NZC – Technology Phases 1–4 (Years 0–10)

Tukuna a whakaaro auaha kia rere kia whakaumutia ai te ao. Through creativity and innovation, we intervene to transform the world.

Purpose Statement

The Technology learning area equips students with the knowledge and practices to thrive as users and creators in a rapidly evolving technological world. Students are taught to understand how products, systems, and processes are developed, adapted, and refined to solve problems. 

Through the study of Technology, students learn how technologies work, how they have changed over time, and how they can support innovative, sustainable, and inclusive futures. Through regular participation in making technology outcomes, students become skilled in the use of tools and equipment and in the selection of materials and ingredients. 

The Technology learning area provides students with opportunities to think critically, work creatively, and build confidence through hands-on making. They learn to test ideas, improve designs, and understand how their choices affect people, communities, and the environment. Students learn that purposeful design can address practical issues encountered in daily life and are supported to apply their learning in real-world contexts. 

As students progress through Technology, they deepen their understanding of how innovation can benefit from interaction across cultures, including te ao Māori, to inform technological practices, processes, and innovations.  

Learning Area Structure

The year-by-year teaching sequence lays out the knowledge and practices to be taught each year.   

In Years 0 to 6, the teaching is structured as one strand:  

Design, Make, and Innovate: Focuses on design processes and making simple outcomes. It develops students’ understanding of how ideas are explored, tested, and refined to meet needs and how design choices affect people and environments.  

In Years 7 and 8, the teaching is organised into the following four strands:   

Design and Innovation: Focuses on ethical and sustainable design processes. It develops students’ understanding of how ideas are generated, tested, and refined to solve problems and how design decisions impact people and environments.  

Materials and Ingredients: Focuses on the properties, uses, and safe handling of materials and ingredients. It develops students’ understanding of how materials are selected, processed, and combined to meet functional and aesthetic requirements, and how these choices affect people and environments.  

Systems and Control: Focuses on mechanical, electrical, and digital components and how they interact. It develops students’ understanding of inputs, outputs, and feedback and how systems are designed, tested, and improved to meet human and environmental needs.  

Digital Technologies: Focuses on data, algorithms, and logic and how digital tools are designed and used. It develops students’ understanding of how interfaces are created to meet user needs and how technology use can be responsible, ethical, and sustainable.  

In Years 9 and 10, the teaching is organised into five strands. Students must be taught at least two of these five strands each year.

Spatial and Product Design: Focuses on form, function, and aesthetics in physical and digital design. It develops students’ understanding of modelling, prototyping, and refining design ideas to meet user needs and environmental consideration.  

Materials and Processing: Focuses on the safe and responsible use of materials, food, and biotechnology. It develops students’ understanding of tools, techniques, and sustainable production processes that meet functional and aesthetic requirements.  

Electronics and Mechatronics: Focuses on mechanical and electrical systems, integrating digital systems and components. It builds students’ understanding of inputs, outputs, feedback, and control, using systems thinking to solve real-world and environmental challenges.  

Digital Technologies: Focuses on systems, data, and design and how digital tools are developed, connected, and used. It builds students’ understanding of how platforms, networks, and interfaces support secure, inclusive, and collaborative experiences and how technology use can be responsible, ethical, and sustainable.  

Computer Science: Focuses on algorithms, data, and logic in digital systems and AI. It develops students’ understanding of computational thinking, coding, and the ethical implications of intelligent technologies.  

The year-by-year teaching sequence, organised through strands and elements, sets out what is to be taught. Its enactment is shaped by teachers, who design learning in response to their learners, adjusting the order and emphasis and adding appropriate contexts and content.  

Technology is a human enterprise of innovation, problem-solving, and purposeful design, involving collaboration, creativity, and critical thinking. To celebrate this, we highlight some influential technologists, designers, and inventors throughout the teaching sequence. Emphasising the human stories, values, and impacts of technology enriches the teaching and learning of the knowledge and practices.

Introduction

Across Years 0 to 10, Technology helps students become confident, creative, and informed problem-solvers. The teaching sequence builds knowledge and practice by guiding students from early observation and making to purposeful design and innovation. Students learn that diverse perspectives enrich innovation and that design can make a meaningful difference.  

In Years 0 to 3, teachers support students to notice how everyday objects are made and why they matter. Through simple design briefs and guided making, teachers introduce how materials behave, how tools are used safely, and how ideas become real outcomes. Making is framed as a way of thinking and doing, where even small design choices have meaning. Teachers select materials, tools, and equipment that match the design focus, encourage experimentation, and build foundational skills in joining, modelling, decorating, and safe tool use. These experiences build familiarity with technologies and support purposeful decision-making. This lays the foundation for understanding design as a thoughtful, human-centred process.  

In Years 4 to 6, teachers guide students from curiosity to purposeful creation. They support students to consider users, constraints, and consequences. Planning tools are introduced, and students are guided to test, adapt, and improve ideas. Making becomes more intentional, with students evaluating choices and refining outcomes. From Year 6, teachers introduce digital tools to expand what’s possible. They select materials, tools, and equipment that support safe, purposeful, and increasingly complex making, helping students design with users in mind and make informed decisions with impact.  

In Years 7 and 8, teachers support students to engage in more rigorous design processes across all strands. Students respond to authentic needs with increasingly complex making and explore mechanical, electronic, and digital systems, learning how components interact to create reliable outcomes. Teachers guide students to balance function, aesthetics, and sustainability through increasingly specialised outcome development, justify design choices, and evaluate materials and technologies for performance and impact. Students begin to see how design can address real-world challenges and make a meaningful difference.  

In Year 9, teachers support students to deepen their understanding by working across at least two strands. Students apply established knowledge and language to develop solutions that meet authentic needs. Teachers guide students to test ideas, communicate thinking, and bring concepts to life. Students integrate digital, mechanical, and electronic components and apply ethical and sustainable practices. Teachers support students to plan and evaluate their work with growing confidence and rigour, considering social, cultural, environmental, and ethical dimensions.  

In Year 10, teachers guide students to work in at least two strands with increasing complexity through research, prototyping, and refinement. Students develop outcomes for authentic contexts, apply disciplinary knowledge with confidence, experiment with ideas, and shape their identities as designers and creators. Teachers select resources that help students take ownership of the design process and develop purposeful, influential, and futures-ready outcomes. Students are encouraged to think critically about the purpose and impact of their work.  

The Technology learning area prepares students with the knowledge and practices to access related curriculum subjects for Years 11 to 13, such as Materials Technologies, Digital Technologies, and Processing and Systems Technologies. 

Links to Technology supports and resources: