Pedagogical Principles for Aboriginal Teacher Education
Abstract
Aboriginal teacher education is a distinctive educational activity. How distinctive Aboriginal teacher education needs to be and the forms it might take are a matter for action research (McTaggart and Garbutcheon-Singh, 1986) by Aboriginal teachers, their communities, and teacher educators working in Aboriginal schools, and from teacher education instititions. But there is experience available from which it is reasonable to propose some general principles which should guide immediate efforts in Aboriginal teacher education.
The pedagogical principles outlined below come from an action research project in Aboriginal teacher education conducted in the Northern Territory over the last two years. The project is known as D-Bate, the Deakin-Batchelor Aboriginal Teacher Education Program, a joint project of Batchelor College in the Northern Territory and the School of Education of Deakin University in Geelong, Victoria.
References
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Lanhupuy W., 1987: Occasional address at the Deakin University ceremony for the presentation of Bachelor of Arts in Education degree testamurs to successful 1986 D-BATE students, Batchelor College, Thursday June 4.
McTaggart R., and Garbutcheon-Singh M., 1986: New direction in action research. Curriculum Perspectives , 6 (2), 42–46.
