Towards an Australian model of culturally nourishing schooling

ABSTRACT

2020 looms large for Indigenous education in Australia, with the ‘Refreshed’ Close the Gap strategy hanging over the collective heads of schools, Indigenous students and their families. After a decade of promises, there is now an acknowledgement within the government that programmes to improve student outcomes in literacy, numeracy and school engagement, as currently implemented, have little possibility in affecting the changes required to sustainably shift Indigenous student’s schooling success.

This paper draws together the findings from eleven concurrent systematic reviews of Australian Indigenous education (AER, 2019, 29(1)) and an in-depth analysis of four key underpinning elements of a culturally nourishing education for Australian Indigenous students. It is argued that the four tenets of this model centres on the curriculum construct of Learning from Country, the authentic inclusion of cultural practices and Indigenous languages in both curriculum and school practice, establishing epistemic and pedagogic mentoring for teachers and the development of a robust professional development model to support a transformative shift in teachers’ pedagogic practices. The authors argue that a whole-school approach explicitly negotiated with and supported by Indigenous families, and that centres these key principles are required if the promise of educational success is ever to be met.

KEYWORDS:

• Culturally nourishing schooling
• indigenous education
• aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander education
• cultural inclusion
• learning from Country
• epistemic mentoring
• teacher professional change

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples are two specific Indigenous groups located within Australia. When the term ‘Indigenous’ is used in this article, it refers to peoples from these two groups.

2. In Australia, Country is an Aboriginal English word describing a living entity including people, culture, land, spirituality, values, stories and resources with a past, present and future (Bird-Rose, 1996, p. 7).

3. Plans are currently underway to undertake research in five schools across NSW that have agreed to embark on whole of school planning that works with the culturally nourishing model outlined in this paper.

4. We would like to acknowledge the import of methodologically locating ourselves and the cultural protocols regarding outlining who we are, our relationships with each other, and in connection with the focus of this research. However, given that there are five co-authors for this paper, and a great many more involved in the AV project itself, this is not practical in this context.

5. Whiteness in this usage refers to the institutional, economic and social arrangements that are associated with colonialism and assumptions about the status of ‘the West’ in relation to the rest (Vass, 2017).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Kevin Lowe

Kevin Lowe is a Gubbi Gubbi man from southeast Queensland. Kevin, who is currently a Scientia Research Fellow at The University of NSW, Sydney Australia, is working on an innovative, community-focused research project on developing a model of sustainable improvement in Aboriginal education. Kevin has had extensive, experience across the education sector, including teaching, technical education administrator, Inspector, Aboriginal Education in the NSW Board of Studies and now a researcher. Kevin has expertise in working with establishing successful programs with Aboriginal community organisations on developing Aboriginal language policy and curriculum development and its implementation. Over the last 20 years, Kevin has led educational projects with Aboriginal communities, schools and education systems that centre on the development of effective school-community learning partnerships. Recently Kevin has worked collaboratively with a team of cross-institutional academics to review research across key areas of schooling and established the Aboriginal Voices a broad-base, holistic project which is developing a new pedagogic framework for teachers.

Iliana Skrebneva

Iliana Skrebneva has a vast experience in the area of Inclusive and Special Education. She has taught diverse groups of students with different disabilities. Iliana’s research interests are within the broad field of Inclusive Education, focusing on how teaching approaches or services are developed to support diverse groups of students successfully. Her recent work has also focused on how the inclusive practices of teachers are be enhanced through the development of 'positive risk-taking'.

Cathie Burgess

Cathie Burgess coordinates Aboriginal Studies, Aboriginal Community Engagement and the Master of Education: Leadership in Aboriginal Education programs at the University of Sydney. Cathie’s research involves community-led initiatives positioning Aboriginal cultural educators as experts through projects such as Learning from Country in the City, Aboriginal Voices: Insights into Aboriginal Education and Redfern Cultural Program.

Neil Harrison

Neil Harrison is an Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Studies, Macquarie University, Australia. His research focuses on how Indigenous knowledge of Country can be embedded in the Australian Curriculum. His latest book (together with Juanita Sellwood), Learning and Teaching in Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Education (Oxford) is used widely in teacher education programs throughout Australia.

Greg Vass

Greg Vass is currently a lecturer at Griffith University. Building on his experiences as a high school teacher, his work is concerned with learner identities and schooling practices that impact on the skills and achievements of students. His research interests aim to investigate relationships between policy enactment, pedagogy/curriculum, and educational inequities/privileges. His current research project focuses on working with learning communities as they engage with the skills, knowledges and practices that support Culturally Responsive Schooling.