Cross-Curriculum Priorities
Making Learning Authentic
Joanna Baker
About me…
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Teacher
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Traveller
About you:
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Role?
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Interests?
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Questions about the AC priorities?
This Workshop:
We will explore the challenges and opportunities
presented by the AC Cross-Curriculum Priorities
1. Why the Cross-Curriculum Priorities? How are
they relevant to English?
2. What is a cosmopolitan approach to learning?
3. Examples of a cosmopolitan approach to the
three priorities.
4. Discussion and sharing of ideas.
Takeaways:
A framework for designing tasks and units in
English which emphasizes situated,
networked learning.
Examples of English tasks and activities that
align with the Cross-Curriculum Priorities and
can be immediately implemented.
A deeper understanding of cosmopolitan
learning and its broader implications for
education.
Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories
and cultures
What ACARA says:
All students will develop an awareness and appreciation of,
and respect for the literature of Aboriginal and Torres Strait
Islander Peoples including storytelling traditions (oral
narrative) as well as contemporary literature. Students will
be taught to develop respectful critical understandings of
the social, historical and cultural contexts associated with
different uses of language and textual features.
Asia and Australia’s engagement with Asia
What ACARA says:
The Australian Curriculum: English enables students to explore
and appreciate the rich tradition of texts from and about the
peoples and countries of Asia, including texts written by Asian
Australians. They develop an understanding of the many
languages used in Australia and how they have influenced
Australian culture. In this learning area, students develop
communication skills that reflect cultural awareness and
intercultural understanding.
Sustainability
What ACARA says:
The Australian Curriculum: English provides students with the skills required to
investigate and understand issues of environmental and social sustainability;
communicate information about sustainability, and advocate action to
improve sustainability. English provides an important means of influencing
behaviours, facilitating interaction and expressing viewpoints through the
creation of texts for a range of purposes, audiences and contexts including
multimodal texts and the use of visual language.
What are your concerns about
implementing the three priorities
in English?
Discussion: Why these priorities? Why
now?
 What are we asking young people to be able to do in the 21st
century?
 What experiences at school will build their confidence and
capacity to DO those things?
 What opportunities does schooling provide for learning as doing?
Melbourne Declaration goals
Australian Curriculum General Capabilities
Education in transnational spaces
Transnationalism = the dynamic processes through which
knowledge, identities and cultures are constructed across
borders (Vertovec, 2001)
 Language and dialogue is the primary medium for these
processes (Luke, 2004)
 A type of ‘complex connectivity’: inter-connectedness as a
socio-cultural and psycho-social condition (Tomlinson, cited in
Rizvi 2009).
 Dynamic: cultures are continuously emerging and
transforming, created and re-created (Rizvi, 2011)
Cosmopolitanism as an educational
ideal
PEDAGOGICAL DIMENSION
ETHICAL DIMENSION
A way of learning about, and participating in,
An ethical framework for negotiating
new transnational social formations and the
transnational spaces, valuing democracy,
ways in which knowledge, identities and cultures equality and respect for difference.
are constructed.
Emphasises the authentic: Instead of learning
concepts and ideas in the abstract, students
learn through contextualized, purposeful activity
and interaction.
Emphasises a relational understanding of the
‘self’: students are able to critically examine the
dynamic interplay of the personal, social, global
‘imagination’ in the formation of their own
subjectivity (Appadurai, 1996)
Situated
Interactive
Cosmopolitan
learning is…
Purposeful
Authentic
What types of knowledge and skills are we
developing in a cosmopolitan English classroom?
Knowledge
Where would you go to source knowledge on the three AC priorities?
 Cosmopolitanism (transnationalism) posits that knowledge is
distributed, and thus dynamic; that it is not held but rather coconstructed.
 Knowledge is created and recreated through networks;
communities of knowledge/learning/practice
How are we using these networks in the classroom?
How might they be used?
An example from the English
classroom: Indigenous perspectives
Task:
Students explore the various forms of oral storytelling that are
integral to Australian Indigenous cultures. They research how
and why oral traditions have developed and endured, as well
as the various types of oral stories. Students may then
compare oral storytelling practices across cultures, or
compare traditional and modern oral storytelling forms within
their community context.
Assessment: presentation of research in any format (website,
video, live presentation), or a written report/essay.
What makes it cosmopolitan?
