acquire, store and validate different types of data, and use a range of software to interpret and visualise data to create information. Using the resources, the students will explore the use of digital systems including how, where and why they are used. Once they have a solid understanding, students will be required to interpret data displays to build solutions to problems.
Technology Curriculum
Australian Curriculum
Design and Technologies
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Digital Technologies
Key Curriculum Idea
One of the Key Curriculum Idea of technology that this resource is built on is creating a preferred future (ACARA, 2016). The students are involved in an investigation and evaluation of a current environmentally sustainable system of recycling and garbage destruction. With this system assessment, they will then develop solutions to improve long term effects in their direct school environment.
Key Curriculum Idea
Key ideas from the curriculum which have been incorporated into this resource is Thinking in Technologies. The students will be engaged in Computational thinking requiring them to problem solve, deciphering patterns and inputting data logically. It also supports the implementation of Information and Communication technology in the Australian Curriculum, as students become users of digital technology managing and operating Scratch software, (ACARA, 2106).
General capabilities and Cross-curriculum priorities
General capabilities and Cross-curriculum priorities
Both chosen content descriptors Knowledge and Understanding ECTDEK021 and Processes and Production Skill ECTDEP025 incorporates general capabilities of literacy, numeracy and critical and creative thinking. These are integrated through the spatial reasoning when the students interpret diagrams and visualising 2D shapes and 3D objects when designing their presentation, inquiring and analysing information of the environmental sites and generating ideas and composing texts when writing their presentation, (ACARA, 2016).
The resource incorporates the general capabilities of numeracy, literacy, ICT and critical and creative thinking. These are assimilated through the comprehension of digital systems as the students will recognise, use patterns and relationships and interpret data displays. The ability to interpret and visualise data calls upon students to make sense of texts, understand digital systems vocabulary and compose texts, (ACARA, 2016). Another key general capability addressed is Managing and operating ICT as students will need to use software such as Scratch to input their data.