The Redeveloped Primary Curriculum: What Changes in September 2026
What's changing, and how to get your school ready
The new school year brings the biggest change to Irish primary education in over two decades. The redeveloped Primary Curriculum, built on the Primary Curriculum Framework, begins its phased rollout this September — and for most teachers the first question is a practical one: what actually changes in my classroom?
This guide walks through what's new, what it means for your planning, and how Coding Ireland already covers the areas you'll be teaching.
🧭What's Actually Changing
The framework reorganises primary learning into five broad areas rather than a long list of separate subjects:
- ✓Language — including Modern Foreign Languages
- ✓Mathematics, Science and Technology (STEM Education)
- ✓Wellbeing
- ✓Arts Education
- ✓Social and Environmental Education
The emphasis is on playful, inquiry-based learning — and on giving teachers more agency over how they teach.
💡A Bigger Role for STEM and Digital Skills
STEM Education is now one of the five headline areas, and digital skills run right through the framework rather than sitting in a separate slot. In practice that means:
- ✓Coding and computational thinking woven into maths and science, not taught in isolation.
- ✓More emphasis on hands-on investigation and pupils explaining their reasoning.
- ✓Digital tools used to support learning across subjects — little and often beats one long session.
🧪How Coding Ireland Covers STEM and Languages
Two of the framework's headline areas — STEM Education and Language, including Modern Foreign Languages — are already covered in full on the platform, with every lesson planned and resourced for non-specialist teachers:
STEM — Maths, STE & Digital Skills
Everything under the Mathematics, Science and Technology area, in one place:
- ✓Maths — 50+ interactive activities aligned to the new curriculum, with instant feedback.
- ✓STE — hands-on science investigations that need no special equipment; the skill is the fair test, not the kit.
- ✓Digital Skills — coding with Scratch, MakeCode and the micro:bit, built around the Primary Digital Strategy.
Languages — Spanish, French & German
Ready-to-teach Modern Foreign Languages for the new Language area:
- ✓Interactive vocabulary, speaking practice and culture — no language degree required.
- ✓Games, audio and printable resources so any teacher can lead a lesson.
- ✓Structured from first words to simple conversation across the senior classes.
📋What It Means for Your Planning
The rollout is phased — schools take on the new areas over time rather than all at once. Three things are worth doing before the first staff meeting:
Know which areas change first
Check the phased timeline for your class level so your September plan reflects the new structure from day one.
Protect time for digital skills and STEM
Because these are embedded rather than bolted on, they're easiest to build in as short, regular activities across the week.
Choose tools your team will actually use
Fewer, well-supported resources beat a scramble of one-off apps — pick something every teacher can pick up quickly.
How Coding Ireland Helps
- ✓Maths, STE, Digital Skills and Languages lessons — all planned and resourced for the redeveloped curriculum.
- ✓Interactive activities that give pupils instant feedback, so practice runs itself.
- ✓Built for non-specialist teachers — no experience required.
- ✓Less prep for you, not more, as the new structure beds in.
Coding Ireland
Coding Ireland