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Student
health
 Indigenous children
who are unwell, tired, hungry or emotionally insecure have
less capacity to take advantage of available opportunities
to learn.
—
MCEETYA Taskforce on Indigenous Education Paper, Solid
Foundations: Health and Education partnership for Indigenous
children aged 0-8 (p.4)
Poor
health is a major stumbling block to effective learning.
It can entail absence from school or training sessions or,
where attendance occurs, it can seriously impair students'
capacity to learn.
Australia's
Indigenous population suffers from comparatively high rates
of lower life expectancy at birth, low birthweight and failure
to thrive in infancy, poor quality diet, disease, low levels
of social and emotional wellbeing, substance misuse, childhood
trauma and injuries.
It is important that teachers are aware of these issues and
how they might impact on schooling. The MCEETYA Taskforce
on Indigenous Education has produced a paper 'Solid Foundations:
Health and Education partnership for Indigenous children aged
0-8' which not only describes the situation effectively, but
also has some useful demographic information and ideas about
and examples of prospects for improvement. It is about much
more than 'children 0-8' and should be read by one or more
people at every site where there are Indigenous students.
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Get
the MCEETYA Taskforce paper…
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What
educators CAN do
Teachers are not equipped to deal with these issues as they
present in students. Partnerships with health agencies and
communities are required for effective action.
However, education can play an important preventive role and
help to break the cycle.
There
are two issues which recur among these case studies —
nutrition and hearing loss — where direct intervention
by educators can be practicable.
Nutrition:
Hungry kids won't concentrate. It's that simple.
Providing
food has been criticised as outside the province of schools
and training institutions, a welfare operation which builds
dependency. But if a Vegemite sandwich makes the difference
between a good session and one which is disrupted, then, in
the short term, a Vegemite sandwich is the way to go.
Hearing:
Conventional education and training relies heavily on auditory
input. The comparatively high incidence of otitis media ('glue
ear') among Indigenous young people in some parts of the country
seriously diminishes their capacity to respond.
Just
how serious is this?
Read about work on this in the Northern
Territory…
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