Comorbidity in the English Curriculum

Australian schools are coming out of shutdown, where for many weeks they have been sheltering from the COVID-19 pandemic. During this period the internet has proven of great value by allowing teachers to continue interacting with their students remotely, talking, listening and exchanging documents via computer.

One effect has been greater involvement by parents in their children’s education. With distance schooling, parents can discover what their children experience in the classroom. So it was, sitting beside my thirteen-year-old son, I watched his English teacher present parts of the New South Wales curriculum for that subject. My reaction is expressed in the following letter of April 30.

Dear [teacher],

This letter concerns the English curriculum for Class 8E.

I’ve been helping [my son] with his Year 8 English assignments and notice that Lesson 4 does not deal with the subject of English.

The first question [of that Lesson] might come from a course on identity politics. It…