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Are you interested in how to embed Aboriginal perspectives in early childhood education regarding space?

Our summary today works with the chapter titled Engaging with place – Foregrounding Aboriginal perspectives in early childhood education from 2017 by Catherine Hamm and Kelly Boucher, from the book titled Found in Translation: Connecting reconceptualist thinking with early childhood education practices. This episode is a great preparation for our next interviewee, Kelly Boucher in episode 114. Since we are investigating the future of cities, I thought it would be interesting to see the different aspects of how to engage with place, and in a broader sense with our environment. This chapter presents the Aboriginal worldviews which are in a relationship with space including human and non-human elements.

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Welcome to today’s What is The Future For Cities podcast and its Research episode; my name is Fanni, and today I will introduce a research paper by summarising it. The episode really is just a short summary of the original paper, and, in case it is interesting enough, I would encourage everyone to check out the whole paper. Stay tuned until because I will give you the 3 most important things and some questions which would be interesting to discuss with a special attention to Australian cities.

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The practice of engaging with local specific indigenous knowledges requires authentic respectful connections to local indigenous groups and a commitment to engage with the full range of historical, political and ethical contexts. Thinking with local, place-based Aboriginal perspectives is largely absent from the everyday practices in early childhood programs which usually are linear, an individual process of achieving milestones along a continuum. Many teachers lack confidence to respectfully and authentically engage with these perspectives as part of their general praxis. This chapter presents the refiguring moments as narratives that attend to the ways in which stories and re-storying disrupt linear modes of knowledge consumption.

The authors through their preparation realised that there is place to embed arts into early childhood teacher education as a way to disrupt traditional practices by moving beyond a technical, structured approach to meaning-making. They bring different perspectives to the commitment to embed Aboriginal perspectives in everyday teaching and learning practices in early childhood, through engaging with the local places where live and work happens to disrupt linear, Western worldviews. This involves working with student teachers to disrupt the taken-for-granted practices of early childhood by attending to concepts, pedagogical practices and worldviews that respectfully centre Aboriginal ways of knowing.

The linear perspective of how children learn and live leaves little room for attending to situated and everyday moments of teaching and learning. In contrast, Aboriginal worldviews are non-linear and situated in relationships, not just exclusively with humans, but also include learning with and from place and more-than-human others, as important actors in knowledge processes. One way to move beyond the linear thinking is to engage with local places by foregrounding local expressions of Aboriginal culture as part of everyday moments of teaching and learning with young children. In Australia, the tension between colonial and Aboriginal cultures and histories make it challenging but not impossible to engage with the Aboriginal worldviews respectfully but that required knowledge and confidence from education.

This chapter presents that this process is messy, filled with tension but must be done due to ethical and political responsibilities. The authors advocate for raising critical questions that take into account the ethics and politics of teaching, generating images of children as being capable and competent of seeing places differently. Pedagogy and curriculum are situated as knowledge mobilization – ways to enact knowledge, rather than just storing content. The authors show how teaching and learning is situated within the concept of being present as a way to engage with complexity.

One of the examples they brought was thinking about space. Attending to place in complex ways requires thinking beyond space or place as culturally or politically neutral while perpetuating forms of European universalism. Thinking with place from Aboriginal knowledge perspectives moves aside the layers of manicured lawns and English country gardens. This acknowledges the traditional Land Owners and situation place with histories and contexts, not as just geographical location, disrupting the dominant colonial understanding of space and place.

Being present requires a move beyond taken-for-granted practices of early childhood that are often bound in developmental logic and work to observe children in a clinical way, positioned by the norms created from child development theories and the construct of the universal child. Being present is a way to enact pedagogy that generates complexity and makes room for different ways of knowing, being and doing. Being present opens spaces to rethink pedagogies as a way to think with concepts and ideas, rather than thinking about or consuming content.

Thinking about content for learning is a universal, decontextualised way that does not engage with complexity or the ethics and politics of teaching. Thinking with offers unexpected unknown ways of learning without predetermined outcomes. Thinking with generates a shift in pedagogy, being comfortable with not knowing and being open to the unpredictable nature of entanglement of bodies, materials, place and wondering. Thinking with complexity can push our practices into uncomfortable places, like children asking about the Aboriginal history of Australia and the teachers answering their questions honestly and with highlighting the complexity and discomfort of that history.

In situating place as a pedagogical contact zone, we acknowledge that places are always in a state of entanglement of human and more-than-human others. The term contact zone gestures towards the ways in which entanglements occur, unpredictably. The authors found the expression ‘learning to be affected’ useful to make room for understanding place as a generative pedagogical zone. This framing attends to the ways in which places are entangled in all kinds of bodies and works to disrupt the linear thinking of place. Thinking with learning to be affected is underpinned by doing. New doings, or mobilizing knowledge is required if we want to introduce different ways of thinking, like the Aboriginal perspectives.

The professional experience with the idea of learning to be affected, Engaging with Place, has been a playgroup taking place in long day care centres, preschools, schools and libraries. The focus is on creating relationships with children, families, the mentor teacher and place. Learning and teaching is focused on place-based pedagogy and what it means to be a teacher for all contributors, mentors and students alike. Conversations, playing with materials and other aspects create the doing part while also help learn to be affected and engage with place.

Pedagogy, curriculum and education can be situated as knowledge mobilisation, something to be enacted, rather than consumed. Situating pedagogy in this way makes room to generate practices that engage with complexity and acknowledge that this engagement is never completed. Conversations and other practices can move us beyond taken-for-granted discourses of child development, towards complex practices. This work requires us to engage in the tensions that come from examining our practices and pushing us into uncomfortable places. By engaging with the notion of place as a pedagogical zone, we work with the understanding that places are layered with complexity and their history. There are no resolutions to these tensions – this messy work remains as part of our everyday practices of being present in our spaces.

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What was the most interesting part for you? What questions did arise for you? Do you have any follow up question? Let me know on Twitter at WTF4Cities or on the wtf4cities.com website where the transcripts and show notes are available! Additionally, I will highly appreciate if you consider subscribing to the podcast or on the website. I hope this was an interesting paper for you as well, and thanks for tuning in!

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Finally, as the most important things, I would like to highlight 3 aspects:

1. Pedagogy and curriculum can be situated as knowledge mobilization – ways to enact knowledge, rather than just storing content and in situating place as a pedagogical contact zone, we acknowledge that places are always in a state of entanglement of human and more-than-human others.
2. Being present opens spaces to rethink pedagogies as a way to think with concepts and ideas, rather than thinking about or consuming content.
3. Learning to be affected’ term can be useful to make room for understanding place as a generative pedagogical zone which attends to the ways in which places are entangled in all kinds of bodies and works to disrupt the linear thinking of place.

Additionally, it would be great to talk about the following questions:

1. What do you think about the connection between space and pedagogy?
2. What do you think about the tensions in a place’s history?
3. What are the tensions in your place, environment and city and how do you attend those?

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