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Education is a global human right and must be available and accessible to everyone. To
successfully push this accessibility to all persons, learning curriculum’s must effectively
communicate a clear understanding of the different types of learner and how to target
them and adapt a lesson for them. The position of this paper concerns the lack of
adaptability and guidance within curricula when catering to a classroom of learners
with disabilities. Since learning is for all, curriculum designers should consider all types
of learners and provide educators with the appropriate resources to effectively adapt
established curricula to learners with disabilities in order to be holistically inclusive.
The claims and recommendations within this paper derive from a variety of scholarly
sources and the Australian Government’s National Standards for Disability Services
(2013).

Within the Australian Government’s National Standards for Disability Services (2013),
the document states that Australia will abide by the United Nations Convention on the
Rights of Persons with Disabilities. In addition to the agreement of advocation toward
the UN document, the Australian Government has opted to uphold their own
supplementary principles that include the following quote, “full and effective
participation and inclusion in society” (Department of Social Services, 2013, pg. 9). The
position exercised by this paper holds this quoted principle under close scrutiny when
analysing the extent of its practice within the curricula of secondary education. Upon
examination of the NSW curriculum syllabus for English, the syllabus provided no
mention of techniques or methods of changing or adapting the syllabus to be all-
inclusive (NSW Department of Education, 2012). The syllabus only makes mention and
acknowledges the notion that teachers should be wary of learners with disabilities
within their class and make the reasonable adjustments (NSW Department of
Education, 2012). Hence, educators are left without any support mechanisms or direct
guidance on how to adapt established curricula to fit learners with disabilities.
Unfortunately, teachers are forced to rely on other teachers who have experience in
adapting curricula to guide them, as their only option (Kuhl et al., 2015). However, this
is a significant problem within schools that do not have access to specific resources or
teachers, instead educators are left feeling exhausted with much more planning and
marking as teachers endeavour to adapt entire curricula to be inclusive, on their own
(Kuhl et al., 2015).

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Additionally, this task is even more exhausting when considering what the literature
states about inclusive curricula. Bunbury (2018) affirms that “to ensure participation
and address the diverse needs of students across the curriculum, quality processes
should be embedded in curriculum design” (pg. 968). Educators, thus, must adapt a non-
inclusive curriculum from the ground up in order to cater to students with learning
disabilities, alone. As mentioned before, they can be expected to do this with “limited
resources available in seeking to meet the demands of an inclusive curriculum and
pedagogy.” (Kuhl et al., 2015, pg. 703).

The matter at hand becomes exemplified when compared to the inclusive standard held
under scrutiny. The Australian Government’s National Standards for Disability Services
(2013), lay an impressively stated and highly inclusive set of information that
effectively embodies what the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities,
set out to accomplish. The issue, thus, therein lies not with the Australian Government’s
understanding of the need for inclusive education for learners with disabilities, but the
failure to mirror these statements within education curricular. The recent literature has
shown that research conducted upon the education standards and curricula found that
“Australia is failing to fulfil even its own ideals of education as a ‘right for all’”(Teather &
Hillman, 2017). The understanding that curricula must be adapted is commonplace
throughout education syllabi. However, it is the notion that the Government is placing
the entirety of a child with a disability’s education on the skill of the educator to adapt
curriculum is unacceptable. This position does not imply that there is a lack of skill or
capabilities from Australian educators, but that the enormous pressure put onto
teachers is not befitting of an issue as vital as childhood education. The Government
cannot guarantee that the teacher is adapting curricula to the standards set out by the
National Standards for Disability Services, especially when the teacher is not given the
adequate resources and avenues to seek guidance.

