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Sarah Tartakover explores the obstacles to achieving inclusive education in Australia and offers insights on delivering it more effectively.

Image courtesy of interviewee. December 6, 2023

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This video video discusses the concept of inclusive education and its significance in providing equitable educational opportunities and outcomes for all students, regardless of their diverse backgrounds. The speaker emphasizes three key components of inclusive education:

1. **Disposition**: A genuine interest and emotional commitment from educators to inclusivity.
2. **Critical Pedagogy**: Encouraging students to develop a critical consciousness regarding societal issues, power dynamics, and oppression.
3. **Social Justice**: Actively combating discrimination and fostering an environment where students engage in discussions about racism, homophobia, and other forms of inequality.

The speaker critiques the historical development of education, noting that curricula have often been shaped by a narrow, predominantly white, middle-class perspective. They highlight the challenges educators face, such as resistance from parents when addressing topics like LGBTQI+ inclusion or anti-racism.

There is a call to diversify the teaching workforce to better represent the student population, as this can have a positive impact on students’ engagement and success. The speaker also stresses the importance of ongoing reflection and critique of personal biases among teachers and within educational policies.

Ultimately, the text advocates for a holistic approach to inclusive education that involves the entire school community, with a focus on creating a supportive, culturally safe environment for all students. The need for continuous professional development and the integration of diverse perspectives throughout the educational process is underlined as vital for achieving equitable educational outcomes.

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X-TIMESTAMP-MAP:LOCAL=00:00:00.000,MPEGTS=900000

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Inclusive education for me is about providing

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equitable educational outcomes

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and opportunities for all students regardless

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of their culture, their SES background, their religion,

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their ability, their disability, and so on.

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So all students, regardless of their backgrounds,

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are deserving and have a right to have quality,

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education, which engages them

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and, promotes their success.

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So historically, as we know, education

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curriculum has been developed largely by white male,

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you know, middle class, people.

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And so the curriculum very much reflects that.

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So I think we really need to be aware of, looking

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for opportunities that re represent all our

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students in the curriculum.

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And also the way that the curriculum, is taught.

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Um, there's, I guess there's three.

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I think inclusive education's a a massive,

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I could probably talk for hours about this,

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but I think for me there's three key factors or,

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or components that are really important.

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The first one is this idea of a, of a disposition.

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So having this genuine interest,

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and desire to be inclusive of all your students.

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And I think to see the humanity in everyone,

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to see diversity as a positive characteristic.

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I, I almost think it's an emotional thing sometimes when I'm

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teaching, I'm sorry, I teach in teacher education

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with pre-service teachers,

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and it's almost something that's, that's visceral,

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that you can see pre-service teachers who really want

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to make an impact beyond going into classrooms and,

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and teaching content that they actually wanna have a

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positive impact, particularly for students who have been

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historically marginalized.

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So that disposition, I think, is really, really,

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important.

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The second thing, I think, the second component

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for me is also around critical pedagogy.

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So engaging students in developing a critical consciousness

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or awareness, around about the world, really.

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And, thinking about texts,

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and when I say texts, it could be images, photos, films,

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thinking about how power and oppression is,

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and, you know, the ideology of the cre, the person creating

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that text is represented.

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So who's at the margins, who's in the center?

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And I think pre-service teachers

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and then their students need to, have this, you know,

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developed sense of a critical consciousness

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and a critical awareness around, around society.

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So how, how, you know, systems of oppression,

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operate in society.

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Um, I think the third thing is,

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developing a sense of social justice.

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Social justice is often bandied around quite a lot

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and can, can be a little bit rhetorical.

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Um, but I think social justice is really important

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that we actually need to be making an active stance against

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discrimination about ra against racism, homophobia.

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And we need to, engage students and,

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and pre-service teachers and teachers, in, in that work.

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I think that's really important.

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And of course, everyone comes along.

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I like to say to pre-service teachers in my class

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that we're all on a continuum.

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We all come onto that continuum at different levels

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because of our life experiences.

