Provide flexible culturally responsive education

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As an educator, you already know you need to create flexible, accessible learning opportunities built on the experiences of the children in your classroom. In the Pilbara and Kimberley, this means developing a culturally responsive education in which you actively work to "make connections between each student's home and school experiences, and use a range of learning opportunities that make schooling more effective for Aboriginal students" (Aboriginal Cultural Standards Framework, 2015).

As outlined in previous sections of this resource, generations of Aboriginal children – particularly those of mixed descent – were removed from their families and placed in missions, orphanages and children’s homes. This happened between 1910 and the 1970s, and these children are referred to as the Stolen Generations. The Healing Foundation and the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies have some information about intergenerational trauma and other impacts of colonisation and assimilation.

Over time, communities have shown strength and resilience in navigating this trauma and its ongoing effects.

You can assist with this healing and actively change the educational experience of Aboriginal children and young people by working with Aboriginal and Islander Education Officers (AIEO), Aboriginal Teaching Assistants (ATA) and the community to make your learning space culturally safe and responsive.

Despite rising awareness, there is still a significant gap in educational outcomes for Aboriginal children and young people. You can make a tangible difference as an educator. By inviting children and young people to share their cultures you are amplifying their voice – a way of building connections and valuing their experience. “They are teachers, also,” a Roebourne AIEO noted. Creating a supportive and inclusive learning community helps build the foundations for lifelong social and emotional wellbeing.

Your cultural awareness learning will, and should, be ongoing. Look for every opportunity to build on this so you can take what you have learnt and apply it in your classroom. You can continue your cultural awareness learning through the school, community programs and events. Speak with AIEOs, ATAs, and community members for information about the local region, such as the history, significant sites, and questions that can and can't be asked.

When Aboriginal children enter their learning community they are required to code-switch. They leave their homes, where they interact and speak according to their Aboriginal cultures and backgrounds – and are disciplined differently – and switch to English to interact in a Western educational and social environment. They then switch back to Aboriginal once the school day is over.  Aboriginal children are experts at code-switching, but it takes lot out of them and requires much skill on their part.

Creating a culturally responsive classroom for Aboriginal children starts with developing two-way cultural respect, understanding their individual story and sharing your own.

You’ll need to be mindful of kinship obligations, avoidance relationships, physical cues – such as whether it’s appropriate to make direct eye contact – and family dynamics. For example, when you’re creating groups for an activity there may be some children you can't ask to work together. Another example could be the way you engage with young men who have been through initiation. You may need to adapt your interactions with them to reflect that they are now considered an adult, with adult responsibilities, in the community.

The AIEO or ATA can help you navigate cultural practices. It may be useful to watch 2019 documentary In My Blood It Runs, which explores the challenges 10-year-old Dujuan, a child-healer, faces balancing his traditional Arrernte/Garrwa upbringing with his Western education.

Build a strong connection with the AIEO or ATA in your school. Working with them to develop engagement and learning strategies will help you do this, as they will have an understanding about what will and won’t work in their community. For example, in Parnngurr, educators and students go out on Country with Martu rangers for activities such as mapping local areas, looking for and counting bilbies, tracking animals and looking for soaks (waterholes). Another example is teaching children measurements by how far they can kick a football or cast a fishing line.

You should set high expectations for all the children in your learning community, based on their individual strengths and skills, to help them reach their potential. You have a responsibility to every child to support their learning through the lens of their cultures, their background and their lived experience.

The performance descriptions for teachers in the Aboriginal Cultural Standards Framework will help you identify indicators to achieve this goal. A Menzies School of Health Research review into Cultural Responsiveness and School Education also provides useful information regarding this topic. The Be You Cultural Actions Catalogue will help you find place-based, culturally responsive actions you can apply in your learning community.

As an educator, you are guided by a state curriculum. Be mindful you are bringing a Western education into a different cultural context. Aboriginal children and young people live in two worlds – they carry beliefs and cultures passed down through generations and these may not align with the Western concepts presented at school. Bridge the curriculum with the cultures, language and knowledge of the community. For example, at Fitzroy schools, children can choose – with the approval of their families or caregivers – between learning Bunuba, Walmajarri or Gooniyandi. Cable Beach and Broome primary school children learn Yawuru, while primary and secondary schools in Newman are incorporating Martu in their curriculum.

One AIEO recalled a visit to an aged care home a few years ago, when aged care workers saw a change in an elderly man who was generally very quiet and “kept to himself”:

As you plan your lessons, continually ask yourself: “What lens am I using as I plan this lesson? Is it a culturally responsive one? How can I partner with the AIEO, or community members, to make this lesson more culturally appropriate?”

