We are delighted to share that Goodstart Kurri Kurri’s Educational Leader and Early Childhood Teacher, Catherine Jones, has been awarded the NSW 2025 Premier’s Teachers Mutual Bank Aboriginal Education Scholarship. to support teachers in furthering their understanding and knowledge of Aboriginal education.
The “Early Years Learning Framework” is the early childhood sectors’ national curriculum framework, for children from birth to five years-of-age. In January 2023, V2.0 was released, which required teachers to be culturally responsive and to create culturally safe places through intercultural pedagogies.
With over 20-years of teaching and leadership experience within the Early Childhood sector, and as an academic in the School of Education at Macquarie University, Catherine’s motivation for applying for the sponsorship was to unpack what the V2.0 revisions mean for teachers and how they can incorporate them in practice.
Catherine aims to enhance not only her own practice but also provide valuable insights for the sector, ultimately benefiting the children and our local communities.
“I want to make it really clear, I'm an experienced teacher, and I can put my hand up and say I don't really get this. And I'm hoping that perhaps this makes other people feel better and think ‘she didn't know, and she tried to find out, and maybe it's not so scary.”
“For a long time, it's been important that we embed Aboriginal perspectives into the curriculum, but V2.0 asked us to take that much further and to incorporate Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing. This is a huge area that educators need to understand to be able to implement the Early Years Learning Framework authentically. It's from the vision, right through the document. It's not just one part of it,” Catherine said.
“It's our job, as non-indigenous people, to learn. We need to understand it and be able to implement it. It’s a whole different world view for me, coming from a Western perspective, to then be able to implement pedagogies that I haven't been taught how to do. The framework talks a lot about place-based pedagogies. If I ask people what ‘place-based pedagogies’ are, a lot of people wouldn't be able to answer that.”
Catherine will be focusing on engaging in a deep way with Aboriginal culture, exploring her own relationship with country, and gaining more knowledge about creating culturally safe places.
“I will be spending a lot of time on and learning from country. Really trying to engage more with the indigenous communities. Visiting schools and centres and gathering knowledge and resources to help rebalance the teaching that we're doing,” Catherine said.
“I'll be focusing on my community, but then also going to several other sites across Australia and New Zealand and learning about what these critical place-based pedagogies look like in day-to-day practice.”
Catherine is so excited about her study tour and describes this as ‘a chance of a lifetime’, which reflects her passion and commitment to making a meaningful impact in early childhood education. Catherine believes that when implemented fully, the V2.0 revisions will promote children's well-being and strengthen their sense of identity and connection to country and community.
Of the seventeen teachers who received a scholarship, Catherine was one of only two from the Early Childhood sector. Catherine is eager to encourage others to pursue similar opportunities and apply for scholarships to continue their professional development within the sector.
“I don't think it matters where you are in your in your learning journey. If you've got a passion and you've got a good idea to dive deeper, then I think you should go for this scholarship. I'd help them apply.”