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And, you know, as long as we're all moving towards

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so social justice, we might, you know,

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pre-service teachers when they graduate might not

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necessarily go in in their first year

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and be, you know, challenging the status quo.

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And some might be amazingly,

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you know, doing a great job of that.

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But that, that needs to be, I think, the aspiration

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that we're able to, change society for, for the better.

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I think that has to be a purpose of education,

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or for me, that is the purpose of education,

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to make life more equitable for, for everybody.

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And particular, well, for,

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for people who've been historically marginalized.

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So Australia, probably like the rest

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of the world at the moment, unfortunately,

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is really dominated by populist right wing media.

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And in Australia, unfortunately,

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that is very widely consumed.

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Um, we've just had a referendum in Australia,

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and I think the, I think that really illustrated,

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sadly, it illustrated it very well how right wing media

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can be very divisive.

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And, you know, if there are, if there's racism, for example,

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bubbling under the surface, it can really bring

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that, to the fore.

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So the challenge I think is, is,

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is media and, you know, it's pro it's not likely

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that we are going to be able

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to d di diversify ownership of media particularly.

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So we actually have to, again, going back

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to critical pedagogy, support students

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and teachers, teacher educators like myself,

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continually, critiquing the media that we consume.

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So against that backdrop of media being very divisive,

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homophobic, racist, it's actually,

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it can be really difficult for schools to then introduce,

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curriculum

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and projects, for example, around

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LGBTQI plus inclusion or anti-racism, projects

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or, first nations perspectives.

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It, it, there can be moral panic amongst parents sometimes

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that, that that's going to, you know,

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unsettle the status quo.

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So that can be a real challenge, I think, for, for,

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for education, inclusive education. Um, another,

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Another challenge I think comes from the historical

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origins of inclusive education

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or multicultural education in Australia.

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Um, so multicultural edu multicultural education in

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Australia came about

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after the second World War when we had a lot of migration.

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And the idea was to equalize, educational opportunities

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for those newly arrived migrants.

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So in Australia,

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historically inclusive education has been conceived

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as something as four minority groups.

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And while that doesn't necessarily persist so much, it's a,

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an outdated idea.

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There are pockets of that existing.

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So pre-service teachers in my class will, will say, we,

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you know, we're looking at, mul cultural diversity,

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but we, you know, it was like a tick the box activity.

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We just, you know, the teacher said, okay,

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we are gonna do a day of bringing in, I don't know,

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you know, spaghetti and learning a few words in Greek.

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And we've ticked the box on cultural diversity.

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So I think that that has persisted a little bit.

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This idea that, you know, culturally diverse teaching

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or inclusive education is a bit of an add-on

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for minority groups.

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So it's not something that's embedded across all the subject

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areas across the whole school.

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Um, but it's essentially just something

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that we do once or twice a year.

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And that's the same for all the, you know, the,

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the categories I suppose, of diversity.

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So for example, lgbtq plus inclusion, it might be,

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we just do this one thing on this one day.

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Uh, and sometimes you're even lucky

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at some schools to do that.

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No, it should be something

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that's embedded throughout the year

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where you're constantly coming back

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to it and talking about it.

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And having students, challenge,

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for example, texts that they're reading.

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Where are the, where are the people?

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Where are the communities from the LGBTQ plus

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community in the text?

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Are they on the margins? Are they even there?

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Are they at the center? So again, engaging,

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students in that.

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Another challenge is

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that some schools have this notion

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that if they engage in anti-racism work,

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that it's reflecting badly on their school,

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that they're admitting to having racism at the school.

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So that's, another challenge.

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One more challenge I think, is that, you know, we are all,

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we're all socialized, we all have our biases,

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and unfortunately some teachers, I guess come to go

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to schools and have this deficit notion

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of students from minority backgrounds.

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And that results in those students having really,

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of those teachers having low

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expectations for those students.

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So that's just something that as teachers, we need

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to continually check our biases and our assumptions.

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No one's immune from that. We all do that.

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We've all been socialized to do that.

