On the new Music 1 syllabus
Brad Fuller, Tom Fienberg and I wrote this initial analysis of the new NSW Music 1 syllabus when it was released just before the Christmas break. It was published on the blog of the Australian Assocation for Research in Education, EduMatters. As teachers return to thinking about school, teaching, and all those things, I thought this was the right time to republish it.
https://humberstone.org/2026/01/27/on-the-new-music-1-syllabus/
My “Musical Cryptography” unit of work, updated to meet new NSW Music 7-10 syllabus (2024 for 2026 onwards)
ASME NSW are running a professional learning day tomorrow on our various new syllabi, and I realised that I haven't shared one of the units of work that I updated for the 7-10 syllabus (Stage 4) last year - so that's what this is. If you've followed my teaching and composition/production for long enough, you'll know that I'm very interested in musical cryptography - hiding messages in music through codes written in pitches, rhythms, perhaps even a waveform itself!
In defence of Explicit Teaching and Critical Thinking
The last few days, I've re-posted a couple of articles I played a minor role in authoring for the Australian Association for Research in Education. These focus on AERO (the Australian Education Research Organisation), the way they push out "evidence" for teachers to follow in Australian education (and the fact that is contested), the lack of independence or peer-review in that process, and a bit of history behind the idea of "Evidence-Based Practice" in education, its roots in medicine, and the fact that despite what you might believe from the popular media, that it has been a contested field in academia since day 1.
https://humberstone.org/2025/07/24/in-defence-of-explicit-teaching-and-critical-thinking/
Evidence is important, but what is the problem?
A re-post of the second article we wrote for the AARE blog recently. This one a bit of a history lesson to get the current debate in perspective! By Brad Fuller, James Humberstone and Rachael Dwyer Following on from our previous piece, we explore the necessity for genuine evidence-based education practice to guide teachers’ work. What is evidence-based practice in education, really?
https://humberstone.org/2025/07/23/evidence-is-important-but-what-is-the-problem/
AERO says educators can trust its evidence. Can they really?
This article is re-published from the AARE blog. I'll be re-posting the second part tomorrow, and a follow-up post soon. By Rachael Dwyer, Brad Fuller and James Humberstone. Big credit to Rachael and Brad who did most of the work on this! The first in a two-part series on AERO and evidence. Tomorrow: Evidence is important, but what is the problem?
https://humberstone.org/2025/07/22/aero-says-educators-can-trust-its-evidence-can-they-really/
