When my son and daughter were 7 and 9 years old respectively, we went on a day tour to Shakespeare’s birthplace, Stratford-Upon-Avon. Our trip was filled with intriguing encounters, including my husband’s leisure afternoon listening to an enthusiastic speaker discussing Hamlet. We then bought a book called ‘To Wee or Not to Wee’ by the talented author Pamela Buchart, as a memento. Little did we know that this seemingly innocent purchase would set the stage for my two children’s opposite taste in Shakespeare’s land.
Upon returning to Sydney, the kids dove into the pages and vivid illustrations of ‘To Wee or Not to Wee’ with infectious enthusiasm. Amidst giggles and occasional exclamations of ‘wow, yuk’, they seemed to both enjoy Shakespeare’s simplified works. My son was drawn to the book’s comedic nature and delighted in the fact that it featured topics that were at the time close to his heart – the pee, wee, butts, etc. At that tender age, his interests naturally gravitated towards the simple whimsicalness and playfulness of the stories.
Fast forward 6 years, my son finds himself grappling with an English assignment about Romeo & Juliet, which fails big time to ignite his interest. His constant comment is ‘How on earth did they not text each other in advance? Why did they die stupid deaths like that, making no sense?’. In stark contrast, my daughter’s love for Shakespeare has flourished, evident in her 2000-word essay exploring the relevance of Shakespeare’ works in young audiences like her, which led to a coveted work experience apprenticeship with the prestigious Bell Shakespeare Theatre Company in Sydney. However, today their opposing views on Shakespeare ignite intense debates, turning our living room into a battleground of emotions…and yellings. But to their credit, I found it hard to determine the winner of this domestic debate as both sides brought out the most valid and convincing arguments. So, we called a truce!
This scenario portraits two key similarities between my household and the real classroom environment that I’d like to discuss, along with two contrasting perspectives on our school system. Firstly, I want to highlight the positive aspect, where I, as a proud parent, applaud the development of young children’ critical thinking skills, a set of skills that has been nurtured since their early years in kindergarten and primary education.
So, how do schools in Australia teach young children like my own thinking skills?
Robert Fischer, an esteemed educator, and author of the popular book ‘Teaching Thinking in the Classroom’ (2005), emphasised the importance of practising independent and philosophical thinking in school, stating ‘when you get out of the real world, you have to think for yourself, that’s why we need to practise it in school’.
In today’s fast-paced and ever-evolving world, it is crucial to equip young minds with the essential thinking skills they need to navigate through the challenges of realities full of artificial intelligence and misinformation. Recognising this, Australian schools have been at the forefront of fostering critical and creative thinking skills among young children in their respective curricula, regardless of school types. Oh, well, let me whinge about the oh-so-complicated school system in Australia a bit later.
Australian schools have been doing well in:
- emphasising inquiry-based learning, where children are encouraged to explore, question, and discover. Students are accommodated to think critically, analyse information, and draw conclusions. As a parent, I deeply appreciate the approach taken by schools to nurture not only my children’s critical thinking skills but also their independence and their ability to make informed decisions. It brings back vivid memories of those wild and wacky days when my little experimenters would spend the whole week ‘allowances’ on Mentos and Coke bottles trying to create mini volcanos that would wreck my kitchen or the backyard. I also recall the times when they would ‘talk strategies’ then argue and agree on whether we should take their respective ‘Fluffy’, a stuffed animal that is designated as a common friend to each class, on a bush track or an ocean walk for their school’s ‘Show and Tell’. Both of my children attended Willoughby Public School, a local primary school just opposite our house, and I must say that the school has done an exceptional job of encouraging their inquisitive minds from an early age. The embedded Habit of Minds principle within the school educational framework has been truly remarkable. It instils in young kids a constant search for something ‘amazing’ in everything they see, fostering a positive thinking attitude and applying the principle of ‘responding with wonderment and awe’ to everyday objects has played a significant role in shaping their thinking outlook.
- integrating Thinking Skills programs, where cognitive abilities focus is embedded in the curriculum, covering a diversity of thinking skills including critical and creative thinking, problem-solving, ethical-reasoning, and especially computational analysing (NSW Government’s Education for Changing World, 2020). From the iconic Aussie mascot ‘Giraffe’ from Healthy Harold, to multicultural recognition activities on Harmony days, from the Earth and Space series, when kids observe the weather and make daily life decisions based on it (we still have my daughter’ cloud sketches as vivid evidences of those ‘skies watching, cloud drawing’ days), to acting and presenting about the life of a famous Australian icons (my son portrayed the late Aussie Prime Minister Harrold Holt in his Dad’s suit jacket), just to name a few of those activities that strongly nurture a wide range of thinking skills into young kids’ school curriculum. When my kids started Kindie, the injection of a thinking skills program such as Philosophy for Children aka P4C is another note-worthy way to help children become ‘more thoughtful, more reflective, more considerate, and more reasonable individuals’ (Lipman, n.d) hence becoming more global citizens in the near future!
