Case Study:
Case study of teacher CRP action research project
Teacher: Julie
School: Ngutu College
Learning Area: English
Year level: 4-6
Context
Ngutu College is in its 4th year of operation after opening in 2021 with the aim of doing schooling differently through the seamless infusion of Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing alongside western curriculum knowledge. The overarching philosophy of Ngutu, builds upon young people’s funds of knowledge and builds upon the individuality of all young people.
It is located in the western suburbs of Adelaide as an independent, non-denominational, socially-just college currently operating from Kindy to year 10, with the expansion to year 12 by 2026. Currently, there are 234 young people enrolled, with 104 young people identifying as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander. In addition to the large cohort of Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander young people, 20% of Ngutu staff also identify as Aboriginal.
Julie has been teaching for 19 years. She has taught in mainly category 1 and 2 schools (which broadly refers to schools in high poverty areas) before moving to Ngutu College when it opened in 2021. During the time of this project Julie was teaching a year 4-6 cohort. Julie acknowledged that her Wardli/ class was super diverse. Within her classroom she had 28% of children who identified as Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander, 28% of children who had an ADHD/ADD diagnosis, 40% of children who had an ASD diagnosis, 20% of children who had anxiety, 16% of children who had a dyslexia, dyscalculia or a dysgraphia diagnosis, 20% of children had a processing disorder, 8% of children had an intellectual disability. There were 52% female children, 36% male children and 12% of children who identified as nonbinary.
Julie worked with a full time Co-Educator within her Wardli/ classroom space and engaged the whole class with the action research project however she had 5 focus children within the project.
The pedagogical challenge
The pedagogical challenge that Julie continued to face was disengagement during yarning circles and whole class discussions. Some children were keen to speak but not listen. Some were opting out by leaving the circle or leaving the room. She had children being passive rather than active. Julie had children talking over the top of one another and it was often the same voices being heard. Julie acknowledged that one of the loudest voices in the room was her own. Many of these same children were disengaged during writing time and they had a reliance on educators for constant reassurance. There was high anxiety about taking risks and children would often give up before trying out things for themselves.
Julie wanted to see if bringing in children’s life worlds would make a difference to engagement whilst shifting the dependency on educators.
Theoretical Basis
Julie’s approach drew on the ‘Guidelines for Preparing Culturally Responsive Teachers for Alaska’s Schools’ published by the Alaska Native Knowledge Network. The 8 Standards shared in this document resonated with Julie’s beliefs around quality education practices.
Links to the five key ideas
Julie chose to focus on three of the five key ideas.
- Life worlds
- Connecting in with people who are important to the children in her class to raise engagement.
- High intellectual challenge
- Every child completing their own book about their chosen person.
- Performing your learning/multi modal
- Sharing completed books in a whole class book launch in which family, friends and staff were invited to attend.
However, throughout the project all five were evident, so this also included:
- Activism
- Cultural difference as a positive asset for learning
The action research question
“How will engaging in children’s life worlds improve participation in English?”
Doing the action research
Julie engaged with Uncle Allan, the Elder in Residence at Ngutu College. Uncle Allan spent time teaching the children the process and protocols that come with holding a yarning circle. The ritual of yarning circles became part of our classroom practice and some of these were filmed during the project to analyse engagement and participation.
Children were immersed in the series of books titled “Little People, Big Dreams”. They were asked: “If you were to write one of these books, who would you write it about? Who is someone who has inspired you, taught you something or you know has overcome a challenge?’
This became the focus for many yarning circles before the children became friendly demanders and asked when they were going to write the books. The children didn’t want to just talk about it, they wanted to author their own books. Julie had anticipated this being the start of an oral language project in which dialogue was encouraged and children built identities as confident speakers and active listeners whilst connecting to children’s life worlds.
Children worked hard to collect information from their families or the person they were writing a book about through interviews. The information gathered from these interviews were storyboarded and made into picture books.
Data collected.
Julie kept a journal and made anecdotal notes on the focus children’s engagement during yarning circles and during writing lessons.
Yarning circle videos and audio recordings were also taken and analysed to capture focus children’s engagement and participation.
Samples of children’s writing.
Regular conversations between the educators on progress or challenges.
Student and teacher outcomes
Children’s engagement in yarning circles increased when the topic was about themselves, someone they loved or someone they were proud of.
Every child persisted to publish a book of their own about their chosen person. Some children were so engaged in the process they wrote multiple books.
Julie became a friendly demander, nudging for high intellectual challenge. Encouraging children to find out more information, to write one more page or to support children who needed help in conducting their interviews or typing their picture books.
Julie noticed relationships were strengthened both between children as well as between educators and children. There was a sense of vulnerability when sharing stories and Julie felt that it was essential if she was asking children to do so, she would need to model this also by sharing stories about her own Nanna.
Children performed learning through sharing their published books with family, friends, College staff through a book launch event.
The broader picture
Ngutu College has intentions of being a Culturally Responsive School. Seeing Educators as researchers of their own practice is encouraged and time is invested into this happening. As well as looking internally for experts to share their learning journey and findings.
Ngutu College’s values of “duality, sustainability, hope, creativity and empowerment” were honoured in this process.
Conclusions
Julie recognised that engagement in bringing in life worlds brought more than she thought it would. It strengthened relationships between educator to child as well as child to child. These strengthened relationships enabled Julie to nudge for high intellectual challenge.
Bringing in children’s life worlds shared the power. Julie was no longer holder of all the knowledge. It shifted this focus to each of the children. They were the experts.
Creating spaces to operate as the third educator supported pedagogical change. Action research allowed Julie to examine her pedagogy, try things out and learn.
Documenting along the way was hard and there was the need to ensure strategies were in place to enable this to happen. A real commitment to journalling or notetaking was needed.
There was a change in energy and atmosphere during writing time. Kids were committed to finishing and became high demanders. Julie felt a sense of pride, she felt love and she felt so honoured to be trusted with these stories that the kids were sharing.
Julie found the affect to not always be positive. It was confronting when children were sad because of the person they were writing about was no longer alive.