ABSTRACT
This chapter suggests that more must be done to ensure that English is framed more adequately and appropriately within the Australian Curriculum, and more generally, in the field and the profession but also in curriculum theory. It focuses on what is perhaps the most significant and certainly most contentious aspect of English in the Australian Curriculum: its tripartite representation of the field, namely, language, literacy and literature. The Australian Curriculum is designed to ensure that students develop the knowledge and understanding on which the major disciplines are based. English teaching in a framework is concerned specifically with language and is to be understood therefore as language education, broadly conceived. In the case of the national curriculum for English in Australia, the focus is on "learning about English language, literacy and literature". In terms of curriculum design and development, the process is marked by "four interrelated phases: curriculum shaping, curriculum writing, implementation, and curriculum evaluation and review".
