The Aboriginal Child and Literacy in English
Abstract
While it is important that Australian teachers are made aware of their failures in teaching many Aboriginals to master literacy (Salmond, 1977; Duncan, 1974) there is a danger of developing a general expectancy that children of Aboriginal descent will be poor performers at school. Resnick and Robinson (1974) emphasize the influence of parent and teacher expectations on the expectations of the children themselves. Teachers’ expectations are particularly important for Aboriginals learning academic skills at school. It is the teacher who can grade learning tasks to ensure the child gains success through his own personal effort, a fundamental experience if low expectations are to be raised (Gurin and Gurin, 1972).
The purpose of this paper is to examine data from the ACER Literacy and Numeracy study of Australian 10 and 14 year olds in 1975, as it relates to the Aboriginals in the sample. On the basis of this evidence it should be possible to draw some conclusions about the successes and failures of Aboriginal pupils in reading and numeracy.
References
Bourke S.F. : The mastery of reading. In Bourke S.F. & Keeves J.P., Australian Studies in School Performance – Vol.3 – The Mastery of Literacy and Numeracy: Final Report. AGPS. 1977.
Bourke S.F. and Parkin B. : The performance of Aboriginal students. Ibid. Ch.8
Boyd R.M. : Motivation scores related to progress in listening and reading. The Aboriginal Child at School,1911, 5(4), 38–45.
Duncan A.T. : Education and Aborigines. In Aboriginal Children in the Classroom. Proceedings of Seminar for Teachers of Aboriginal Children in the Taree Inspectorate, 1974, 121–138.
Gurin G. and Gurin P. : Expectancy theory in the study of poverty. In Sperry L. (Ed.) Learning Performance and Individual Differences. Scott, Foresman and Co., 1972, 37–54 .
Resnick L.B. and Robinson B.H. Motivational Aspects of the Literacy Problem. Learning Research and Development Center, Univ. of Pittsburgh, 1974.
Salmond J. : Aboriginals and reading. The Aboriginal Child at School. 1977, 5(5), 57–63 .
