Early Childhood Education at the Cultural Interface

Abstract

TheEarly Years Learning Framework for Australiaemphasises that children's own identity is constructed within their given context of family and community. This article presents the findings of a multiple case study project undertaken within five remote Aboriginal communities in the Northern Territory, Australia. Community Elders were concerned that while their children had a positive sense of self during their prior-to-school years, on entry into formal schooling they experienced a disjuncture between those experiences and the expectations of a Western curriculum. The project involved partnering one university academic to work with each community, exploring ways of improving 4-year-old children's pre-reading and numeracy skills to enhance their capacity to engage with expectations on entry into formal schooling. Elders were determined to have the children be successful at school and saw success there as inextricably interwoven with their sense of efficacy to explore and to learn. Outcomes included positives such as children demonstrating increased pre-reading and numeracy skills and, importantly, the engagement of the whole community in the project. Foundational to the success was making Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing key components of learning opportunities provided to the children, supporting awareness of their social and cultural heritage.

‘We love sharing your land’: Children’s understandings of Acknowledgement to Country practices and Aboriginal knowledges in early learning centres

“…Embedding Indigenous knowledges in education settings brings benefits to Indigenous children and communities (Shay & Oliver, 2021). Examples of these benefits include the engagement of Aboriginal communities in ECEC and improved literacy and numeracy skills (Maher & Buxton, 2015), and affirmation of cultural identity (Webb, 2022). Non Indigenous families also benefit from this work, but this is less well researched and understood.…”

Cultural connections in early childhood: Learning through conversations between educators and children

“…Support from members of the local Aboriginal community has been recommended and found to be helpful in the early childhood context in order to assist Aboriginal children in bridging the gap between their different cultural contexts (Ellis et al, 2010;Maher & Buxton, 2015). Knowing, being and doing in Aboriginal ways and non-Aboriginal ways can be explored and modelled or demonstrated best by Aboriginal educators, who are themselves bi-dialectal.…”

“…In early childhood education, the communication or cultural context of the learning environment has an influence on children's learning experiences (Maher & Buxton, 2015). In the early years, a child's ongoing development of identity is influenced by the content they learn, the ways in which they learn and the contexts they learn within.…”

“…Many aspects of life intertwine and affect an individual's capacity to engage with and learn from educational opportunities (Gerlach, 2008;Webb & Williams, 2018). This complexity of life experiences has been acknowledged as an important consideration, both in Australia and internationally, when implementing a strengths-based community approach to support Aboriginal children (Gerlach et al, 2016;Maher & Buxton, 2015;Walter et al, 2017). Not least of these complexities is the trauma of colonisation that has impacted on Aboriginal families and communities across and through generations (Eckermann et al, 2006).…”