New Zealand is a small country, but we punch above our weight when it comes to digital technology. Robotics, artificial intelligence and advances in connectivity are revolutionising our businesses, industry and community. With a number of innovative local businesses like Rocket Lab, who are launching rockets into outer space, New Zealand has the opportunity to be a world leader in digital technologies. We need to make sure our school curriculum is world leading too.

Our national economy needs workers with specific technological skills to enable innovation and support the digital infrastructure that strengthens New Zealand’s potential for economic growth. The ICT industry is currently facing significant challenges recruiting suitable workers. We therefore need to increase the number of students leaving school with these valuable digital specialist skills. Even future workers outside of the industry will need knowledge of digital technologies to participate in an increasingly digital world. All our students need to understand digital technologies to succeed in the 21st century. 

As Minister of Education in 2017, I realised our curriculum needed to change to reflect that the world was changing too. I presented a new digital technologies curriculum designed to build the digital skills and fluency of young people in New Zealand. The curriculum, which will be fully implemented by the beginning of next year, teaches children how to both use and create digital technology. Shortly after I announced the new curriculum, The Economist Intelligence Unit's Worldwide Educating for the Future Index ranked New Zealand the best country in the world at preparing students for the future.

Digital technology education will start with five year olds who will learn how to break tasks down into step-by-step instructions, test those instructions, and correct them. This will lay the foundation for creating the algorithms that computer programs are based on. By twelve, students will be writing programs using basic, visual programming languages, and will understand how computers store information. Older students will learn how to use programming languages that real software engineers use, like JavaScript.

Throughout the curriculum development process, I was mindful of legitimate concerns about the amount of time students spend on devices. It is crucial that moderate, purposeful screen time is combined with other learning, including outdoor activities and physical education. The new curriculum is about teaching the computational thinking behind how digital technologies work, the skills to design and build digital systems, and how to use that knowledge to design solutions to real world problems. In many cases, this will not even require a device. 

Digital technologies will be integrated with other learning areas in the curriculum, so students will learn about programming in the context of mathematics, science or art. This is not just about adding another area to the curriculum, but instead, working to introduce an emphasis on digital technologies into the broader context of the curriculum. Students will be taught to critique past, existing and possible future technologies, while considering their environmental, social and cultural impact. For example, learners will consider the impacts of products they design on people. The curriculum is future-proofed and able to be adapted to cover technology that doesn’t even exist yet.

A new curriculum is only effective if we have high-quality teachers who are equipped to deliver it. That’s why we invested over $40 million to support the uptake of the new digital technologies curriculum. A range of supports were made available to help teachers and school leaders be ready to teach this new content. Prior to the curriculum announcement, the Government had already made substantial investments to support digital devices in schools, such as ultra-fast broadband to 97 per cent of schools, in order to provide the digital infrastructure required. Schools are now in the final stages of upskilling their teachers and developing a digital technologies programme. Digital technologies are revolutionising our society and economy, and they will continue to do so for many years to come. From next year, New Zealand students will be taught a curriculum that prepares them to participate, create and thrive in this rapidly changing digital world.