What I Learned in School Today

Every day there is something new. At our staff meeting this week, we were walked through the process of an individual plan for Aboriginal students. I hope that as I describe it, I have interpretted the information accurately! My school here has a high Aboriginal population, and these plans are a piece of communication that includes the family, the student, and the teacher. It is different from an IEP, in fact, the two are not related at all.

This plan is specifically for goal setting and understanding each culture (Aboriginal heritage and public school). It aims at retention and attendance. The drop out rate for high school is very high. With these plans in place and revisted on a predetermined schedule, one hopes that the student will continue in school and be successful. It involves interests, strenghs, needs, family involvement, and teacher support and understanding.

The last terms are very large and complicated. That is, if I understand it correctly, the Aboriginal culture is one of extended family, close family, and fluid family. The members come and go, someone is there looking after children, but it might change one day to the next. They might go on "walk about" and move the household to another family member's for awhile. Parents may or may not catch up to them for awhile. However it "looks," it's all good.

You can imagine this affects attendance, homework, consistency, routines, friendships, and responsibilities in the world of the public school. Yet with the country's apology to the Aboriginal culture, certain obligations are to be met for these families. Yes, there are also issues of tolerance and racism. Complicated. I find myself thinking of our Hispanic culture and our Native American culture in the same breath. It is still different, though, and very immediate. My classroom has 25 students, 8 or 9 of whom are Aboriginal. They are beautiful children, and I can see them marching to a bit of a different drummer. It's so great! At the same time, I'm learning about the local Gumbayggirr language spoken by the local tribe when the language teacher comes to the classroom once a week. How lucky am I?