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But we have to learn to check our own biases, assumptions

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and then make sure our colleagues

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and friends are also challenging us respectfully and,

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and checking those biases

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and assumptions so that we have high standards for, again,

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all our students, regardless of their, their backgrounds.

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We need really good teacher education courses.

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And I, I worry that, you know, everything seems

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to be constrained and there's less hours

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and there's more students.

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So that really worries me.

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But we need to keep fighting back within our educational

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institutions to make sure that inclusion is,

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not only in one, you know, unit,

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but it needs to be across the whole course.

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And we all need to be supporting each other.

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So I think that's one thing, getting pre-service teachers

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to critique their own positionality of

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how they're position in society

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and thinking about how they're privileged

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or oppressed based on their skin color,

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their SES background, how is that affording them unearned

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privileges or oppressing them?

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And as someone who ticks pretty much most

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of the privilege boxes, apart from being female,

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I guess I use myself as, as an example of continually,

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you know, checking my privilege, talking about privilege,

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which is also uncomfortable work,

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for some people or unsettling work.

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Inclusive education isn't just about individual teachers

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developing these dispositions and practices and skills.

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It actually is the responsibility

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of the whole school community.

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So school leaders need to be at the forefront of,

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making it comfortable, encouraging conversations explicitly

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that talk about racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism,

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it need, there needs to be, you know,

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comfortable spaces to do that.

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There needs to be professional development,

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offered in an ongoing way.

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We need to be able to critique the policies of the school.

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And I mean, I think the point is that we have so many policy

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policies, and in fact, in Australia, as you know,

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in the rest of the world, all teachers are

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mandated to be inclusive.

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There's school policy, there's state policy,

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there's federal policy,

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but that actually doesn't necessarily per se mean anything.

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That doesn't mean that teachers are going into classrooms

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and being effective educators.

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So there needs to be, I think sharing examples of,

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of what it looks like in classrooms is a

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really, good idea.

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So continually, sharing examples, what does it look like

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to teach Decolonize the curriculum?

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We've been talking a lot about that.

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Our, our first nations histories and cultures

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and perspectives are very important in Australia.

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However, what I keep hearing from non-indigenous pre-service

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teachers is they're really reticent to do that work.

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They're scared they'll get it wrong.

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How do we encourage them to do that confidently?

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'cause if we don't do that,

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and you know, again, going back to the referendum,

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it looks like we're not doing a particularly good job of

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that, that as an educator, that's really

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where my energy's gonna be going, sort of,

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you know, probably for the rest of my life.

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But we need to, we really need to get, you know,

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have equitable outcomes for First Nations

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students and communities.

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If we're going to, you know, say

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that we are doing inclusive education properly.

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Most of our teachers in Australia, again, like, other

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countries, white, middle class,

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and actually a lot of females.

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Um, so it's really important

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that we diversify our teaching workforce.

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Um, I'm really excited that, my university, I worked

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with some people and we got some funding from the Department

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of Education to recruit people from

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culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds,

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particularly African Australian people

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and First Nations people,

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to a employment based teacher education program

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where they're kind of fast tracked intensively,

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fast tracked out in schools, getting incredible experience.

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And the the purpose of that is that, you know, there are,

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there are, where I live in the western suburbs of me,

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of Melbourne, there are a lot of students, for example,

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from African backgrounds.

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Now, if those students don't see people in front of them

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who look like them, who've had similar experiences who,

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speak the language that they speak, then

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that's very disheartening.

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There's like a, a sort

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of psychic disequilibrium I think when they don't have that.

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There's nothing in that classroom that, you know,

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is reflecting their own lived experiences.

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And of course, people who've had, e experiences.

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There's lots of trauma at the moment.

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Of course, we've got, I went, I visited a school yesterday.

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Um, there were lots of students who've just arrived from

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Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Turkey.

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And one of our pre-service

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teachers who's also had a similar experience

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is there with those students.

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And I can just say that he's thriving

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because he is responding to those students.

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They're responding to them,

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and thankfully the school are really looking

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to him to be a leader.

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So that's the other thing that's, I,

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I've heard the opposite of that.

