The national school curriculum unfairly assumes all students can do their homework using a computer and the internet at home, a submission to the federal government's review warns.
But in reality, one in five children do not have access to the internet at home and that figure rises to one-third of children aged 5 to 14 in the most disadvantaged families.
In its submission to the curriculum review, the children's education charity The Smith Family said a lack of access to a computer and the internet among disadvantaged families could undermine the implementation of the national curriculum.
''Curriculum, schools, teachers and educational systems now tend to assume that all children and young people have access to resources such as computers and the internet, but our analysis and experience working with disadvantaged families shows this is clearly not the case,'' its submission said.
The submission said Australian Bureau of Statistics data shows that 85 per cent of children under 14 who used the internet at home did so for educational purposes, highlighting the importance placed on technology outside school.
The charity's head of research and advocacy, Anne Hampshire, said digital literacy was vital to education but it could not just be assumed all students had access to the same level of technology.
She said many families struggled to put food on the table so a computer was a luxury many could not afford.
Mele Tuliakiono, a mother of three, knows about the problems of not having a computer or internet access at home.
Until recently Ms Tuliakiono, from Rosemeadow, in Sydney's south-west, had to send her children to the library on the way home from school so they could use public computers to do their homework.
She now has a computer package from the Smith Family that includes internet access, which has changed her life.
''It's so exciting, I can do things on the computer at home now and so can the kids,'' she said.
Federal Education Minister Christopher Pyne launched a review of the national curriculum in January and appointed two outspoken critics of the curriculum to report to him by midyear.
Mr Pyne wanted a greater focus on Western civilisations included in a national curriculum but NSW schools, including the public, Catholic and independent sector, were urging the government to retain a strong focus on Aboriginal history.
In their joint submission to the review, the three school sectors said any curriculum calling itself national or Australian needed to include a strong focus on indigenous history and culture.
Other criticisms of the curriculum came from primary school principals, who argued it was overcrowded, too advanced and risked undermining the teaching of basic literacy and numeracy skills.
