The Department for Education has published draft primary national curriculum programmes of study for these subjects so that they can be discussed ahead of a formal consultation later this year.
The final programmes will be introduced into primary schools in September 2014.
The draft programmes have been drawn up following a report by an expert panel chaired by Tim Oates, director of research and assessment at Cambridge Assessment and Professors Mary James, Andrew Pollard and Dylan Wiliam.
In a letter to Tim Oates, education secretary Michael Gove, said, 'I want schools to have high expectations for all subjects – regardless of whether they are tested nationally – and set these high expectations out in their own school curricula, which, from September, must be published online and lay out what is taught year-by-year.
'This clarity over content will give parents an assurance that their children are making proper progress, safeguard each child's entitlement to a secure foundation on which they can build their own education, and help teachers in each primary year ensure that the necessary knowledge has been mastered before moving on to more stretching content, and indeed to wider curricular choices.
'It will be for each school to specify in its own way the year-by-year detail of its own curriculum in every subject. But in order to ensure that our children master the essential core knowledge which other nations pass on to their pupils, we are publishing primary Programmes of Study in mathematics, science and English which are explicitly more ambitious than ever before.'
In maths children will be expected to add, subtract, multiply and divide fractions, in line with the way children are taught in high performing countries such as Singapore and Hong Kong.
By the age of nine children will have to their times tables up to 12 x 12, as is expected in Massachusetts. Currently children only need to know their ten times table by the end of primary school.
By the age of seven children should know number bonds up to 20, such as 9 + 9 = 18.
In English, children will be taught to read using systematic phonics and there will be a stronger emphasis on reading for pleasure.
In grammar children will be expected to understand how to use apostrophes correctly and how to use the subjunctive.
Learning to recite poems and taking part in debates and presentations will also be expected.
In science, there will be new content in the curriculum about evolution, the solar system and speed, as well as scientific experiments and demonstrations, similar to what is taught in Alberta and Massachusetts.
There will also be a consultation later this summer on the plan to introduce foreign languages from the age of seven at the start of Key Stage 2.
There will be no other changes to the structure of the primary curriculum. The Government will maintain the requirement for the teaching of art and design, design and technology, geography, history, ICT, music, and physical education throughout primary school.
However, the Association of Teachers and Lecturers criticised what it called a 'heavily prescribed curriculum'.
Dr Mary Bousted, general secretary of the ATL, said, ‘The detailed programmes of study will lead to a uniform education, with next to no opportunity for teachers to excite children and adapt learning to suit their pupils in their local area, developing the skills they need for life, future education and work. ATL believes that the curriculum must help all children learn and develop. A curriculum focused on identifying and developing skills is essential then.
‘Self-management, problem-solving, initiative, communication and many more are just as important as reciting kings, queens and times tables.
‘We want to hear more about the CPD that will support a new curriculum. And crucially, where government is going to find the teachers to teach advanced maths and modern foreign languages in primary schools – the profession is under-resourced and low in confidence on this front.’
