Unrealistic Expectations: How New Curriculum Indicators Set Our Youngest Learners Up for Failure

Balancing Ambition with Reality: The Impact of Overwhelming Curriculum Demands on Early Learners and Educators

The release of the latest English and Maths curricula has sparked heated discussions among educators across Aotearoa. As schools grapple with the intricacies of these new guidelines, one glaring issue has emerged: the sheer volume of learning objectives and the unrealistic expectations placed on schools to ensure children meet or exceed curriculum outcomes for each year level.

A Shift in Curriculum Direction: From Refresh to Rigour

The new curriculum expectations reflect a significant shift from the draft refreshed curriculum proposed by the previous government. The earlier draft focused on creating a more flexible and holistic approach, valuing student agency and localised learning contexts. This approach, reflective of growing calls for international education reform, aimed to balance foundational skills with broader competencies, allowing teachers to adapt learning to the needs and cultural contexts of their students.

However, the current government has steered the curriculum back towards a more traditional, ‘knowledge-rich’ model, heavily influenced by structured literacy and numeracy approaches. The updated curriculum explicitly outlines what students are expected to understand, know, and do in each year of schooling, rather than across phased stages, placing a strong emphasis on sequential and linear knowledge building expectations.

While these changes were promoted as a way to raise standards and address perceived declines in student achievement, the reality for educators has been far more complex. The curriculum now includes a detailed list of indicators and learning outcomes that teachers must cover, leading to mounting pressure on schools to ensure students meet increasingly rigid benchmarks.

Too Many Indicators, Too Little Time

Both the English and Maths curricula have laid out a staggering number of indicators for Year 1 students—160 in English and up to 69 in Maths by the end of the first year. This means teachers are expected to cover approximately 229 objectives over a school year, averaging roughly two objectives per school day. However, this framework fails to acknowledge a critical detail: the first 6 months of schooling are within that same year.

The curriculum does not differentiate clearly between what is expected of students in their first 6 months at school and what is expected by the end of their first full year. Instead, it simply adds the 6-month indicators to the full-year expectations. This oversight forces educators to pile the first 6-months’ worth of learning on top of the expectations for the full year, effectively doubling the pressure on both teachers and students.

Unrealistic Timelines and Inflexible Expectations

The timelines set by the curriculum do not account for the varied starting points of students. Some children start school in March, April, or later, effectively reducing their time to achieve these indicators to just three terms or even less. Additionally, Ministry guidelines categorise children born in late July as Year 0, while those born a month earlier are expected to achieve the full set of Year 1 objectives within only six months. This creates an inequitable scenario where some students have significantly less time to reach the same outcomes, overwhelming both educators and students.

Concurrent Teaching: A Band-Aid Solution?

While it’s possible to cover some objectives concurrently, this is far from a universal fix. Teachers are left with the task of deciphering which indicators can be integrated and taught simultaneously, adding further complexity to an already heavy workload. This expectation places immense pressure on educators, who must balance the demands of the curriculum with the needs of their students, often without clear guidance on how to effectively manage this integration.

Contradictory Purpose Statements: A Disconnect Between Intent and Practice

The purpose statements within the updated curriculum emphasise connections to the wider world, big ideas, and the application of knowledge in creative ways. These statements suggest a vision of learning that is meaningful, integrated, and connected to real-world contexts. However, the curriculum’s overwhelming focus on rigid “teaching sequences” contradicts this vision. Instead of fostering connected learning, the prescriptive nature of these sequences often forces teaching into a compartmentalised, box-ticking exercise, undermining the opportunity for students to explore and apply their learning in authentic and engaging ways.

Failing Our Students by Setting Them Up to Fail

The structure of the new curriculum does not just set unrealistic expectations for teachers—it also sets our youngest learners up for failure. The foundational years of school should focus on exploration, confidence-building, and fostering a love of learning. However, the current approach risks labelling children as ‘not meeting standards’ before they have even had a chance to fully engage with school life.

Many young children need extended time to master basic early literacy skills, such as recognising key phonemes, before progressing to more complex tasks. The expectation that five-year-olds can meet such a vast array of indicators within a rigid timeframe fails to consider the diverse developmental stages of young learners. This relentless focus on meeting every indicator risks damaging children’s confidence and love of learning, pushing them into a continuous cycle of assessment and remediation.

What About the Other Curriculum Areas?

The English and Maths curricula alone set daunting expectations for teachers and students, but these are only two of the broader curriculum’s learning areas. With such a heavy focus on literacy and numeracy, where is the time to adequately cover other crucial areas like Science, Social Studies, The Arts, Technology, and Health and Physical Education? Each of these subjects also comes with its own set of learning outcomes and competencies that schools are expected to deliver.

This overcrowded curriculum leaves little room for a balanced education that nurtures creativity, curiosity, and holistic development. Teachers are already stretched thin, and the added weight of meeting the demands of all curriculum areas further risks turning classrooms into places of constant catch-up rather than spaces of rich, engaging learning experiences.

Rethinking Our Approach to Curriculum Expectations

The solution is not simply to speed through content or increase the frequency of assessments, but to reconsider how learning expectations are set and measured. A more flexible approach to the curriculum is needed—one that recognises and respects the varied paces at which children learn, especially in their early years. Instead of rigid year-level outcomes, a framework that prioritises depth over breadth would allow educators to focus on ensuring that students truly understand and enjoy what they are learning.

Teachers need support in balancing these curriculum demands with the realities of classroom life. Professional development that helps teachers prioritise and integrate learning objectives is crucial, along with time and resources that allow for meaningful engagement with students.

A Call for Realistic Expectations

The new English and Maths curricula, while designed with the intent of raising standards, risk overwhelming our youngest learners with unattainable targets. It is imperative that we advocate for curriculum indicators that are both ambitious and achievable, ensuring they align with the developmental needs of our students. Educators need the flexibility to focus on quality learning experiences rather than merely meeting an exhaustive list of objectives.

To achieve this, policymakers must engage closely with educators to refine these indicators, ensuring they are realistic, balanced, and reflective of the complex realities within our classrooms. By working collaboratively with the education sector, the government can create a curriculum that supports both teaching and academic excellence and the holistic development of our students, without compromising their wellbeing or love of learning.