Updated: Mar 2000 | Outcomes Focus

Why Focus on Outcomes?

Outcomes-focused Education

	What Does it Mean?
	Transition from Content to Outcomes
	Getting Started
	Understanding the Outcomes
	Deciding What Needs to Change
	Planning with an Outcomes Focus

What Does it Mean?

At the most fundamental level, establishing an outcomes approach means identifying where each student is at with respect to the outcomes, then planning learning experiences for the student or group of students to develop particular outcomes.

Learning achievements are monitored during the learning experiences. Subsequent learning activities and strategies are planned to enable each student to progress further.

At the more general level, an outcomes focus allows a teacher, individually or within collaborative groups, the autonomy and flexibility to devise plans that meet the differing needs of students in a range of educational settings. Figure 1 emphasises the focus on outcomes in curriculum provision, assessment and reporting.

Fig. 1: Focusing on Outcomes

The adoption of an outcomes-focused approach requires reflection and review of classroom practices and school operations. Teachers have to consider the implications of the change for their practice and their students.

School leaders have to think about the change process required in their schools and how to lead and manage that process to give it the best prospect of success. This may include determining:

	What professional development is critical to successfully progress an outcomes-focused approach.
	What resources are needed to support any change to curriculum provision, assessment and reporting.

Getting Started

The following questions, which are clustered according to the Curriculum Council's Getting Started model headings, may help in determining significant considerations in an outcomes-focused approach.

	Do you understand each of the policy points from the Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting: Policy and Guidelines?
	What is the relationship between the Curriculum Framework and the Student Outcome Statements?
	What relationship does the Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting: Policy and Guidelines have to the Students At Educational Risk policy and guidelines?
	How does the expectation for schools to improve learning, teaching and management through technology fit with implementing the Curriculum Framework?
	What is the relationship between implementing the Curriculum Framework and the Education Department priority to promote, maintain and support the teaching of Aboriginal studies, culture and languages?

Understanding the Outcomes

The following questions, which are clustered according to the Curriculum Council's Getting Started model headings, may help in determining significant considerations in an outcomes-focused approach.

	Are the outcomes for student learning understood and reflected in the school plan?
	Do you understand the Core Shared Values of the Curriculum Framework?
	Is the curriculum student-focused and led by an understanding of what the students have achieved in relation to the outcomes?
	Do students share in the setting of goals for their learning?
	Does assessment reflect the outcomes that students have attained?
	Do you need to know more about outcomes-focused education, the Curriculum Framework and the Outcomes and Standards Framework?
	What do you know about the developmental nature of different students' learning?
	Does each student get enough time and support to accomplish quality outcomes through individual and group programs?
	What opportunities are provided to promote students' ability to see the various forms of knowledge as being related and forming part of a larger whole?
	How do you share your expectations with students?

Deciding What Needs to Change

The following questions, which are clustered according to the Curriculum Council's Getting Started model headings, may help in determining significant considerations in an outcomes-focused approach.

	Do instructional practices allow students to learn in different ways, at different times and at different rates?
	In what ways are students allowed to demonstrate what they have learned?
	Does your teaching encourage students to be responsible for their own learning?
	Do assessment practices acknowledge and match the various learning styles of students?
	Do you enhance learning opportunities by allowing students to integrate the Core Shared Values?
	Do your teaching and assessment practices cater for students at educational risk?
	Do you understand and accept your role as a facilitator of learning?
	What messages are you conveying by the methods of reporting you select?
	Are classroom conditions set up to allow all students to be successful in their learning?
	Do assessment methods focus on criterion-referenced approaches?
	How are students encouraged to focus on reaching their potential?
	Do you support a collaborative approach to planning and a collective responsibility for students' achievement of outcomes?
	Do you need to review assessment and reporting policies and practices in your school?

Planning with an Outcomes Focus

The following questions, which are clustered according to the Curriculum Council's Getting Started model headings, may help in determining significant considerations in an outcomes-focused approach.

	Do assessments and reports focus on progress students have made in relation to outcomes?
	How does the planning and designing of programs in the classroom begin with the levels of student achievement in relation to the outcomes?
	What kinds of student learning skills and competencies are needed in an outcomes-focused approach?
	What authentic tasks do students have to perform to demonstrate the outcomes they have achieved?
	Is it important to review the content and structure of curriculum in your classrooms?
	What processes do you have to review your classroom practices and instructional patterns in some or all of the eight learning areas?
	How do the Core Shared Values shape the curriculum offered to students?