THE Abbott government is set to scrap a politically correct curriculum that forces maths students to study Aboriginal culture and lets kids give "reasonable'' rather than accurate answers.
Conservative education critic Kevin Donnelly is a frontrunner to lead the government's review of the national curriculum next month.
Dr Donnelly - who is director of the Education Standards Institute and a former chief-of-staff to Social Services Minister Kevin Andrews - said the existing curriculum was "a mile wide and an inch deep'' and demanded more "academic rigour''.
"Teachers are trying to cover too much ground, especially in primary school,'' he told News Corp Australia.
"Students are really not focusing on anything in real depth and get a superficial knowledge and understanding.
"The curriculum should be cut back and teachers ought to be focusing on the essentials.''
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In every subject - from science to physical education - children must study Aboriginal culture, environmental sustainability and Australia's engagement with Asia, under the national curriculum forged by the former Labor government.
Kindergarten kids learning to count to 20 should also "read stories from other cultures featuring counting in sequence to assist students to recognise ways of counting in local languages and across cultures'', the maths curriculum states.
Year 6 kids studying geometry can "investigate the use of rotation and symmetry in the diagrammatic representations of kinship relationships of Central and Western Desert people."
And Year 4 kids learning about fractions will "investigate the use of fractions and sharing as a way of managing Country: for example taking no more than half the eggs from a nest to protect future bird populations.''
Year 10 statistics involves "investigating biodiversity changes in Australia since European occupation."
And in year 5 algebra, kids "use calculators to check the reasonableness of answers'' - rather than checking if an answer is right or wrong.
Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne said there was a "question mark'' over the need to retain the themes in the curriculum.
And he said there were "certainly issues'' with the way maths was being taught.
"I expect the review to make recommendations on the suitability of marking a student's mathematics homework as 'reasonable','' he said.
"A rigorous science and maths curriculum is needed to lift student outcomes across Australia, to ensure we remain economically competitive with the rest of the world in years to come.''
The latest global report card on 15-year-olds' academic performance has exposed the dumbing down of a generation of Australian teenagers.
The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) report, released this month, showed that Australia's maths performance in Year 10 fell by the equivalent of half a year of schooling between 2003 and 2012.
Australian Association of Mathematics Teachers chief executive Will Morony said the PISA results "certainly need attention''.
But he said it was important to give students "real world examples'' of how maths is relevant.
He said using examples of Aboriginal culture to teach maths concepts could be "killing two birds with one stone''.
But Dr Donnelly yesterday insisted the curriculum was too "politically correct'' and should focus on basic academic skills.
"Performance has dropped and standards are falling, and something urgently needs to be done to review the curriculum, review teacher training and review what happens in the classroom,'' he said.
"It's not about money or extra resources.''
Dr Donnelly, a frontrunner to lead the government's review, refused to say yesterday if he had been offered the job. He referred the question to Mr Pyne's office, which said the review team would be announced next month.
An analysis of the curriculum shows that in science, Year 2 students learn how Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people use science to find food.
Year 4 students are "considering how scientific practices such as sorting, classification and estimation are used by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in everyday life."
In history, Year 9 students "explore the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples'' during World War 1.
Victoria has already modified parts of the maths and science curriculum to protect what it regards as the state's higher standards.
In Queensland, where schools have adopted the curriculum for maths, English, science and history, acting Education Minister Ian Walker said the curriculum should be adapted to each school's needs.
"We also need to look at the quality of the teacher in the classroom and the ability of the school to adapt the curriculum to their specific needs in order to see a real improvement in student outcomes," he said.
NSW will introduce the national English curriculum for primary schools next year, when it will also give schools the option to use the national curriculum for maths and science.
South Australia is already using the national curriculum in maths, science and history, and will introduce geography from 2015.