ACRP Assessment: Essay

By: Tony Dimrajian

SID: 19058173

Chosen Question: Option 2

As a future secondary teacher, it is pivotal that I successfully understand how to build

positive, respectful relationships with all students. This essay will delve beneath the

surface of how such relationships can be formed with Aboriginal and Torres Strait

Islander students in particular. It is my role and duty to develop the key skills and

values involved in this process as well as building relationships with school

communities. Working towards fully engaging Indigenous students in the classroom is

a key component of teacher-student relationship-building. The core aspects of full

engagement are to engage students at a behavioural, emotional and cognitive level;

three facets that will be explored in further depth later on. The Australian Professional

Standards for Teachers (APST) listed by the Australian Institute for Teaching and

School Leadership (AITSL) specify the importance of understanding, respecting and

supporting Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students in Standards 1.4 and 2.4.

The essential components of forging positive, respectful relationships with Indigenous

students that will be discussed throughout this essay include teachers having an

intercultural understanding, promoting a positive sense of Indigenous student identity,

engaging with the community, and engaging Indigenous students using various

strategies including the eight-way framework of Aboriginal Pedagogy. There will also

be a particular focus on how I as a future teacher can engage Indigenous students

within my Key Learning Area (KLA) of mathematics. Additionally, I will take a close

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look at the NSW Aboriginal Education Policy and the Closing the Gap Prime

Minister’s Report, and consider how policy can affect real institutional change.

Throughout this essay I will point out many of the skills and values involved in each

of these components and explain how these are all important factors of successfully

building positive and respectful relationships with Aboriginal and Torres Strait

Islander students.

In order for teachers to build good relationships with Indigenous students, they must

reach a level of cultural proficiency and demonstrate significant intercultural

understanding. The Stronger Smarter Institute (SSI) highlights the impact of deficit

conversations on school culture and encourages using a strength-based approach to

acknowledge the positives in all cultures. The Stronger Smarter approach states that

by teachers having cultural proficiency, it will help to shift the tide of low

expectations and transform school cultures. SSI also identifies that teachers should

not only have background knowledge of Indigenous culture, but also must understand

the specific needs of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students and have cross-

cultural sensitivity. Consulting local communities about the aspects of Aboriginal

cultures and traditions to be taught will help to maintain a respectful relationship with

the Indigenous community (Board of Studies NSW, 2008). Awareness and empathy

are values and skills that all teachers should build on to be mindful of the language

they use, and of sensitive issues such as the stolen generation, land rights,

reconciliation, racism or Australia Day. The Indigenous population is severely

disadvantaged in education, employment opportunities and wellbeing (Fowler et al.,

2018). Teachers must ensure that their own perceptions of indigenous cultures are not

hindering Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander students from reaching their full

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potential. Yunkaporta (2009) argues that the issue is not just about what is taught, but

rather how it is taught. The AITSL standards indicate the high level of importance

placed on teachers becoming more knowledgeable and responsive towards the needs

of Aboriginal communities (Price & Garlett, 2015). AITSL Standard 2.4 focuses on

prompting teachers to understand and respect Indigenous culture, and promote

reconciliation. Teachers may meet this standard by applying their intercultural

understanding to be a catalyst for cultural shift within their schools.

Another core component of building thriving relationships with Aboriginal and Torres

Strait Islander students is for teachers to recognise and develop a positive sense of

Indigenous student identity within their schools. SSI presents this component as the

first of its meta-strategies for real change and Dr Chris Sarra discusses the importance

for Indigenous students to feel as though they can be proud of their own cultural

identity within a classroom setting. The Stronger Smarter approach shows that one of

the key skills teachers must have is open-mindedness. If teachers are open-minded

about learning and listening to the stories of their students, and are also mindful and

respectful of the questions they ask, it will help Indigenous students to feel a greater

sense of connectedness towards their teachers and school. However, when considering

Indigenous education in Australia, Bodkin-Andrews & Carlson (2014) state it quickly

becomes apparent that “history has left a tragic legacy to the educational outcomes

and opportunities of Aboriginal young people”. Beresford (2012) argues that

Indigenous people have been isolated and left to underachieve as a result of the

“generations of racist-inspired policies”. Let us consider current policy targeting

Indigenous education. The NSW Aboriginal Education Policy states that it promises

to account for Indigenous cultures within education and that “the department values

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the skills, experiences and knowledge of Aboriginal people” (NSW Department of

Education, 2008). The very first commitment under the objectives section of the NSW

Aboriginal Education Policy is that the department will push towards helping improve

the education and wellbeing of Indigenous students to give them the opportunity to

excel in all areas of education. The Closing the Gap Prime Minister’s Report

(Commonwealth of Australia, 2017) expresses the importance of acknowledging

culture as the key to supporting a positive and respectful sense of Indigenous identity.

Policies and promises are one aspect of real change, however these policies are of no

use if they are not successfully turned into action.

One of the key focal points of current policy and an essential component of building

positive, respectful relationships with Indigenous students is community engagement.

