I have taught in two remote aboriginal schools in the northern territory. One was a ‘non-bilingual school’, and the other a bilingual school.

 

I have been trained in and have taught classes using; First Steps, Accelerated Literacy, Ann Morrice and Walking Talking Texts.

 

I completed my training in Queensland and have done an internship in a remote Aboriginal school in North Queensland.

 

I have received praise from many people, both in the education department and from other departments, when they have been into my classroom about what is happening there.

 

This year has been particularly exciting and the students have done better than what has been previously achieved with that age cohort.

 

This is the story of my professional journey.

 

At the non-bilingual  school, the indigenous children spoke ‘Aboriginal English’[1] as their first language.  The children at the school were very defiant about learning through and speaking in ‘Standard Australian English’.  The majority of them could read, in that they were able to sound out words. Yet they did not choose to read. They did not choose to write. As one child once told me,

 

“Hey Miss…  what for them other fella been say we dun talk proper way? I been talk same like eberbody. You white fella dun talk proper way.”

 

I ran a program where the children practiced becoming literate in their own language.

We spent time in the mornings writing in Aboriginal English or as we called it ‘home language’ then translated it into Standard Australian English or ‘school language’ and visa-versa. We translated texts into ‘home language’… etcetera…

 

Once the children could see that reading and writing could be applied to their home language, and that it was in fact a distinct language and not ‘bad English’ they were more willing to work at developing competencies in school language.

One day a student said to me

 

“Miss… on the weekend we been catch big mob fish… Hey! If I been talk school way.. I been say… On the weekend I caught lots of fish… Hey Miss, that what I been say school way …huh?!?”

 

The lesson that I took away from this school was that children have a fundamental need to be able to learn to read and write in their home language and to be able to have their language valued as part of the schooling system.

 

I purposefully applied to teach at a bilingual school for my next teaching position, as I want to see what it was like first hand.

Many people warned me off bilingual schools, saying that they were a waste of time. After reading up on the philosophy, the mountains of research that supports bilingual approaches, the complete dearth of research to support the (many) ‘arguments’ against bilingualism and various personal stories from people in the social networks that I am apart of, I decided that the only way to truly know would be to go and work at one.

 

 

 

 

When I arrived at the bilingual school I had to totally change my mindset.

 

I had to confront the very deeply inculcated ‘Australian’ value of  monolinguality – that is the belief that to have knowledge one must speak English.

 

I had to re-examine my role as a teacher, from one that delivers education directly to the students, to a role of making sure that educational outcomes were being delivered to the students in the best possible way.

 

I will now talk about how my classroom has worked this year.

 

The students learnt through their mother tongue for 70% of the day, and through English for 30% or about 1 hour and 39 minutes.  This class is grade 2/3. In grade 3 the students start learning how to read and write in English.

 

I do not speak that language, at least not to the extent that I am able discuss conceptual knowledge. That would take 5 or more years of intensive study.

 

Literacy is mainly taught through the students’ first language.  As my TA has no formal training it is my job to ensure that the students are being taught in a pedagogically sound way.

 

There is a real shortage of TA’s that are fully trained. There is also a shortage of teachers who speak the traditionally languages as a first language. This may have something to do with them not getting the same conditions as ‘blow in’ teachers, for example free housing.

 

I think about how literacy is taught in a mainstream school, and apply these processes and theories to how literacy is taught in the first language.

 

At the start of this year, we spent a lot of time working on teaching the students the genre of narrative. This was taught in their first language.

 

In English we were focusing on teaching the alphabet, and basic sight words. We were teaching these through craft activities in the afternoon session. We were also doing a lot of role-playing in English, to improve their vocabulary and oracy.

 

Two students made benchmark in the NAP in writing.

 

They clearly showed how they were transferring their knowledge of genre’s in their first language to English.

 

Everyday the students in our room spend time reading and writing in their first language and in English.

 

They keep a daily journal in both languages. 

 

 

When my TA is away, it is not possible to do the literacy side of the curriculum, unless the dedicated workers from the Literature Production Centre (LPC)  can find time in their overwhelming workload to come up and assist.

 

The LPC has had its funding cut in real terms, by reductions and trade offs, and by not being increased in line with the CPI. So this makes it a challenge to provide quality Bilingual education. The only reason that it does work is through the sheer will of the indigenous workers.

 

In other subject areas for example; Mathematics, Science, Studies of society and the Environment, etc, my TA and I plan together about how to deliver the conceptual knowledge. This is a combination of  my TA delivering the instruction independently and my TA translating the instructions that I give.

 

In other subject areas, it is the conceptual knowledge that proves difficult to communicate in a foreign language.

 

When my TA is not at school the children really want to do what I am asking them, however if we are talking bout conceptual knowledge they often do not understand what I am asking them to do. When my TA is at school the concept is explained to the students in their home language and you can see the light bulbs going on.

 

 

After having the students for almost a whole year now.

 

With the appalling, yet slightly above average attendance rate of 60-70%, attendance is such a huge problem across the territory.

 

Children are reading and writing in English. They are reading and writing in their first language.

 

The children are becoming literate and are proud of their literacy. They are not ashamed of being literate in English, as the students were at the non-bilingual school. They do not see being literate in Standard Australian English as compromising who they are, as they know that their own language is a valued part of the school environment.