Moreover, the issue is further accentuated by sections of the curricula that are outright
unadaptable to suit the needs of learners with disabilities. This issue of adaptability
concerns outcomes that involve standardised testing or assessment such as the
NAPLAN tests which perpetuate the segregation of learners with disabilities as a direct
result of their exclusive structure. Matz (2019) affirms this notion by explaining that
“when teachers know that their students will be tested on a very narrow range of

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materials, they are often explicitly discouraged from broadening curricular

possibilities.” (pg. 20). Matz (2019) continues to express her difficulties as a first-year
teacher attempting to teach a classroom that included 12 students with disabilities,
using a curriculum that judged them based on standardised test results. Hence, it is
abundantly clear that Australia’s National Standards for Disability Services are not
being upheld in practice as a result of unconsidered and unadaptable curricula.

The Australian education curricula would, thus, benefit from a variety of change and
reforms. The recommendation involves two significant solutions. The first is the
removal of standardised testing and marking. This removal is pivotal in guaranteeing an
all-inclusive curriculum that allows students with disabilities to flourish within a
classroom among their peers and not segregated by standardised data. Instead,
standardised testing and NAPLAN can be replaced by multi-modal assessments that
prioritise how students learn and allow for student-centred assessment. Swancutt et al.
(2019) suggest a solution to standardised testing or traditional numerical methods of
assessment, through compiling a student profile that reveals the accomplishments and
achievements of students in addressing the relevant curriculum outcomes without
having to subject students to standardised testing and numerical results. This method
can be useful in replacing standardising testing within curricula, as it addresses the
need for students to fulfil outcomes by providing evidence of their learning and abilities
through the compilation of student achievement. This idea, paired with a multi-modal
and creative form of assessments, could see a more inclusive style of assessment within
education curricula that accommodates for learners with disabilities without impeding
upon students without any disabilities.

The second significant solution is the addition of a national approach to modifying

curricula to better fit students with disabilities. Understandably, the entire recomposing
of already established curricula to wholly accommodate learners with disabilities is
unrealistic. Hence, educators can be aided in their endeavours of adapting pre-existing
curricula through the providing of a national approach that guides them through their
adaptation process. This national approach can be Government-mandated and, thus,
guaranteeing that educator adaptation of curricula abides by the standards put in place
by the Australian Government. Additionally, the document can be compiled by
experienced educators who have spent lifetimes adapting rigid syllabi to better fit

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students with disabilities. Using English to provide a more profound example, Apitz et
al. (2016) suggest that when faced with a curriculum that pushes specific prescribed
texts, educators can make the texts more inclusive by rewriting them as adapted texts
tailored to the classroom needs. Of course, this involves an abundance of extra work for
the educator that can become extremely daunting. Instead, a national approach to
modifying curricula can provide English teachers with a document that has adapted
texts ready to use for teachers. These texts can be compiled from the previous work of
teachers and then approved by a national education authority. The document can also
provide educators with pedagogical recommendations for the multiple types of
disabilities present in Australian classrooms, and how the educator can go about
catering curricula to an inclusive classroom. The compilation of this national approach
is in no way difficult as the contents of the documents it would entail, abound
throughout the multiple experienced educators across the nation who have worked
hard to establish inclusive classrooms for all learners.

In conclusion, although the Australian Government shows valiant inclusion of learners

with disabilities through the National Standards for Disability Services (2013), in
practice the education system is still failing learners with disabilities as a direct result of
inflexible curricula and a lack of educator resources when attempting to adapt said
curricula. It is imperative that Australia rises up and solves these education issues if as a
nation it expects to fulfil its own standard of emphasising “full and effective
participation and inclusion in society” of people with disabilities (Department of Social
Services, 2013, pg. 9). The recommendations provided will be an effective step in
achieving this standard, as their implementation can allow for curricula to be more
inclusive while also providing teachers with the resources necessary to adapt pre-
existing curricula.

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References

Apitz, M., Ruppar, A., Roessler, K., & Pickett, K. (2017). Planning Lessons for Students
With Significant Disabilities in High School English Classes. TEACHING
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(1st ed.). Retrieved from
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Board of Studies, Teaching and Educational Standards NSW. (2012). Australian

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