- preparing our future generation with technology integration and digital readiness programs. A decade ago, schools in Australia started the new Digital Technologies curriculum designed to help students not only know ‘how to use computers’ but also engage creatively with technology, ‘the kind of engagement that enables life-long careers’ (Tate, 2022 as cited in Zagami, 2022). Schools across Australia have actively participated in curriculum enrichment programs that expand the integration of digital technologies. These initiatives encompass a wide range of projects, from STEM endeavours such as ‘Guidelines to Shade’, which focuses on utilising technologies to prevent skin cancer in Australia, to the digitalisation of Australian Indigenous arts projects. Students have had the opportunity to apply digital tools to create animations or music, which happened to be my daughter’s favourite activity, to delve into more advanced coding classes, which my son particularly enjoyed. This pioneering integration of technology within the primary educational landscape has received extensive support from schools, reflecting a commitment to fostering technologically ethical development among the younger generation.
While many of these achievements and positive aspects of Australian schools are worth celebrating, it is crucial to recognise that there are also pressing issues within the system. In this article, I want to address the biggest faux pas: educational in-equity.
I’m quoting here the words of Pasi Sahlberg, an educational reform expert whom I greatly admire. Having been globally recognised in various educational reform advising roles at Finland’s Ministry of Education and Culture, the World Bank in Washington D.C, and Harvard University, he made a significant move from Helsinki to Sydney five years ago, together with his wife and two boys. According to Sahlberg, the Australian school system suffers from a serious design flaw and that transforming it is not just a possibility, but a moral obligation for a country that proudly labels itself as an ‘education nation’. I find his insights thought-provokingly relevant and compelling.
In 2007, when I welcomed my first-born daughter in Sydney, there was this lovely midwife who attended to me with all the post-delivery care from breastfeeding advice to baby bath techniques. On the second evening of my stay at the ward, she asked if we had considered putting our daughter’s name down for Loreto Kirribilli or Wenona.
I will never forget that moment when, caught off guard, I turned to my husband and whispered, “What on earth are those names?”. It turns out they were prestigious private schools for girls. We laughed and told the midwife that we had no idea yet. I mean she was only two days old! Who thinks about schools that early? Oh well, everyone except me, ha-ha. It is no joke! The fact is for our daughter to be considered into those privileged, and elite schools when the time comes, we would need to register her from birth. It was a shocking revelation for someone like me, hailing from an underprivileged and under-developed country like Vietnam. In my home country, the local school was the default and only option for most families. It didn’t matter if you were from a well-off or less fortunate background; the neighbourhood school was where everyone went. My husband, on the other hand, came to Australia from a much more socio-economically advantaged background in Scandinavia, but even there, the local public school was the obvious choice. So, you can imagine the shock-of-my-life face when I discovered that in Australia, or at least in Sydney, many parents start planning for school enrolment even before their babies are born!
As I immersed myself in the Australian school system, it became apparent that this educational journey that I parallelly embarked with my two children was far more intricate, complex, and challenging than I had anticipated. It became evident that while Australia offers a world-class education, I wholeheartedly agree with Sahlberg’s assessment that it is not accessible for everyone. And that the biggest issue with this system is its educational in-equity, largely stemming from its over complicated system that includes not only government funded public, independent, selective, private but also Catholic and other religious-based schools with other complications of single sex or co-ed environment. This multiplicity of school sectors can contribute to disparities in access to quality education. Public schools, which cater to a diverse range of students including the special needs, accommodate for approximately 60% of Australian school-aged children, often face resource limitations and struggle to provide the same level of support and opportunities as their private counterparts. In the past decade, commonwealth, and state fundings for private schools have increased sixfold compared to public schools.
Private schools, apart from receiving fundings, have tripled their fees, with some reaching $40,000 to $50,000 per year per student. In contrast, public schools rely entirely on government funding for their operations. This mismatched distribution of funding among different school sectors has exacerbated the equity issue in education, deepened the unequal support among diverse types of schools hence highlighted the socioeconomic disparity. The pursuit of individual excellence in Australian education, at the expense of a more inclusive and equitable system, has slowly eroded the fairness of education. It’s disheartening to hear that reputable international organisations such as UNICEF and the OECD consistently rank Australian education as ‘highly segregated and unequal, leaving a significant number of children behind’. According to the Gonski Institute for Education (2018), 70% of Australians strongly advocate for prioritising equity within our nation’s school system. To achieve this, I believe significant reforms need to be made so quality education is accessible for all children regardless of their backgrounds. “It’s not the case of class warfare; it’s more a matter of Australians recognising the need to better educate all of our children to succeed in a rapidly changing world’ (Sahlberg, 2022). While composing this article, my attention was drawn to the situation where a dozen of public schools in metropolitan Sydney including Liverpool, Cammeray, and some others in central west NSW areas have been forced to implement remote learning due to Covid serge coupled with the existing ‘chronic shortage of teachers’.
Earlier in this article, I mentioned Professor Matthew Lipman and his P4C program for teaching thinking skills. He shared an insightful quote from a young student, aged 10, in his study: ‘‘A good teacher makes you think…even when you don’t want to”. The importance of having good teachers goes beyond teaching thinking skills. They play a pivotal role in sowing the seeds of educational equity, ensuring that every student has equal opportunities to partake and to thrive. This situation of decade-long teachers’ shortage in Australia poses another diabolical issue of the education system that needs urgent and comprehensive reform. Let’s chat about this next time we meet.
In the meantime, I sincerely hope you all stay safe, healthy, and dodge the seasonal flu bug. May your children’s minds sparkle with brilliance as they conquer their school adventures with awesomeness.
From mums' Chats to teachers' talks - everything everywhere everyone...but not all at once! 