Building Cultural integrity with 'Country asTeacher'

This project will implement and assess the effectiveness of the ‘Country as Teacher’professional learning approach, pedagogy and curriculum design, building on piloting of the approach during a Teachers as Researchers program in 2020. Based in Indigenous knowledge and ways of being the ‘Country as Teacher’ program embeds classroom practice in deep respect for place-focused, ecocentric pedagogies that have been part of teaching and learning in Australia for centuries. This project will assess the transformative impacts of participation
in the program for teachers, students, and the school community, exploring how well it increases capacities to know, understand, and care for the places they inhabit. Learning from Country through encounter and story-telling are central to the educative processes practiced as part of teaching and learning in Australia for centuries. The place-focused, ecocentric Indigenous pedagogical approaches informing this project build skills for cultural integrity alongside capacity to address ecological challenges and nurture capacity for genuine reconciliation.