Very well put Chris;
...the current curriculum is not about IT per se, but more about use of applications.
...or in too many instances one could more accurately describe this as 'the misuse' of applications and the teaching of bad habits and extremely poor ICT working practices. At least that was my experience observing how ICT is taught in several secondary schools. Why is it that so many teachers of ICT seem to possess a rabied aversion to obtaining (let alone reading) any manuals, books on how to get the most out of software packages, FAQs, consumer or professional computer magazines, or even the built-in the help systems that come supplied as an integral part of all modern software? In both of the schools in which I did my teaching practice there wasn't a single copy of any 'MS Office' manual, nor or a book, nor any other publication relevant to these two schools' principal software applications suites that were used by every student in these establishments! A good name or description of this phenomenon might be... "What ever you do in schools, never under any circumstances 'RTFM'!" Maybe I was simply unlucky as to the two very different schools I got allocated to for my teaching practice. But somehow I doubt this ...especially given the dire quality of the leading ICT GNVQ on-line courseware that's now been purchased at considerable expense (costing several thousand pounds per-school per-year) by upwards of 3,000 secondary schools across the UK. Madness! David Bowles <TIC> Education-Support / TeacherLab