Listening sticks illustrations created by Western Sydney Region Aboriginal students.

Responding to My People, my place

Read and enjoy the texts in My People, My Place, in order to respond to Rap point 1 for Task 2. Note that Task 2 activities could also be supported by related discussion or activities in Stage 4 PDHPE as indicated in Stage 4 outcomes.

Teaching focus: Focus strongly on the importance of knowing who we are and where we belong. Belonging is a vital component of identity. Aboriginal students need to be able to answer the key questions: Who are you from, who are your People?

Activity 1: Responding to text

Teacher explains the focus of the lesson – that people’s cultural identity is a vital part of who they are. This lesson will explore how belonging to a group of people and a place builds identity. Teacher reads pages 1 and 2 from My People, my place, sharing Maureen and Daphne’s stories with the whole class while they read along silently. Class discussion about these two texts – class mindmap of reader response words – how readers felt listening to these texts.

Activity 2: Shared, Guided and Independent Reading

Groups of students each read a different text from My People, my place. They fill in a class mindmap of the key issues after reading. The scaffold to help you with this is on the last page of My People, my place. Following this, teacher and students create and label relationship lines between four bubbles: family, Land, Values, Culture. Cluster extra words around each key concept. For example, next to Land, write spiritual refreshment. Between family and values – an arrow pointing towards values – because the family passes down its values.

Activity 3: Interviewing and recording responses

Students interview parents or grandparents:

• Why is our cultural background important? Why do we need to know about it?

• Tell me some messages for living a good life that our culture says are important.

Rap sheet 2, Rap sheet 3, and Rap sheet 4 will help you with this activity. Students share interview responses as a class. They discuss their own ideas about these two questions. They choose five good reasons for knowing our cultural background to write in the class message. They finish their message by naming five messages for living a good life, which many cultures value highly.

Alternative activity 3 response: Interviewing and recording responses

Alternatively, students create posters with five icons on them. Each icon represents a message about living a good life. Upload one of these posters to the blog, accompanied by an explanation of the meaning of the five icons, and the lessons they teach about how we should behave.

Activity 4: Individual writing - Optional

Students write a short piece, called Where my family comes from, sharing information about their culture, for a class magazine to be published at the end of the rap. The rap writers Maureen, Daphne and Lizzie will read the magazines and send a response to each class.

Posting response for Task 2

1. prepare the response to Rap point 1 with the class
2. student/s (rap representative) word process the response, edit and save
3. teacher facilitates the student/s use of the word processor and blogging procedures to post the response to Rap point 1 once the teacher has approved the final text.