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I've heard people from African backgrounds in schools

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with 20 years experience,

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and a new teacher can come into that staff room and

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and just ignore the, expertise

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and the experience that that person has.

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So there's so much work to be done on so many levels,

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I think, in schools, in teacher education courses.

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Um, but certainly diversifying the teaching workforce should

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be a real priority.

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I think the first thing I, I do in my,

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teacher education courses,

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so I teach a unit called inclusive education.

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And that course really,

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or that unit has really been informed by research I've,

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I've done around creating cultural inclusive classrooms.

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I followed a group of seven pre-service teachers,

15:10.145 --> 15:12.685
as they did their final year of their fourth year,

15:12.825 --> 15:14.085
of a bachelor of education

15:14.085 --> 15:16.645
around the multicultural western suburbs.

15:16.865 --> 15:18.565
And I looked at, you know,

15:18.565 --> 15:23.125
what they were doing in classrooms to make a change parallel

15:23.125 --> 15:25.405
to that, what we had eight focus group sessions

15:25.405 --> 15:27.565
where they were talk about what they were doing in class,

15:28.265 --> 15:29.325
and we would discuss it.

15:29.385 --> 15:31.725
And I think that that was really important.

15:31.985 --> 15:36.125
You know, it was, I suppose, not an indulgence,

15:36.145 --> 15:37.365
but it, it was incredible.

15:37.505 --> 15:39.885
It was an incredible opportunity to have so much time.

15:40.185 --> 15:42.325
It was 24 hours of reflecting

15:42.325 --> 15:43.485
what they were doing in schools.

15:43.945 --> 15:47.445
And I think that was a key thing to be able to, you know,

15:47.445 --> 15:48.525
once you've graduated

15:48.705 --> 15:50.725
and you're in schools, who do you talk to?

15:50.905 --> 15:52.285
If there is, you know,

15:52.445 --> 15:54.365
a racist conversation in the staff room,

15:54.385 --> 15:58.285
if you overhear students in the yard, if a parent comes in,

15:58.305 --> 16:00.365
if you overhear another teacher, say something.

16:00.465 --> 16:02.205
And these are all examples from

16:02.745 --> 16:06.005
my 20 years in teacher education that happen.

16:06.075 --> 16:09.285
Unfortunately, you know, education is, you know,

16:09.565 --> 16:11.725
teachers are a microcosm of society.

16:11.785 --> 16:14.605
You will feel, unfortunately find aspects of all of

16:14.605 --> 16:15.925
that in classrooms.

16:15.925 --> 16:19.645
So we need to be able to confidently respond to that

16:19.705 --> 16:22.245
as teacher educators and as educators.

16:22.785 --> 16:25.605
For me, in my inclusive education courses,

16:25.865 --> 16:27.845
the first thing I do is create,

16:28.355 --> 16:32.845
hopefully create a culturally safe space to have discussions

16:33.505 --> 16:34.965
to actually be able to,

16:35.745 --> 16:38.125
and this has taken a while to get the confidence to do this.

16:38.245 --> 16:40.725
I suppose when I started my PhD, I didn't even,

16:40.925 --> 16:43.685
I thought if I put the word racism in there, is it going to,

16:43.705 --> 16:46.365
you know, am I gonna get through the candidate to procedure?

16:46.825 --> 16:50.085
But, you know, it is actually of course being able to,

16:50.185 --> 16:51.845
to name things explicitly

16:51.945 --> 16:53.765
and to have conversations around them.

16:54.705 --> 16:58.205
And, so creating a, a culturally safe space

16:58.205 --> 17:00.925
for everyone, the importance of language,

17:00.925 --> 17:03.845
inclusive language, I spend a lot of time talking about,

17:04.185 --> 17:08.085
you know, language and the respectful sensitive language

17:08.085 --> 17:10.885
that we need to use around whatever it is, disability

17:11.065 --> 17:14.205
or gender or the lgbtq plus community.

17:14.205 --> 17:16.285
And of course, language changes all the time.