The NSW Aboriginal Education Policy emphasises the importance of partnering up

with the NSW Aboriginal Education Consultive Group (AECG) Inc. and Aboriginal

communities to implement school programs, spread recognition of the Aboriginal

student identities and provide culturally inclusive environments for Indigenous

students to learn. To affect real institutional change within schools, the policy outlines

roles and responsibilities for school principles, educators, and the directors of

Aboriginal education and community engagement. As a future teacher, implementing

the policy will help guide me towards utilising engagement with the NSW AECG Inc.

and communities to develop effective teaching plans and improve educational

outcomes for Indigenous students. A supporting document to the NSW Aboriginal

Education Policy titled ‘Aboriginal Education and Training Policy: Turning Policy

into Action’ outlines that the policy should be implemented on a day-to-day basis by

schools and as a teacher I intend to take on this ongoing process of learning and

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engagement with local AECGs and Aboriginal communities. I can build positive

relationships with the Indigenous community by asking the local community for ideas

on how to incorporate Aboriginal education into my teaching, getting involved with

multicultural groups and programs that exist where possible and finding out if the

school has any particular days of celebration, such as multicultural day. The

document ‘Working with Aboriginal communities’ developed by the Board of Studies

NSW in 2008 details what is involved in working with Aboriginal communities from

protocols, to making contact, to getting to know the community and localising the

curriculum for students. This is a resource I will certainly find valuable in my

teaching career when reaching out to Aboriginal communities. SSI also places high

importance on recognising and embracing Indigenous leadership in schools. I intend

to find out if my school has an Aboriginal Education Officer and will approach and

listen to them, and participate where possible.

Fully engaging indigenous students in the school and classroom environment is

another key focal point for teachers if they want to build positive, respectful

relationships with these students. Full engagement encompasses how students are

engaged behaviourally, emotionally and cognitively. Fredericks, Blumenfeld and Paris

(2004) define behavioural engagement as student effort and participation in activities,

emotional engagement as student’s emotional reactions and sense of belonging or

connectedness to the school, and cognitive engagement as student self-regulation and

investment in their own learning. A resource, which can help teachers engage

Indigenous students at each of these three levels, is the eight-way framework of

Aboriginal Pedagogy. Yunkaporta & Kirby (2011) describe the framework as one,

which sees education as “fundamentally holistic, non-linear, visual, kinaesthetic,

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social and contextualised”. Story sharing is one of the eight ways and it is suggested

that yarning could be a classroom activity, which mirrors the way that Indigenous

people teach, learn and pass on knowledge to one another (Yunkaporta & Kirby,

2011). Additionally this method provides the opportunity for educators and

Indigenous students to better understand one another and helps to build positive and

meaningful relationships between them; thus engaging them emotionally as they feel

a greater sense of belonging and engaging them behaviourally as they participate in

group discussions. This one-on-one attention is highly valued by students (Tracey et

al., 2015) and in conjunction with community engagement provides a more

personalised sense of interaction. Another of the eight ways is the deconstruct-

reconstruct pedagogy which makes the learning content more accessible for

Indigenous students by breaking down the workload into smaller, manageable chunks

which they can more easily digest (Yunkaporta & Kirby, 2011). Some of the other

aspects of eight ways include non-linear pedagogy to reiterate content for students,

non-verbal practices to allow students to experience learning hands-on and become

critical thinkers, and land-links which prioritises relating the content to local land;

thus engaging Indigenous students cognitively.

As a future teacher, I will aim to engage Indigenous students within my KLA of

mathematics. I can certainly refer to the eight-way framework of Aboriginal

Pedagogy outlined by Yunkaporta & Kirby (2010), or other Indigenous pedagogical

frameworks such as the nine signposts for being culturally responsive to Torres Strait

Island provided by Osborne (1996), which can both give me insight into the many

ways of thinking and teaching Indigenous students by considering their cultures

(Lloyd, Lewthwaite, Osborne & Boon, 2015). In relation to mathematics more

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specifically, Price & Garlett (2015) consider mathematics as a way of storytelling.

This involves giving all students including Indigenous students the opportunity to

explore cultural symbols, act out a mathematics story, represent their story through

their own symbols and share their symbol systems. In mathematics, these cultural

symbols may be used to understand the basic concepts of algebra. Mathematics

involves much creativity and relationships through patterns and structures, similar to

other creative pursuits such as song, dance and visual arts (Price & Garlett, 2015).

Warren & DeVries (2009) describe that Indigenous students are more likely to engage

with formal mathematical language when learning in a fun and safe environment.

Kinaesthetic and visual strategies for teaching mathematics can be used to assist

Indigenous students in learning about quantifying by counting (Warren & DeVries,

2010). It is my role to ensure that I use differentiation when creating lessons to be

inclusive of students from diverse cultural backgrounds, and to provide carefully

shaped opportunities for Indigenous students that successfully meet AITSL Standards

1.4 and 2.4 within my mathematics classroom.

In conclusion, it is evident that there are a number of key components to consider

when striving towards building positive, respectful relationships with Aboriginal and

Torres Strait Islander students. Some of the many skills discussed include having

cultural proficiency, cross-cultural sensitivity, acknowledging a positive sense of

Indigenous identity, listening and reaching out to the community, and differentiating

pedagogy in accordance with frameworks such as the eight-way framework to engage

Indigenous students behaviourally, emotionally and cognitively. As a future teacher, I

intend to implement policies such as the NSW Aboriginal Education Policy, meet the

teaching standards outlined by AITSL, and build on my skills and pedagogical

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strategies towards forging positive, respectful relationships with Aboriginal and

Torres Strait Islander students. These skills, values and relationships with school

communities will continue to grow and help me to develop into a culturally

responsive secondary teacher in the mathematics classroom and the overall school

context.

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References

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