Learning progressions in psychology within the curricula policy documents

Psychology is an extremely popular senior school subject in Victoria.
More Victorian schools are offering psychology in the younger years
than ever before, usually within science curricula or as an optional
study, despite psychology not being explicitly mentioned in the VELS
(and AusVELS) curriculum. As students enter VCE Psychology in future
years, ‘where will the prior learning of psychology come from within
the new AusVELS curriculum policy document?’ While acknowledging that
a curriculum policy document is only a starting point and can never
capture the totality of a student’s experience, and that hypothetical
learning progressions must be grounded on research into student
learning, a central question asked here is ‘what does progression
towards a psychologically literate citizen look like within the
Victorian curricula policy documents’? This seemingly simple question
was in reality an incredibly complex and problematic one to answer. In
the end, a systems approach was taken, one that interweaves the
progression of psychological big ideas with the scientific practices,
to engage students towards a greater understanding of psychology as a
way of knowing, doing and thinking.