17:16.345 --> 17:18.325
And even last course someone said,

17:18.485 --> 17:21.405
I think we should use a different terminology for this.

17:21.645 --> 17:24.085
I can't remember what it was, but this term, I said, okay,

17:24.085 --> 17:25.325
great, let's, let's have a look.

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Let's have a think about that.

17:26.425 --> 17:29.685
So I think the other important thing is teacher educators,

17:29.875 --> 17:32.605
like educators in schools are always learning,

17:32.605 --> 17:34.805
like we're on the con the continuum as well.

17:34.845 --> 17:38.005
I never think that I'm gonna be a fully, you know, you know

17:38.045 --> 17:40.405
that I'm at the end of the inclusive education journey,

17:40.405 --> 17:42.925
then it'll be time for me to re retire, I think.

17:42.985 --> 17:45.445
But you know, that I'm always learning with my students.

17:45.785 --> 17:49.605
Um, so I think that that idea that your co-learners,

17:50.265 --> 17:53.525
you, you know, using diversity as a, a resource,

17:53.705 --> 17:57.845
so I ho I try to model in teacher education courses

17:58.115 --> 18:01.925
what I think is effective inclusive education

18:02.025 --> 18:03.205
for pre-service teachers

18:03.205 --> 18:04.885
to then model when they're doing their placement

18:05.185 --> 18:06.365
and when they graduate.

18:06.785 --> 18:09.965
So in fact, in those inclusive education units,

18:10.455 --> 18:15.085
their lived experiences are, are, are really privileged.

18:15.085 --> 18:17.925
In fact more than any of the theoretical content,

18:18.195 --> 18:19.325
it's their experiences

18:19.465 --> 18:21.725
and if they're safe to be able to, if they feel safe

18:21.725 --> 18:25.685
to talk about that, I see so many shifts along

18:25.765 --> 18:26.885
that disposition line.

18:27.265 --> 18:28.845
And I don't think we can get to the, you know,

18:28.845 --> 18:31.165
I was talking about the disposition and how you move along.

18:31.505 --> 18:33.325
That's where I find when they listen

18:33.325 --> 18:34.725
to each other's experiences

18:34.825 --> 18:38.045
and they go, wow, I'd never thought that as a female,

18:38.305 --> 18:40.405
you are, you know, you might be feel

18:40.405 --> 18:41.725
unsafe to go out at night.

18:42.105 --> 18:43.925
So someone shares that, you know,

18:43.925 --> 18:45.485
you can see people thinking wow,

18:45.945 --> 18:47.925
or what it's like to be a person of color

18:48.145 --> 18:51.245
or so again, trying, you know, I've gotta be really aware

18:51.245 --> 18:55.725
that, about everyone's emotional labor in all of that

18:55.785 --> 18:56.885
and not exploiting that.

18:56.885 --> 18:59.925
And people can pass and they don't need to contribute.

18:59.925 --> 19:03.645
But what I actually find is that people are very happy

19:03.705 --> 19:07.805
to share their experiences of, of, you know, homophobia

19:07.905 --> 19:09.565
or whatever it is.

00:00 - Inclusive education for me is about providing equitable educational outcomes and opportunities for all students regardless of their culture, their SES background, their religion, their ability, their disability, and so on. So all students, regardless of their backgrounds,

00:21 - are deserving and have a right to have quality, education, which engages them and, promotes their success. So historically, as we know, education curriculum has been developed largely by white male, you know, middle class, people. And so the curriculum very much reflects that. So I think we really need to be aware of, looking for opportunities that re represent all our students in the curriculum.

00:53 - And also the way that the curriculum, is taught. there's, I guess there's three. I think inclusive education's a a massive, I could probably talk for hours about this, but I think for me there's three key factors or, or components that are really important. The first one is this idea of a, of a disposition. So having this genuine interest, and desire to be inclusive of all your students. And I think to see the humanity in everyone,

01:23 - to see diversity as a positive characteristic. I, I almost think it's an emotional thing sometimes when I'm teaching, I'm sorry, I teach in teacher education with pre-service teachers, and it's almost something that's, that's visceral, that you can see pre-service teachers who really want to make an impact beyond going into classrooms and, and teaching content that they actually wanna have a positive impact, particularly for students who have been historically marginalized.

