Rural and Remote Education - NSW
Rural
and Remote Education - NSW
Moree Aboriginal education
workers and others, 5 March 1999 - notes
Curriculum
"That's our biggest
problem - the relevancy in the curriculum for our children. You can talk
to any parent having trouble getting their kids to school - at any age.
There's nothing there for them, nothing that interests them. They learn
more on the streets than they do in the school. It needs to be addressed
to their specific learning needs."
Aboriginal Studies
"Not so long ago
there was a big stink about history - Australian history - when the War
Memorial in Sydney was vandalised. There was a major outcry about the
lack of history being taught in our schools. If that's the case, how would
they deal with the true history of this country and the colonisation of
this country? How would they go putting that across in the schools?"
"An Aboriginal perspective
in all schools is mandatory. But, of course, we know as Murri workers
that's not happening. We're all out there trying but it's definitely not
happening."
Language teaching
They teach Indonesian
and Japanese but not Kamilaroi, in spite of the high numbers of Aboriginal
students.
Teaching staff
"When you get teachers
out to these areas, they come green. They come with virtually no awareness
at all about the community that they're coming into. I think that should
be the responsibility of the Department. It's the schools out here that
give them a couple of days of local sensitisation. Then after three years,
they're gone trained. We send out trained teachers to go and teach over
at the coast. They don't stay in towns of this size with its problems.
It's got a lot to do with the housing that's available and any prospects."
"They're giving teachers
incentives to get out. The incentive is, you stay three years, get your
points up, you've got a transfer out of there. They should give you an
incentive to stay. You've spent three years there, you've built up a relationship
with the community and you like the school, you've got a lot of experience,
the incentive should be to stay rather than to get out. But it's sort
of seen as a punishment to be here."
"The teachers can
only do what the curriculum allows them to do. And there's no incentive
to stay. The allowances don't compensate you for being away from your
family. There have to be more incentives from the Department to make experienced
and quality teachers want to come to this area. And stay. One year here
we had 29 staff turnover in one year. And the following year we had 28.5
staff who were straight out of Uni at the one school out of about 50-54
in total. More than half."
It was pointed out
that there has been, over the past 3 years, a substantial increase in
the numbers of Murri education workers employed in the area. In the Catholic
system the number has increased from 4 to 12.
Teaching and learning
quality
"I come across a
lot of behaviour problems in my three districts. Some of the schools I
go to are central schools and some of the kids in Years 7 and 8 and at
Years 2 or 3 reading level. So I think more AEAs are needed. The criterion
for an extra AEA is another 120 kids in the school. That's unbelievable."
Many Aboriginal families
still don't identify as such, making accurate calculations of the number
of Aboriginal students impossible. "Families still aren't confident enough
to put their hands up."
"We have many, many
children slipping through the net from primary into high school with the
reading level of an 8-year-old."
"There are some predominantly
Aboriginal schools where not one Aboriginal kid has passed the Basic Skills
Test. It's culturally biased. I suggest teachers be put on some sort of
contract based on productivity: that their kids go out of the school with
literacy level at high school standards or HSC standards. At the moment
none of the kids at the schools I work with - they can barely read and
write and they're in high school. There's got to be something put in place
to offset this balance. Our kids aren't being taught. It's up to the schools
to develop a method that works for our kids."
Proposed teaching
strategies for Indigenous students
"Mix the practical
with the theory." "Show them the practical application. Black kids learn
better outside the 4 walls of the classroom than inside."
Introducing a bridging
program - such as was once in place in Moree from kindergarten into primary
school - was also suggested.
Local knowledge and
social issues within their own community was said to be most relevant
because, especially in isolated areas such as Boggabilla and Goodooga,
95% of the children will not leave the area. "2-Unit Maths and Japanese
are going to be of no value or use to that community in the long run.
Why sit there wasting time? If they made it relevant to the local community
it's going to benefit the community: offer apprenticeship courses through
a joint Schools-TAFE program; hands-on things that our kids are really
good at."
At Toomelah - with
100% Aboriginal enrolment - the Aboriginal Education Resource Teacher
made big books with Aboriginal English - the way the kids speak - for
the Reading Recovery Program. Followed through from Kindergarten to Year
6.
"For our kids, smaller
classes, definitely more relativity in the curriculum to what they need,
far more hands-on stuff - our kids learn better by doing than copying
from the board or from books that have no relevance to many of our kids
at all. And one-to-one or one-to-two tutoring or teaching is critical.
It works. But whoever controls that money says, 'No we can't have it.'
We say that same old things over and over again."
The Catholic school
Homework Centre was said to work well. However, a much lower proportion
of Catholic school students in the area are Aboriginal.
Incentive programs
and rewards which have been introduced at Bourke Primary School and also
at Lightening Ridge were commended. At Bourke an old train with 2 carriages
is located in the school grounds, one with the computers in it and the
other with the reading resources. "That's one of the incentives for the
kids to do well in the class-room. If they do well in the class-room,
they're allowed time on the computer." At Lightening Ridge some years
ago classes were streamed and rotated in 40 minute sessions as in high
schools, alternating academic and other subjects.
Peer mentoring (high-achieving
students assisting others) and role modelling (AEAs and other Aboriginal
people coming into the school) are very important. The quality of the
leadership within the school was also identified as critical to the education
success of Indigenous students.
The Reading Recovery
program was commended (flexible as at Toomelah mentioned above). But only
one teacher in the school is trained in it - at a cost of $17,000-$20,000
each out of the school's budget - and after three years that teacher takes
his/her new knowledge elsewhere.
Discipline
"My major concern
is with kids getting suspended - they get sent to these time-out centres.
I think the Department should look at having a special class-room in the
school, for in-school suspension. But they haven't got enough staff to
monitor them."
"Time-out centres
are not working. They get suspended and agree to go to the time-out centre.
But later you see 50 or 60 kids in the street riding bikes. They don't
care. They should be kept in class - within the school grounds - and within
the responsibility of the Education Department."
Financial support
Some parents cannot
access Abstudy because of the means test, even though they are just above
the poverty line. Participants feared the effects on adult education which,
to date, has produced Aboriginal Education Assistants and teachers.
Keeping Indigenous
students in the education system is an ongoing challenge. Scholarships
and bursaries were suggested.
Last
updated 2 December 2001.