Practitioner’s Aboriginal Literacy Resource
Practitioner’s Aboriginal Literacy Resource was adapted (edited in the form of a practitioner’s resource) from its original document Indigenizing Framework for Aboriginal Literacy – An Integrated Program for a Holistic Ecology of Aboriginal Literacy. This Resource will hopefully challenge practitioners to think about the pedagogy of Aboriginal literacy in different ways. It is not only designed to encourage new insight and understanding but to stimulate critical reflection that leads to steady improvement in practice. This Resource is organized into three main parts. It starts off by giving the reader a brief overview of the literacy and educational strategies and learning outcomes. It also introduces and carefully defines key terms and concepts that will be used throughout the package. It then offers up a collection of eight indigenization strategies for teaching literacy to Aboriginal learners. Along with every teaching or language instruction approach or strategy, the practitioner will be helped along by illustrative examples and real-life cases. The final third of this Resource goes beyond singular teaching approaches and stresses the importance of indigenizing the whole educational process. Literacy practitioners should be prepared to develop an Integrated Program of a Holistic Ecology of Aboriginal Literacy. Here the Medicine Wheel, principal Indigenous values and virtues, a set of curricular streams grounded in the notion of Aboriginal community and the revitalization of Aboriginal languages are all used to establish this holistic educational model. With the creation of such an integrated program we hope to be on our way to successfully indigenizing literacy.
Kristian Urstad, Ph.D. Author & Editor
