The key learning area movement : A force for pedagogical change or a facade for continued conservatism?

Throughout the early 1990s the formal curriculum across all Australian States and Territories was re-organised to accommodate a Key Learning Area (KLA) focus.  The KLA approach to schooling marked a departure from an historical reliance on individualised school subjects as the organisers of <i>disciplinary</i> knowledge.  Indeed a KLA structure has the potential to promote interdisciplinary teaching and learning, a focus on the skills, values, attitudes and <i>knowledge</i> students are to learn and to break away from the sometimes divisive subject subcultures that permiate schools.  In short the potential for a KLA 'movement' of positive benefit to teaching and learning exists.<br /><br />Over the last decade however, the impact of the 'KLA movement' on teacher practice has become more apparent.  Far from being a force for pedagogical change, some KLAs are merely re-badged versions of traditionalist conceptions of school subject and knowledge.  This paper draws on data from a study of New South Wales (NSW) history and Human Society and Its Environment (HSIE) teachers and provides an evidenced argument about the use and misuse of Key Learning Areas.