You’ll need to be particularly mindful of providing an accurate view of history and geography that articulates the horrific impacts of colonisation for Aboriginal Peoples. As part of your ‘walking softly’, you should take the time to learn local Aboriginal history from the community and discuss how to teach it as part of your culturally responsive approach to education. Ask the AIEO or ATA you work with to support in this and reach out to community members or Elders to lead these lessons, perhaps on Country. Everyone plays a role in creating a culturally safe environment.

While your first preference should be to consult with AIEOs, ATAs and community members about local cultures and history, the following educational websites also have a range of useful teaching resources: ABC Education, SBS Learn and Narragunnawali: Reconciliation in Education.

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Racism can manifest itself in many ways in a learning community – including your own unconscious biases – and can have a significant impact on a child or young person’s social and emotional wellbeing.

It can be as overt as offensive name-calling or physical bullying based on skin tone – whether light or dark – or Language Group. Be firm that racism and bullying will not be tolerated in your learning community. Work with the AIEO or ATA and the school’s senior staff to develop strategies to de-escalate conflict. Be clear about the consequences of such behaviour and apply them fairly and consistently.

Be wary of your own unconscious biases. These could be having low expectations or not calling on Aboriginal students because you assume they can’t answer a question, being dismissive or demeaning to an AIEO or ATA, being condescending or paternalistic towards Aboriginal children or their caregivers, or assuming particularly disruptive children are always at fault.

For example, you might have punished a child for disruptive or aggressive behaviour when they may have been responding to racist name-calling or covert bullying from a classmate. You will need to address their conduct. But reprimanding them without understanding why they were being disruptive may alienate the child, reinforcing beliefs that their perspective or wellbeing isn’t important, that they don’t belong or that the learning community – and the world in general – is inherently unjust. More importantly, this doesn’t address the racism or bullying that led to their actions.  Schools are required to encourage a supportive and inclusive learning environment.

Work with the AIEO or ATA to create a space where children and young people feel comfortable to discuss racism or bullying experiences and why they may feel or behave the way they do. This is an opportunity to show you value their views and feelings. You or the AIEO may need to speak with the child or young person one-on-one, outside the classroom environment, which may make them feel more comfortable to speak freely.

For anti-racism resources you can check out the Australian Human Rights Commission’s Racism. It Stops With Me campaign, racial equality project All Together Now or Cool Australia’s lessons exploring the key themes of the Adam Goodes documentary The Final Quarter.

Be You has lots of resources about bullying, such as ‘Recognising bullying behaviour’ and ‘What schools can do about bullying’.

Be patient, be open-minded – make education a two-way learning experience for you and your students.

Scroll through the suggested actions below and consider whether they can be adapted or contextualised for your learning community and included in your Be You Action Plan. How can these actions be most effective? We encourage you to consider the following steps to help increase the effectiveness of whole-setting actions:

1. Consult with members of the learning community, particularly Aboriginal and Islander Education Officers or Aboriginal Teaching Assistants, to develop and agree on the best approach. You could also seek input from the wider community, including Elders, families or caregivers, health and community services.
2. Tailor actions to meet the needs of your learning community. For example, modify or contextualise actions to suit the age and demographics of the children or young people in your care.
3. Regularly review and revisit actions to check their effectiveness and to drive continuous improvement.