01:50 - So that disposition, I think, is really, really, important. The second thing, I think, the second component for me is also around critical pedagogy. So engaging students in developing a critical consciousness or awareness, around about the world, really. And, thinking about texts, and when I say texts, it could be images, photos, films, thinking about how power and oppression is, and, you know, the ideology of the cre, the person creating

02:24 - that text is represented. So who's at the margins, who's in the center? And I think pre-service teachers and then their students need to, have this, you know, developed sense of a critical consciousness and a critical awareness around, around society. So how, how, you know, systems of oppression, operate in society. I think the third thing is, developing a sense of social justice.

02:53 - Social justice is often bandied around quite a lot and can, can be a little bit rhetorical. but I think social justice is really important that we actually need to be making an active stance against discrimination about ra against racism, homophobia. And we need to, engage students and, and pre-service teachers and teachers, in, in that work. I think that's really important. And of course, everyone comes along. I like to say to pre-service teachers in my class

03:25 - that we're all on a continuum. We all come onto that continuum at different levels because of our life experiences. And, you know, as long as we're all moving towards so social justice, we might, you know, pre-service teachers when they graduate might not necessarily go in in their first year and be, you know, challenging the status quo. And some might be amazingly, you know, doing a great job of that.

03:48 - But that, that needs to be, I think, the aspiration that we're able to, change society for, for the better. I think that has to be a purpose of education, or for me, that is the purpose of education, to make life more equitable for, for everybody. And particular, well, for, for people who've been historically marginalized. So Australia, probably like the rest of the world at the moment, unfortunately, is really dominated by populist right wing media.

04:18 - And in Australia, unfortunately, that is very widely consumed. we've just had a referendum in Australia, and I think the, I think that really illustrated, sadly, it illustrated it very well how right wing media can be very divisive. And, you know, if there are, if there's racism, for example, bubbling under the surface, it can really bring that, to the fore. So the challenge I think is, is,

04:52 - is media and, you know, it's pro it's not likely that we are going to be able to d di diversify ownership of media particularly. So we actually have to, again, going back to critical pedagogy, support students and teachers, teacher educators like myself, continually, critiquing the media that we consume. So against that backdrop of media being very divisive, homophobic, racist, it's actually, it can be really difficult for schools to then introduce,

05:24 - curriculum and projects, for example, around LGBTQI plus inclusion or anti-racism, projects or, first nations perspectives. It, it, there can be moral panic amongst parents sometimes that, that that's going to, you know, unsettle the status quo. So that can be a real challenge, I think, for, for, for education, inclusive education. another, Another challenge I think comes from the historical

06:01 - origins of inclusive education or multicultural education in Australia. so multicultural edu multicultural education in Australia came about after the second World War when we had a lot of migration. And the idea was to equalize, educational opportunities for those newly arrived migrants. So in Australia, historically inclusive education has been conceived as something as four minority groups.

06:33 - And while that doesn't necessarily persist so much, it's a, an outdated idea. There are pockets of that existing. So pre-service teachers in my class will, will say, we, you know, we're looking at, mul cultural diversity, but we, you know, it was like a tick the box activity. We just, you know, the teacher said, okay, we are gonna do a day of bringing in, I don't know, you know, spaghetti and learning a few words in Greek. And we've ticked the box on cultural diversity.

07:04 - So I think that that has persisted a little bit. This idea that, you know, culturally diverse teaching or inclusive education is a bit of an add-on for minority groups. So it's not something that's embedded across all the subject areas across the whole school. but it's essentially just something that we do once or twice a year. And that's the same for all the, you know, the, the categories I suppose, of diversity.

07:30 - So for example, lgbtq plus inclusion, it might be, we just do this one thing on this one day. and sometimes you're even lucky at some schools to do that. No, it should be something that's embedded throughout the year where you're constantly coming back to it and talking about it. And having students, challenge, for example, texts that they're reading.

