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conclusion
Curriculum for Excellence is the most ambitious reform of Scottish education for many years. It offers the opportunity to provide a fresh approach to enable our young people to become responsible citizens, confident individuals, effective contributors and successful learners. For the first time there is a clear focus on a coherent curriculum for all children and young people from 3 to 18.
This curriculum is more than curriculum areas and subjects: it is the totality of experiences which are planned for children and young people through their education. Curriculum planners at all levels will need to ensure that they view the curriculum in this wider sense and that the curriculum works to deliver the values, purposes and principles of Curriculum for Excellence.
The OECD report Quality and Equity of Schooling in Scotland raises challenges for Scottish education - the need to address underachievement and to provide more choices and more chances for all our children and young people, particularly those from disadvantaged socio-economic backgrounds. This framework challenges all those involved in planning the curriculum to work as partners to provide more opportunities for vocational education and the need to promote greater flexibility and creativity. In addition there is a continuing need to 'raise the bar' to ensure that young people are challenged to achieve to their maximum potential.
These are the challenges and opportunities that those planning the curriculum will have to meet. This document provides a framework for this - a definition and purpose for the curriculum, principles for curriculum design, the central place of the experiences and outcomes and a range of entitlements for all children and young people. It does not provide a set of templates which can be applied across the system - there will be the need for models to be developed at local level to address local needs and circumstances. There will be implications for leadership at all levels and for continuing professional development.
It is now for establishments and partners at all levels in the system to consider and reflect on the framework set out here and to consider how, individually and in partnership, they can begin to adopt more fully the values, purposes and principles of Curriculum for Excellence.
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