3. Teaching time allocated
The third element in determining the extent of overcrowding is the amount of teaching time
allocated to each content description in each subject or learning area, using ACARA’s
notional time allocations for writers (ACARA 2013: 9) as the measure of the amount of
teaching time required for the curriculum in each area. APPA has compared these time
allocations during the primary years with the number of content descriptions in each learning
area and subject to determine how much time is available in ensuring that all children come
to understand each content description.
It might be expected that, while individual content descriptions will inevitably cover varying
amounts of content requiring different teaching and learning time for students, overall the
content descriptions in different subjects or learning areas would, on average, take a similar
amount of learning time. In other words, content descriptions in each learning area at each
year level or phase are about as easy or hard for students as those in other learning areas at
that stage of schooling.
The most striking pattern in the table below is that the more time available to the learning
area in the primary years, the more time is allocated to each content description and,
conversely, the less time allocated to the area, the less time allocated to each content
description. So those areas that are allocated less time do not deal with this by reducing the
number of content descriptions; rather it is dealt with by reducing the amount of time teachers
have to teach each content description.