07:50 - Where are the, where are the people? Where are the communities from the LGBTQ plus community in the text? Are they on the margins? Are they even there? Are they at the center? So again, engaging, students in that. Another challenge is that some schools have this notion that if they engage in anti-racism work, that it's reflecting badly on their school,

08:15 - that they're admitting to having racism at the school. So that's, another challenge. One more challenge I think, is that, you know, we are all, we're all socialized, we all have our biases, and unfortunately some teachers, I guess come to go to schools and have this deficit notion of students from minority backgrounds. And that results in those students having really, of those teachers having low expectations for those students.

08:45 - So that's just something that as teachers, we need to continually check our biases and our assumptions. No one's immune from that. We all do that. We've all been socialized to do that. But we have to learn to check our own biases, assumptions and then make sure our colleagues and friends are also challenging us respectfully and, and checking those biases and assumptions so that we have high standards for, again, all our students, regardless of their, their backgrounds.

09:12 - We need really good teacher education courses. And I, I worry that, you know, everything seems to be constrained and there's less hours and there's more students. So that really worries me. But we need to keep fighting back within our educational institutions to make sure that inclusion is, not only in one, you know, unit, but it needs to be across the whole course. And we all need to be supporting each other.

09:39 - So I think that's one thing, getting pre-service teachers to critique their own positionality of how they're position in society and thinking about how they're privileged or oppressed based on their skin color, their SES background, how is that affording them unearned privileges or oppressing them? And as someone who ticks pretty much most of the privilege boxes, apart from being female, I guess I use myself as, as an example of continually,

10:11 - you know, checking my privilege, talking about privilege, which is also uncomfortable work, for some people or unsettling work. Inclusive education isn't just about individual teachers developing these dispositions and practices and skills. It actually is the responsibility of the whole school community. So school leaders need to be at the forefront of, making it comfortable, encouraging conversations explicitly that talk about racism, sexism, homophobia, ableism,

10:43 - it need, there needs to be, you know, comfortable spaces to do that. There needs to be professional development, offered in an ongoing way. We need to be able to critique the policies of the school. And I mean, I think the point is that we have so many policy policies, and in fact, in Australia, as you know, in the rest of the world, all teachers are mandated to be inclusive. There's school policy, there's state policy,

11:09 - there's federal policy, but that actually doesn't necessarily per se mean anything. That doesn't mean that teachers are going into classrooms and being effective educators. So there needs to be, I think sharing examples of, of what it looks like in classrooms is a really, good idea. So continually, sharing examples, what does it look like to teach Decolonize the curriculum? We've been talking a lot about that.

11:40 - Our, our first nations histories and cultures and perspectives are very important in Australia. However, what I keep hearing from non-indigenous pre-service teachers is they're really reticent to do that work. They're scared they'll get it wrong. How do we encourage them to do that confidently? 'cause if we don't do that, and you know, again, going back to the referendum, it looks like we're not doing a particularly good job of that, that as an educator, that's really

12:06 - where my energy's gonna be going, sort of, you know, probably for the rest of my life. But we need to, we really need to get, you know, have equitable outcomes for First Nations students and communities. If we're going to, you know, say that we are doing inclusive education properly. Most of our teachers in Australia, again, like, other countries, white, middle class, and actually a lot of females.

12:33 - so it's really important that we diversify our teaching workforce. I'm really excited that, my university, I worked with some people and we got some funding from the Department of Education to recruit people from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds, particularly African Australian people and First Nations people, to a employment based teacher education program where they're kind of fast tracked intensively,

13:03 - fast tracked out in schools, getting incredible experience. And the the purpose of that is that, you know, there are, there are, where I live in the western suburbs of me, of Melbourne, there are a lot of students, for example, from African backgrounds. Now, if those students don't see people in front of them who look like them, who've had similar experiences who, speak the language that they speak, then that's very disheartening. There's like a, a sort