Culturally responsive education in practice

• Form networks with educators, AIEOs and ATAs from other schools to gain an understanding of their communities, share similarities and differences. This allows everyone to share knowledge and activity ideas - not only ideas that have been tried and were successful, but also those that haven’t worked.
• Incorporate local Aboriginal history in lessons. This can be achieved by working with AIEOs and ATAs to identify the local holders of this knowledge and who in the community would be best placed to lead these lessons or assist with discussions. Suggested sources include local Native Title Bodies, Prescribed Body Corporates or other Traditional Owner groups. 
• Develop projects with students to celebrate and better understand their cultures and history with the class. This doesn’t have to be limited to paper-based projects. It could be a photography or oral history project where students learn about their history from their Elders and create a PowerPoint presentation, which they present to the class.
• Cultural excursions including trips on Country, camping, fishing and hunting all encourage intergenerational knowledge translation when actively engaging with Elders, AIEOs/ATAs and rangers. This can help you identify significant sites in the region. It could also be an opportunity to build connections with families or caregivers, who could be approached to volunteer for these excursions.
• Establish a healthy cooking and gardening program incorporating traditional Indigenous foods and plants. Get the local rangers to support this work and share their knowledge, which could include foraging excursions. In some places, like One Arm Point Remote Community School, EON Foundation has worked with classes to share knowledge about Bardi seasons, such as the best times to plant and harvest crops and when to eat certain animals to ensure they don’t become extinct. This has enabled educators and students to plant and maintain a healthy fruit and vegetable garden in accordance with the traditional Bardi seasonal calendar. 
• Engage knowledgeable community members to lead bush medicine workshops, including collecting materials and making medicines. This activity enables knowledge to be passed between generations and strengthens connections between children or young people and the older people in their community. You could also include learning about traditional Aboriginal medicine and ecological knowledge in science classes.
• Use 50words.online to incorporate local language into the classroom which could include signs and learning areas. This activity enables students to become the educators, highlighting how, in different contexts, people’s roles can change. At One Arm Point and Jigalong Remote Community schools, Bardi, Martu and English are included on signs in classrooms and around the school. This allows students to feel as though their identity is recognised and celebrated. 
• Name each classroom after an animal or season in the appropriate language, in consultation with the local language centre or Traditional Owner group.
• Teach the local and English names of sites/towns/items/activities in the community. This activity could also include an excursion around the community where students map out the areas, then name them in the local language and in English. This incorporates various curricula in one activity and allows students to be the holders of knowledge and the educators to learn from them.
• Incorporate a structured local language lesson in the classroom. At Roebourne School, some of the AIEOs run a cultural class and teach language to the students. This activity builds capacity and confidence for the AIEO staff while also reminding students that their local language is valued. 
• Engage community members to teach language for different classes, such as music, art and language classes, based on their strengths, interests and skill sets.
• Run a classroom art exhibition where the children can display art they have made that represents their culture or the Land, and invite community members to attend.
• Determine a common language or visual representations for emotions, including non-verbal communication, that allows children to self-select how they are feeling. For example, thumbs up, halfway or thumbs down.
• Use the Be You Feeling Cards to encourage conversation with children and young people.
• Actively promote the use and active engagement with Aboriginal authors and books in the classroom and at home. For more information visit the Indigenous Literacy Foundation.
• Be aware of the influence that the physical environment can have on students who have been exposed to trauma. Create spaces that promote different energy levels, balancing spaces for calm and high energy levels. 
• Establish classroom principles and learning foundations with AIEOs/ATAs. These could include learning principles that include the incorporation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives.
• Encourage children and young people to identify and talk about their role models. You could create role model wall or run a show and tell.
• Learning communities in urban areas can establish connections with the Land by exploring the local national parks through a cultural lens with Aboriginal Park Rangers.
• Develop an Acknowledgement of Country protocol and policy, which is school and classroom specific. Have an acknowledgement in class each morning and ask students to take turns in sharing why this is important and what it means to them personally.
• Work with the AIEO/ATA, families or caregivers to learn about family structures, avoidance relationships and kinship obligations in the community. Consider these relationships before planning an event or seating arrangements in classroom. 
• Create a leadership program, within the classroom or school, that supports inclusive and responsive learning where students competent in their language are encouraged to help others learn.
• Create personalised learning strategies and emotional de-escalation activities that actively include the caregivers and work with the families’ identified strengths.
• Develop lesson plans with the AIEOs/ATAs that can be used for children across a range of developmental ages and capabilities.
• Share lesson plans with the caregivers and families in a way that is easy for them to understand and encourages feedback.
• Establish a sensory box within the classroom.
• With help from AIEOs/ATAs and community members create a list of local language swear words that’s available to new education staff, to best restrict use of these words in the classroom.
• Actively include children or young people in decision-making processes to determine the type and location of culturally responsive activities.
