ACARA: How Creative Kids Lesson Plans meet the Australian Curriculum

What is ACARA?

The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) provides the framework for teaching within the Australian school context. ACARA outlines the band descriptions, content descriptions and achievement standards for subjects within this context. These resources can be accessed via the ACARA website along with work samples for grading purposes. 

Art in the Australian curriculum

Within the Arts learning area, there is a range of sub-categories including Dance, Drama, Media Arts, Music and Visual Arts. In the Visual Arts, there are two broad categories of focus – Making and Responding – and these categories cover a broad variety of skills and knowledge within the Visual Arts sphere.  Learning in the Visual Arts teaches a broad range of applicable skills from communication, critical reasoning and practical skills to help students understand their role as global citizens. 

ACARA and the WA curriculum

Each state within Australia interprets the national Australian Curriculum, creating its own specific curriculum to suit its context and providing more specific teaching points and resources. Each state uses the ACARA curriculum as the basis for its curriculum. Teachers can access the specific band and content descriptions outlined by ACARA or their individual state curriculum authority to inform their teaching practice to ensure they are covering the full range of outcomes and capabilities within the subject area. 

How our art lesson plans meet the curriculum 

Creative Kids Art Lessons cover the outcomes provided in the Visual Arts learning area within the Australian Curriculum, focusing on the primary years of schooling from Foundation to Year 6. We offer a range of projects that cover the full range of Visual Arts outcomes set out by ACARA from Foundation to Year 6. Our lesson plans provide specific activities that cover the content descriptors set out in the ACARA standards and include clear rubrics, which provide teachers with a structure and specific points against which to assess students. The lesson plans and assessment rubrics can be adapted by teachers to use in the classroom within a more specific curriculum or context. 

The lesson plans are structured to meet the learning outcomes of each specific age range, including Foundation to Year 2, Years 3 and 4 and Years 5 and 6 respectively. The lessons develop students’ skills within the Visual Arts, covering key areas, such as Visual Conventions, Materials and Technologies, Skills and Processes, Styles and Viewpoints. Creative Kids lesson plans cover a variety of topics, concepts, skills, techniques, styles and contexts, providing a broad selection of activities to enhance students’ skills, understandings and confidence with the Visual Arts as both as artists and as audiences of the Visual Arts. 

Who ACARA standards apply to

In Australia, students begin compulsory schooling from the age of 5 or 6. Students can also complete a non-compulsory year of schooling prior to this. The compulsory year of schooling and optional prior year are known under different terms within the various Australian states and territories, including Prep, Kindergarten, Pre-primary, Reception and Transition. Students complete approximately 7 or 8 years of compulsory primary schooling, finishing their final year in year 6. In the Visual Arts, the first years of schooling are covered by the ACARA standards under the Foundation to Year 2 band. Within this curriculum, these primary schooling years are broken into the following bands: Foundation to Year 2, Years 3 and 4, and Years 5 and 6.