Year 7 Technologies – Term 1 (WA Curriculum): Digital Systems and Data Management

What this unit covers

In Term 1, Year 7 Technologies in the WA Curriculum centres on the unit “Digital Systems and Data Management”.

Students explore digital systems hardware, data representation, spreadsheet analysis, and digital citizenship through hands-on activities covering networks, binary systems, data visualization, and online safety.

Lesson sequence (20 lessons)

The unit breaks down into the following lesson-by-lesson sequence — each title below is a teachable lesson, in order:

1. Identifying Common Network Hardware Devices in Your Home
2. Drawing Simple Network Diagrams with Routers and Switches
3. Exploring Internet of Things (IoT) Devices and Smart Home Technology
4. Understanding How IoT Sensors and Actuators Exchange Data
5. Investigating Corporate Networks and Server Functions
6. Introduction to Binary Number System and Digital Signals
7. Converting Whole Numbers to Binary Code
8. Understanding Bits, Bytes and Data Storage Capacity
9. Exploring Unicode Character Sets for Text Representation
10. Creating Binary Messages with Letters and Emojis
11. Setting Up Your First Spreadsheet for Data Collection
12. Importing Data from Multiple Sources into Spreadsheets
13. Creating Bar Charts and Line Graphs from Dataset Information
14. Building Scatter Plots to Compare Food Prices and Sales Data
15. Visualizing Census Data Using Maps and Location-Based Charts
16. Understanding Your Digital Footprint and Online Presence
17. Investigating Data Permanence Through Social Media Examples
18. Searching for Your Own Digital Information Online
19. Creating Strong Passwords and Understanding Privacy Settings
20. Developing Personal Digital Citizenship Action Plans

Curriculum codes in this unit

Content codes:

Skills codes:

Reading the codes: WA codes (the ones starting with WA) pack the year level, learning area, strand and content number into one string, while the national Australian Curriculum v9 uses a different anatomy that starts with AC9 — same content family, different labels. Our complete WA Curriculum guide decodes both, character by character.

Planning notes for Term 1

WA terms run roughly 9–11 weeks, and in 2026 Term 1 runs from Monday 2 February to Thursday 2 April — 9 weeks for WA public schools. With 20 lessons in this unit, that leaves breathing room for assessment, moderation and the weeks that disappear to carnivals, camps and public holidays — plan the assessable work to land two to three weeks before the end of term rather than in the final week.