Curriculum Whitewash
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Posted by Tyson Woorama Jun 4, 2006 |
Australian Federal Education Minister Julie Bishop says Aboriginal children should not be taught their culture in schools, following yet another report. I swear to God, if as much money was spent on Indigenous education as the over-inflated salaries of those who write endless reports about it, there'd be no crisis anyway.
This report suggests students who are less "traditional" are likely to do better in school. "Western education cannot and should not preserve Aboriginal culture," it says.
"Too often, educators continue to defer to Aboriginal culture without recognising that Aboriginal culture is the problem. Can a culture that is pre-literate and pre-numerate survive in an education system that is meant to make children literate and numerate?"
Rubbish! See my articles Indigenous Knowledge Theft and Indigenous Mathematic Systems which debunk the myth of "pre-literate and pre-numerate" savages. In particular, click here for a picture and description of pre-invasion literate and numerate text.
"Can a welfare culture that has no work ethic be in a position to prepare its children for school?"
This rubbish is riding on the back of the current media propaganda labelling Indigenous culture as intrinsically abusive towards women and children. Now this Minister says it will inform education policy. This is horrendous, and flies in the face of Article 7 of the International Labour Organisation's Convention 169, which clearly states that "...educational programmes and services should be adapted to address (Indigenous students') special needs and should incorporate their histories, their knowledge and technologies, their value systems and their aspirations. It provides that, whenever practical, children belonging to these peoples should be taught to read and write in their own indigenous language, or in the language most commonly used by the group to which they belong. Indigenous education must be bilingual and bicultural."
The director of the Indigenous Education Leadership Institute, Chris Sarra, said Aboriginal culture should be embraced and the report represented a plan to "kill off one of the most ancient societies in the world".
It may be true that low level, stereotyped Indigenous activities like "dot painting paper boomerangs under the tree" don't help our kids learn. But that is not inclusive education. Inclusivity happens when children are allowed to use familiar logic systems and ways of thinking to explore western and other cultural texts and mathematical systems. Indigenous knowledge is very sophisticated, but it is often dumbed down by western educators who don't know any better.
Read more about the way education is being manipulated to kill off our cultures in the article links below.