Year
2024Credit points
10Campus offering
No unit offerings are currently available for this unitPrerequisites
NilUnit rationale, description and aim
In order to operate as effective educators, a knowledge of the scholarship surrounding learning and teaching as it articulates with different cultural contexts is required.
This unit assists participants to explore specific worldviews of specified South East Asian and /or Pacific Island peoples, how they learn and communicate with one another and how this influences their implementation of national curriculum. Participants are encouraged to share their teaching experiences as a foundation to reflectively engage with appropriate international teaching perspectives. The focus of this unit is to respectfully assist participants working collaboratively, to critically explore their own teaching and the complex dynamics that promote learning by students, whose first language is not English.
This is one of four units within the mission-focused Certificate in Learning and Teaching which is delivered offshore.
This unit aims to enable participants to be able to contextualise their teaching practices in light of cultural-sensitive scholarship.
Learning outcomes
To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.
Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.
Explore the graduate capabilities.
| Learning Outcome Number | Learning Outcome Description | Relevant Graduate Capabilities |
|---|---|---|
| LO1 | Describe learning practices that influence and support learning for all. | GC1, GC2, GC7, GC9, GC11 |
| LO2 | Demonstrate knowledge of local cultures and how they influence reflective teaching and learning experiences. | GC1, GC2, GC4, GC6, GC7, GC9, GC11, GC12 |
| LO3 | Design approaches to creating and sustaining learning that is responsive to policy contexts, community needs, and the professional learning needs of teachers. | GC1, GC2, GC3, GC4, GC6, GC7, GC8, GC9, GC11 |
Content
Topics will include:
- Contextual Analysis
- Immediate school experiences
- Cultural and national priorities
- Critique of national curriculum
- Teacher responsibilities including “Duty of Care”, mandatory reporting and other legislation
- Tension between western education and local cultural values
- Uncritical transfer of western curriculum and values to developing countries
- Critiquing teacher centered, student centered and learner centered pedagogical perspectives
- Critiquing local understandings of quality teaching
- Improving teaching and learning
- Summary of current and planned research on teaching, learning curriculum in the local context
- Innovations in teaching and learning in developing countries
- Visible learning and its application to the local context
- Reflective educational practice: professional, community, assessment preparation
Learning and teaching strategy and rationale
A variety of learning and teaching approaches are sequenced and integrated to comprise a progressive and developmental learning and teaching strategy emphasising collaborative learning and cultural sensitivity. Culturally relevant pedagogies accompanied by new pedagogies and critical reflection are explored. Students are encouraged to share experiences and challenges with each other in order to develop a community of practice in their schools. The unit employs stimulating adult learning strategies to maximise student engagement and critical reflection. These include:
- Face to face learning – seminars, tutorials and workshops
- Collaborative learning
- Practical activities
- Self-directed study
- Required reading
- Multi-media sources and viewing
Assessment strategy and rationale
The underpinning assessment strategy needs to relate to:
- Knowledge of context
- Implementation of pedagogical practices that are culturally appropriate
- Critical evaluation of teaching and student learning
The assessment tasks for this unit have been designed to contribute to high quality student learning by both helping students learn (assessment for learning), and by measuring explicit evidence of their learning (assessment of learning). Assessments have been developed to meet the unit learning outcomes and develop graduate attributes consistent with University assessment requirements. These have been designed so that they use individual and group tasks to measure the different learning outcomes of the unit. Assessments are adapted to the contexts where the learning in the unit occurs and include practical activities, presentation of findings and a reflective report.
Overview of assessments
| Brief Description of Kind and Purpose of Assessment Tasks | Weighting | Learning Outcomes |
|---|---|---|
Assessment Task 1 Reflective Practitioner (individual) Using a structured protocol, teachers plan, teach and evaluate two lessons. The protocol identifies how reflective practice is critiqued in each dynamic. The assignment report invites students to identify their planning for student learning and to evaluate its implementation. | 40% | LO1, LO2 |
Assessment Task 2 Reflective Practitioner (group) Using a structured protocol, teachers in teams share and critique their colleagues’ planning, implementation and evaluation of two lessons. Colleagues engage with one another at the planning stage and evaluation stage. These dialogues and written evaluation protocols serve at the data for the assessment report. The protocols aim to guide the professional reflection that is the basis of the report. | 60%* | LO1, LO2, LO3 |
Representative texts and references
Ganimian, A. Murnane, R. (2016). Improving education in developing countries: lessons from rigorous impact evaluations, Review of Education Research, 86, 3, 719-755
Guthrie, G. (2010). Progressive education fallacy in developing countries: In favour of formalism, London: Springer.
Guthrie, G. (2018). Classroom change in developing countries, London: Taylor & Francis.
Masino, S., & Niño-Zarazúa, M. (2016). What works to improve the quality of student learning in developing countries? International Journal of Educational Development, 48, 53-65.
McLaughlin, J. (2017). Shifting boundaries and education development discourses: Implications for comparative and international education in Oceania. In: Annual Review of Comparative and International Education, Published online: 22 Jan 2018; 205-230. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1479-367920180000034018
Reid, K., & Kleinhenz, E. (2015). Supporting teacher development: Literature review, Canberra: Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.