13:34 - of psychic disequilibrium I think when they don't have that. There's nothing in that classroom that, you know, is reflecting their own lived experiences. And of course, people who've had, e experiences. There's lots of trauma at the moment. Of course, we've got, I went, I visited a school yesterday. there were lots of students who've just arrived from Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Turkey. And one of our pre-service teachers who's also had a similar experience

14:06 - is there with those students. And I can just say that he's thriving because he is responding to those students. They're responding to them, and thankfully the school are really looking to him to be a leader. So that's the other thing that's, I, I've heard the opposite of that. I've heard people from African backgrounds in schools with 20 years experience,

14:26 - and a new teacher can come into that staff room and and just ignore the, expertise and the experience that that person has. So there's so much work to be done on so many levels, I think, in schools, in teacher education courses. but certainly diversifying the teaching workforce should be a real priority. I think the first thing I, I do in my, teacher education courses, so I teach a unit called inclusive education.

14:57 - And that course really, or that unit has really been informed by research I've, I've done around creating cultural inclusive classrooms. I followed a group of seven pre-service teachers, as they did their final year of their fourth year, of a bachelor of education around the multicultural western suburbs. And I looked at, you know, what they were doing in classrooms to make a change parallel to that, what we had eight focus group sessions

15:25 - where they were talk about what they were doing in class, and we would discuss it. And I think that that was really important. You know, it was, I suppose, not an indulgence, but it, it was incredible. It was an incredible opportunity to have so much time. It was 24 hours of reflecting what they were doing in schools. And I think that was a key thing to be able to, you know, once you've graduated

15:48 - and you're in schools, who do you talk to? If there is, you know, a racist conversation in the staff room, if you overhear students in the yard, if a parent comes in, if you overhear another teacher, say something. And these are all examples from my 20 years in teacher education that happen. Unfortunately, you know, education is, you know, teachers are a microcosm of society. You will feel, unfortunately find aspects of all of

16:14 - that in classrooms. So we need to be able to confidently respond to that as teacher educators and as educators. For me, in my inclusive education courses, the first thing I do is create, hopefully create a culturally safe space to have discussions to actually be able to, and this has taken a while to get the confidence to do this. I suppose when I started my PhD, I didn't even, I thought if I put the word racism in there, is it going to,

16:43 - you know, am I gonna get through the candidate to procedure? But, you know, it is actually of course being able to, to name things explicitly and to have conversations around them. And, so creating a, a culturally safe space for everyone, the importance of language, inclusive language, I spend a lot of time talking about, you know, language and the respectful sensitive language that we need to use around whatever it is, disability or gender or the lgbtq plus community.

17:14 - And of course, language changes all the time. And even last course someone said, I think we should use a different terminology for this. I can't remember what it was, but this term, I said, okay, great, let's, let's have a look. Let's have a think about that. So I think the other important thing is teacher educators, like educators in schools are always learning, like we're on the con the continuum as well. I never think that I'm gonna be a fully, you know, you know

17:38 - that I'm at the end of the inclusive education journey, then it'll be time for me to re retire, I think. But you know, that I'm always learning with my students. so I think that that idea that your co-learners, you, you know, using diversity as a, a resource, so I ho I try to model in teacher education courses what I think is effective inclusive education for pre-service teachers to then model when they're doing their placement and when they graduate.

18:06 - So in fact, in those inclusive education units, their lived experiences are, are, are really privileged. In fact more than any of the theoretical content, it's their experiences and if they're safe to be able to, if they feel safe to talk about that, I see so many shifts along that disposition line. And I don't think we can get to the, you know, I was talking about the disposition and how you move along. That's where I find when they listen

18:33 - to each other's experiences and they go, wow, I'd never thought that as a female, you are, you know, you might be feel unsafe to go out at night. So someone shares that, you know, you can see people thinking wow, or what it's like to be a person of color or so again, trying, you know, I've gotta be really aware that, about everyone's emotional labor in all of that and not exploiting that.

18:56 - And people can pass and they don't need to contribute. But what I actually find is that people are very happy to share their experiences of, of, you know, homophobia or whatever it is.

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