Eight Aboriginal Ways of Learning

Incorporating Aboriginal perspectives is a requirement for public school teachers in New South Wales, however I would wager that most would struggle with doing this in an authentic, non-tokenistic manner.

Tyson Kaawoppa Yunkaporta, an Aboriginal Education Consultant for Western New South Wales, has created a richly evolving space at http://8ways.wikispaces.com/about the eight ways that Aboriginal people learn. I would like to acknowledge the Traditional Owners of Western New South Wales for sharing this knowledge and their generosity in making it available for teachers to use. I hope that this becomes a vessel for skyrocketing educational outcomes for Aboriginal students.

I would have loved being taught in these ways and definitely would have relished going to school even more than I did - yes, a total nerd! But who can resist the pull of deep, contextualised learning? So let's use it!

Primary School Debating

Please visit the debating wiki I've set up for our primary school debating team - I think it holds a lot of promise for developing and maintaining an ongoing discussion amongst the students. I think to start small and grow is a good start, rather than attempt the tower of Babel with similar consequences!

I'd really love your feedback - just drop me a line on the wiki. Hmm, I wonder from where that idiom originates? Yes, I could find out myself right now haha! but unfortunately I know that this initial enquiry would lead to a much more extensive search and in my goal to prioritise, I'll have to give this a miss.

Now I know why they're called mind maps...but if only I could stop veering off the primary nodes!