Blogpost #7 - Academic & Professional Readings...

Share three pieces of academic or professional reading and explain how they and other sources helped you form hypotheses about aspects of teaching that might contribute to current patterns of learning.

Inquiry Question: Can we make accelerated shifts in Literacy through teaching Identity and Cultural Competencies?

1. Difficulties relating to teaching and learning are derived largely from the kinds of conflicts that arise in the process of translating foreign ideas and the difficulty of conceptualising these ideas. Most of the content as well as the methods of our formal education systems have been and continue to be based on mainly western rather than indigenous systems.

As teachers we owe it to ourselves and our communities to look towards our cultures, (the contexts in which the task of educating future generations is carried out), for clues to some of the questions that vex us today. We need to share this cultural knowledge with those who come to us...so they too would better understand the context in which we work and which give us sustenance...

for we cannot let our silences

again keep us apart

mortgage our identity

or even sell our pride

we do not want to suffer pain

privately at the end

because we know deep inside

we've only ourselves to blame

A Consideration of (Cultural) Context in Teacher Education

Konai Helu-Thaman (1992)

2. Talanoa is a popular and preferred means of communication that captures the traditions and protocols of the Pacific Islands. It is a Pasifika research methodology used to capture people's stories, realities and aspirations (Vaioleti, 2003). Talanoa can be referred to as a conversation, a talk, an exchange of ideas or thinking between people. It can be formal or informal and almost always carried out face to-face. Tala means to inform, tell, relate and command, as well as to ask or apply. Noa means of any kind, ordinary, nothing in particular, purely imaginary or void (Vaioleti, 2006). Talanoa is common in many parts of the Pacific, such as Samoa, Fiji and Tonga. It enables social engagement and can lead from storytelling to critical discussions. It is an approach that most Pasifika people relate to as they practice it everyday in their homes, churches and schools.

Talanoa Research Methodology: A Developing Position on Pacific Research

Timote M. Vaioleti (2006)

3. Sourced from my Tongan culture, is the kakala framework. Kakala refers to fragrant flowers woven together to make a garland, and has many equivalent concepts in Oceania such as lei (Hawaii), hei (Cook Islands) or salusalu (Fiji). Kakala embodies physical, social and spiritual elements and reflects the integrated nature of indigenous epistemologies and knowledge systems. There are three major processes associated with Kakala; toli, tui and luva. Toli is the collection and selection of flowers and other plant material for making the kakala...tui is the making or weaving of the kakala. The time taken to do this depends on the complexity and intricacies of the flowers...Luva is the final process and is about giving the kakala away to someone else as a sign of peace, love and respect. Kakala requires me to utilise knowledge from global as well as Pacific (indigenous) cultures in order to weave something that is meaningful and culturally appropriate for my students.

This is important because, teaching in my view, is essentially autobiographic: as teachers, we give of ourselves when we share our knowledge, skills and values with our students. If this is motivated by compassion, a commitment to peaceful and harmonious relations, and respects for one another's cultures, then sharing will lead to wisdom and sustainable relationships in the classroom and other learning contexts.

Teacher capacities for working towards peace and sustainable development

Konai Helu-Thaman (2010)