Teachers should establish if students have developed robust level five understandings and are ready to begin working towards level six achievement objectives for the nature of technology and plan learning experiences to progress these as guided by the level six Indicators below.

Characteristics of Technology

Characteristics of Technological Outcomes

Achievement Objective

Students will:

• Understand the interdisciplinary nature of technology and the implications of this for maximising possibilities through collaborative practice.

Achievement Objective

Students will:

• Understand that some technological outcomes can be perceived as both product and system. Understand how these outcomes impact on other outcomes and practices and on people's views of themselves and possible futures.

Teacher Guidance

To support students to develop understanding of characteristics of technology at level 6, teachers could:

• support students to analyse a range of examples of technological development and explain how different disciplines have impacted on the nature of the technological practice undertaken and how this in turn has influenced understandings of the contributing disciplines. Examples should include those from the students own work and others' technological practice and allow students to gain insight into the interdisciplinary nature of technological practice
• support students to explore examples of where collaborative work between technologists and/or other people has led to new possibilities for technological practice and/or outcome design. Examples should include those from the students own work and others' technological practice and allow students to gain insight into the way idea generation and exploration can be enhanced through collaboration
• support students to understand that interdisciplinary collaboration provides exciting opportunities to 'work at the boundaries' of established fields and appreciate that this may lead to situations where no codified technological knowledge exists to guide practice, tensions between people may arise, and a greater number of unknown consequences may result
• provide students with opportunities to discuss how the interdisciplinary nature of technology and the need for collaboration can influence how technology is understood and accepted by different groups in both positive and negative ways.

Teacher Guidance

To support students to develop understanding of characteristics of technological outcomes at level 6, teachers could:

• support students to discuss particular technological outcomes as a product and a system and support them to understand that the categorization of product or system is not an inherent property of the outcome, but rather how it is perceived by people in order to describe, and/or analyse it;
• guide students to explore examples of socio-technological environments to explain how technological outcomes (products and systems) and non-technological entities and systems (people, natural environments, political systems etc.) interact together . Examples should be drawn from past, present and possible future socio-technological environments. Socio-technological environments include such things as communication networks, hospitals, transport systems, waste disposal, recreational parks, factories, power plant etc.
• support students to understand that interactions in socio-technological environments are complex and result in dynamic relationships between technological outcomes, entities and systems. Guide students to explore the influences and impact of these relationships on the way technological outcomes are developed and manufactured.

Indicators

Students can:

• explain how different disciplines have impacted on technological practice
• explain why collaboration is important in technological developments that involve interdisciplinary work
• explain how interdisciplinary collaboration in technology can enhance and/or inhibit technological development and implementation
• describe examples of interdisciplinary collaboration in technology that has influenced, or could influence public understanding and acceptance of technology.

Indicators

Students can:

• explain why some technological outcomes can be described as both a product and a system;
• describe socio-technological environments and the relationships of technological outcomes involved;
• discuss the interactions between technological outcomes, people, and social and physical environments within particular socio-technological environments;
• explain why understanding socio-technological environments allow technological outcomes to be better understood.