Week 31 - Indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness in my practice

Week 31
Indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness in my practice
I have created a reflective entry demonstrating my own critical understanding of indigenous knowledge and cultural responsiveness. I have discussed these understandings using Rolfe’s (2001) reflective model.
What?
The more I read, the more it appears that we are teaching in a 'white space' and not doing enough for our indigenous learners. I, myself, identify as both NZ European and Maori ethnicities, however, if I’m to be truly honest with myself, I really only identify with my NZ European identity. I know of and understand parts of my maori identity but I don’t relate to the ‘intangible’ (Teaching Tolerance, 2018) and cultural side of things such as language, values and beliefs as I was raised and schooled in a eurocentric environment.
The school I currently teach at has a diverse range of cultures; 6% NZ Maori, 39% NZ European, 2% Pacific, 47% Asian and 6% Other (Sunnyhills, 2018). Our school Vision states that ‘We are responsive to our learners and whanau through our recognition and respect of the many cultures, languages, identities and needs’ (Sunnyhills, 2018). As a classroom teacher I try to uphold our school vision and be culturally aware and responsive to all my learners by acknowledging their cultural characteristics, experiences and perspectives (Gay. 2001, p.106) and making appropriate cultural links in the classroom to use and channel these for effective pedagogy.
So What?
As a collective, we appear to be following our vision of being responsive to our learners and recognising their languages, cultures and needs in our learning culture. However, we are a predominantly Asian school with a high focus on their needs, support and learning resources in the classroom in what Milne (2013) suggests as a ‘white space’ education system. I feel that although our school vision states that we recognise and respect our many cultures, languages and identities, I’m not truly convinced that this is the case with our indigenous learners.
Reflecting on my own classroom practice, I now see that I predominantly acknowledge certain cultures when widely celebrated on specific occasions through ‘visible’ and ‘tangible’ (Teaching Tolerance, 2018) learning activities such as crafts, music, art and technology, whilst other cultures needs are met via school-wide support systems, learning resources, planning and funding.  As a teacher I do the best I can with the tools and knowledge I have available, but I question is there enough emphasis and support being shown with our indigenous learners and are the learning resources relevant and available to everyone school-wide?
What next?
Looking at the Action Continuum I believe I sit between the blue and the purple box, and can see that in order to move forward to the next level I need to embed and embrace the different cultural identities and needs into my pedagogy and classroom practice. Learning resources and school-wide support would empower me to move forward on the Action continuum, to the next level of intangible cultural responsiveness where my learners, whanau and the communities culture and identities are acknowledged and valued.
Bishop (2009) points out that the key to making a difference and achieving success with Maori students is agentic teachers, which fits in with the school vision through collaboration and supportive partnerships with whanau and the wider community. I believe relationships start in the classroom and can spread far and wide within the community. We need to recognise, celebrate and make visible, our diverse learners cultures and identities in the classroom starting first and foremost and with a strong emphasis on our indigenous learners.

References

Bishop, R., Berryman, M., Cavanagh, T. & Teddy, L. (2009).Te Kotahitanga: Addressing educational disparities facing Māori students in New Zealand. Teaching and Teacher Education, 25(5),734–742.
Edtalks.(2012, September 23). A culturally responsive pedagogy of relations. [video file]. Retrieved from https://vimeo.com/49992994
Milne, B.A. (2013). Colouring in the white spaces: Reclaiming cultural identity in whitestream schools. (Doctoral Thesis, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand). Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/10289/7868
Sunnyhills School Internal Data Aggregation. ( 1/7/18 ). Retrieved from: etap.co.nz based on 528 students.
Teaching Tolerance.( 2010, Jun 17). Introduction to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. [video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGTVjJuRaZ8

Comments

  1. Tina Taylor3 July 2018 at 01:22

    A very reflective post. I too believe the key strategy to being culturally responsive is creating educational parterships with whānau and communities.
    Ka Hikitea -Accelerating success 2013-2017 talks about productive partnerships. Based on the understanding that māori students are connected to whānau and should not be viewed or treated as seperate..

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  2. Anonymous3 July 2018 at 02:10

    Hi, Thank you for sharing this honest reflection. I can relate to everything you wrote about. My school is also very multicultural with the majority of our role being Filipino. I really like that all the suggestions made to improve Maori achievement can be applied to any culture and would have such a positive impact. I too believe that “Students, family and whanau have funds of knowledge” (Cowie et al, 2011) that can support and enhance the learning taking place at school. I reflected on the need to do more to fill n the "white space" by reaching out to our families more and involving the children in the decision making process when it came to their learning.

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  3. Unknown10 July 2018 at 13:50

    Hi, thank you for your post. I enjoyed the video clip from Bishop where he was talking about the need to address educational disparities using the metaphor of fiscal deficits. As it is debilitating for a country to have an economic debt so it is debilitating for education to have achievement gaps between Maori and non Maori. In the metaphor this equates to a debt owed by society to those people that have not been able to achieve in the education system to the level that they should have been able to. In article 3 of the Treaty of Waitangi, Maori were guaranteed the opportunity to benefit of being citizens of the new society.

    I found the Action continuum to be a useful assessment tool. I also got a lot out of the Introduction to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy video clip reminding me not to group all students of an ethnic group into “one size fits all”.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Unknown10 July 2018 at 21:53

    Thank you for your post. I enjoyed the video clip from Bishop where he was talking about the need to address educational disparities using the metaphor of fiscal deficits. As it is debilitating for a country to have an economic debt so it is debilitating for education to have achievement gaps between Maori and non Maori. In the metaphor this equates to a debt owed by society to those people that have not been able to achieve in the education system to the level that they should have been able to. In article 3 of the Treaty of Waitangi, Maori were guaranteed the opportunity to benefit of being citizens of the new society.

    I found the Action continuum to be a useful assessment tool. I also got a lot out of the Introduction to Culturally Relevant Pedagogy video clip reminding me not to group all students of an ethnic group into “one size fits all”.

    ReplyDelete

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