The real-world ‘problem’:
How cultural practices evolve according to time and place.
The knowledge networks:
Academic researchers; local and international indigenous
communities
An example from the English
classroom: Asia
Task:
Students create (digital) storybooks for English Second
Language learners. Working with a partner school in Asia, or
with ESL students in their own community, students research
the key language challenges these students face through
interviews and evaluation of existing texts.
Assessment:
The completed storybook
What makes it cosmopolitan?
The knowledge networks:
ESL students in Asia; professional creative writers and
publishers.
The real-world ‘problem’:
How ESL learners from particular linguistic backgrounds can
improve their skills through reading stories.
An example from the English
classroom: Sustainability
Task:
Students select a current sustainability issue (eg. carbon
pricing) and create a campaign around this issue. Students
research their issue and develop a position, design an
advertising campaign targeted at a specific audience,
create a website to support their campaign, and present a
persuasive speech to their peers.
Assessment:
Any or all elements of the campaign.
What makes it cosmopolitan?
The knowledge networks:
Researchers in sustainability and related sciences; activist
organisations.
The real-world ‘problem’:
How can we use the techniques of persuasion to promote
action on important environmental and social issues?
Skills
What types of skills do students need in order to navigate and
make meaning of transnational spaces?
 AC General capabiltiies/21C skills project
 In English?
How do you teach to develop these at the moment?
 Cosmopolitan approach: an emphasis on interaction to
make meaning
 Encountering new/conflicting ways of seeing the world
generates creativity and critical thinking (Luke, 2004)
Developing skills in the English
classroom
What capabilities do we think students need in the 21st century?
 research processes: seeking, comprehending, evaluating and
synthesizing information.
 creative application of knowledge to solve problems and achieve
specific goals
 intercultural competencies
 collaboration
 written and oral communication for various contemporary
purposes, audiences and contexts
Discussion:
Pros/cons of this approach as you understand it
Ideas for connecting classrooms with
knowledge networks, at a local/regional/global
level.
So why cosmopolitan learning in
English?
Networked learning is already going on students do it every day!
We need to use the power of connectivity to
make meaningful connections – to make English
learning relevant, purposeful and useful for our
students.
Online resources for the priorities
Joanna Baker
ATSI Histories and Cultures:
 QSA resources on oral traditions, indigenous spirituality, and ethical
research in indigenous studies.
Asia and Australia’s Engagement with Asia
 Asia Literacy Ambassador Project
 Asia Education Foundation AC resources for English
 Texts related to Identity: Intersections of Identity
Sustainability
 NDLRM Sustainability Resources
 Sustainability Unit for English
Further reading
Transnationalism and Cosmopolitan Learning:
 Rizvi, Teaching Global Interconnectivity
 Rizvi, Towards Cosmopolitan Learning
Experience and education (learning as doing):
 Dewey, Experience and Education
Networked Learning:
Downes, Learning networks and connective knowledge
References
Appadurai, A. (1996). Modernity at large: Cultural dimensions of globalization (Vol. 1). Minnesota:
University of Minnesota Press.
Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. (2013a). General capabilities in the
Australian curriculum. Retrieved from
http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/GeneralCapabilities/Overview/General-capabilities-in-theAustralian-Curriculum.
Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority. (2013b). Cross-curriculum priorities.
Retrieved from http://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/crosscurriculumpriorities.
Luke, A. (2004). Teaching after the market: From commodity to cosmopolitan. Teachers College
Record, 106(7), 1422-1443
Herrington, J., & Oliver, R. (2000). An instructional design framework for authentic learning
environments. Educational Technology Research and Development, 48(3), 23-48.
Rizvi, F. (2009). Towards cosmopolitan learning. Discourse: Studies in the Cultural Politics of Education,
30(3), 253-268. Retrieved from http://repository.unimelb.edu.au.ezp.lib.unimelb.edu.au/10187/14831.
Rizvi, F. (2011). Experiences of cultural diversity in the context of an emergent transnationalism.
European Educational Research Journal, 10(2), 180-188. Retrieved from
http://dx.doi.org.ezp.lib.unimelb.edu.au/10.2304/eerj.2011.10.2.180.
Vertovec, S. (2001). Transnationalism and identity. Journal Of Ethnic & Migration Studies, 27(4), 573582. doi:10.1080/13691830120090386.