Narrative Life: Democratic Curriculum and Indigenous Learning

ISBN-13: 9781402097348 / Angielski / Twarda / 2009 / 290 str.

Neil Hooley

Opis

Indigenous education is one of the great challenges facing humanity in the historic quest for a democratic and peaceful future. The 370 million Indigenous peoples of the world demand that the racist and colonial wrongs of the past be recti ed and that they stand as equals in confronting the social, political and cultural problems that surround us all. Education offers a way forward, whether concerned with the public good, schooling for all citizens including universal primary education and expanding secondary education, the education of women regardless of background, the inclusion of local cultures, literacy and numeracy for all as a democratic right and the provisionof comprehensiveeducationthat enables both personal aspiration, cultural satisfaction and economic pathways. What this means is that all children no matter where they live, no matter what theirbackgroundorthecolouroftheirskinshouldexpecttohaveaccesstoeducation of the highest quality. This does not impose a particular style of education for local communitiesbut respects that educationaldirections must be decidedindependently by countries themselves. Within this general context, there is also something most profound about Indigenous knowing, of appreciating Indigenous perspectives and applying these across all knowledge, across all subjects of a curriculum. Rather than accepting the one often highly conservative and dominant view of knowledge, teaching and learning for all schools, Indigenous perspectives offer other insights and means of analysis, re ection and critique. These can open up elds of creative and critical learning for all children, including the dispossessed, marginalised and disenfranchised.

Spis treści

Acknowledgements Foreword Preface Terminology About the author List of Tables and Figures Quotation Part 1 Context 1. Global Trends and Indigenous Challenges 2. Building Democracy 3. Confronting Whiteness 4. Education, Being and Identity Part 2 Community 5. Indigenous Education 6. Self-Determination 7. Culture and Environment 8. National and International Insights Part 3 Commitment 9. Indigenous Literacy and Epistemology 10. Two-Way Inquiry Learning 11. Participatory Narrative Inquiry 12. Exemplars of Indigenous Knowledge and Practice Part 4 Change 13. Ambiguity and Indigenomathematics 14. Policy, Practice and Pedagogy 15. Education as Democratic Public Sphere References

Blurb

Written with educational practitioners in mind and set in a framework of progressive epistemology and pedagogy, this work tackles issues of global concern. It seeks to answer the question of how we structure education for the world’s 370 million indigenous people so as to promote intercultural understanding, maximize opportunity and right colonial wrongs.

Hooley’s work details an innovative curriculum design for indigenous school children based on the principles of participatory narrative inquiry, as well as exemplars of indigenous knowledge. Written from an Australian perspective, the book discusses broad international issues that impact on schooling such as globalisation, democratic education and whiteness and raises significant questions regarding indigenous culture and knowledge.

Taking inspiration from the works of John Dewey and Paulo Freire, Hooley asserts that a curriculum based on participatory narrative inquiry recognises and respects the interests and rights of local indigenous communities. Further, it provides a mechanism for linking with white mainstream curricula through the compilation of portfolios of student work and exemplars of knowledge across all subjects areas. This model views formal schooling as a central aspect of a child’s personal, family and community narrative and does not impose knowledge from without, but constructs knowledge from within. Learning is given an indigenous context and thus two-way inquiry between cultural viewpoints is encouraged.

Narrative Life makes an original contribution to indigenous education worldwide, and does so across all settings of primary and secondary schooling.