• Have a clear, fair, consistent and transparent response to racism and subsequent bullying incidents (physical, verbal, online) specific to your community for educators, AIEOs/ATAs and school support officers to use. You’ll find anti-racism resources listed on this page.
• Display the Australian Institute of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Studies (AIATSIS) Map of Indigenous Australia in the classroom and encourage students to identify Language Groups known to them.
• Greet children, young people, families and caregivers at the school drop-off or pick-up in local language. You can also promote local language through ‘word of the week’ activities.
• Engage children and young people in intergenerational learning and modelling respectful relationships by visiting Elders in nursing homes and making connections.
• Engage children and young people in learning and singing songs with Elders. Make sure you consider cultural sensitivities and protocols.
• Invite Aboriginal artists to encourage students to create their own culturally meaningful art that can be displayed in the classroom. Incorporate Bronwyn Bancroft’s The Art in Country book in your art class and discuss the significance of shapes, colours and patterns of Country. You could also work with a local art centre to engage children and young people in making natural pigments, such as ochre.
• ANZAC Day activity – read Alfred’s War by Rachel Bin Salleh, which explores roles and perspectives of Aboriginal soldiers during World War I.
• Reinforce the importance of language in the classroom and create an open space where children can express themselves in a language of their choice.
• Create lessons that explore the history of colonisation from an Aboriginal perspective to better understand its ongoing impacts. 
• Display culturally appropriate artifacts/artwork around the school. Discuss how to do this appropriately with AIEOs/ATAs and community members.
• Provide opportunities for intergenerational learning where Elders are invited into schools and tell their stories to younger generations. This could include conducting activities on Country that they engaged in when they were children, such as looking for goannas in Jigalong. 
• Work with Aboriginal health care services, offering them the chance to come into the learning community to talk about relevant topics such as bullying, anxiety and social and emotional wellbeing.
• Encourage learning in different spaces, both indoors and outdoors.
• Invite Aboriginal LGBTQIA+ speakers to the school to talk to young people about celebrating diversity, promoting inclusion, encouraging belonging and creating a safe space.
• Establish an ‘Australian animal of the month’ calendar and discuss the stories and cultural significance of the animal for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities.
• Engage a community member to teach traditional weaving, enabling the class to make wearable art.
• Include traditional Aboriginal instruments in music class and engage a community member to discuss the significance of instruments, including how they’re made and when they’re used.
• Ask the AIEO or ATA to teach students Aboriginal symbols to incorporate in writing, drawing and storytelling.
• Engage with the artist of your learning community’s Reconciliation Action Plan artwork to discuss the significance and connection of the artwork to your setting.
• Encourage the students to take part in yarning circles to share their ideas and thoughts throughout the day. Ask the AIEO/ATA to lead the yarning circle. 
• Explore Songlines and Dreamtime stories by inviting Elders to share their knowledge and reflections of these.
• Teach about significant social activism of leading Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander mentors. This could include Truganini, Mabo or Vincent Lingiari.
• Discuss David Unaipon’s achievements and why he is on the Australian $50 (fifty dollar) note.
• Discuss the music of Archie Roach, including the song Took the Children Away. 
• Discuss the journey towards the 1967 referendum and what impact that had on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples. 
• Use the ABC’s ‘Right Wrongs’ resource to discuss social change and the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander civil rights movement.
• Discuss Reconciliation Week, including what it aims to do and how the learning community can get involved in developing their Reconciliation Action Plan. Read Say Yes by Jennifer Castles to unpack the meaning of Reconciliation Week and ask questions such as “What does reconciliation mean to me?”
• Discuss Native Title, Traditional Land Ownership and the impact of the Mabo case in your geography class.
• Read Sorry Day by Coral Vass and Dub Leffler to acknowledge National Sorry Day on 26 May. 
• Engage in natural play by exploring different natural materials sourced from the local area. Work with a local ranger to explain what natural resources are available in your local area, including native seeds and where they can be planted in a learning setting.
• Work with the AIEO/ATA to embed the 8 Aboriginal ways of learning in your classroom.
• Read Bruce Pascoe’s Young Dark Emu to engage local ways of knowing and being with Country from an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspective.
• Work with community groups to do an on Country clean-up day.
• Display the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander flags in your classroom and discuss the meaning of the colours and symbols.
• Discuss the significance of the 1946 Pilbara Strike, which lasted until 1949, when hundreds of Aboriginal pastoral workers walked off the job for better pay and conditions. 
• Run a competition for each classroom where students collaborate on an artwork that relates to the NAIDOC theme for the year. Encourage students to research the theme, Aboriginal art styles and to work together to map and develop a piece that will be presented to the rest of the school and community members. Elders could be invited to the reveal ceremony and be on the judging panel to choose the winning artwork.
• Organise a NAIDOC ball for all students to attend. Here you can raise the profile of your local Aboriginal students by encouraging them to share stories, cultural dances 
  and food with other students. To ensure all students are comfortable to attend, educators should seek to have shoes and formal wear donated for students who may not be able to obtain these. Engage service providers and Aboriginal Medical Services to support the event. You could also ensure students’ families, Elders and community members are invited.

The art featured on this page is by Tyrown Waigana and Kevin Wilson.