DSJL – Assessment 2 Part B Reflection

Throughout time, Australia has slowly become a very diverse nation. Ethnic

backgrounds such as Aboriginal, English, Indian, Arabic, Chinese, African, Italian,

Polish, you name it. During this semester we are learning about diversity and the

social justice issues that are identified in today’s society. Social Justice in my

understanding is the fairness between an individual and society. Fairness and

respect of other people’s differences and promoting equity within society is so

important for schools especially. Students need to understand why people are

different and why they need to be treated fairly. There are a few theories that provide

evidence in the discrimination present within schools and also how other people’s

influences may be the reason for discriminating others. In my reflection, I will

discuss and explain the importance of implementing social justice perspectives in my

teaching practice, through the pedagogical theories that may influence and enhance

learning and teaching through my key learning area (KLA) music.

Before starting this assessment, I didn’t expect it to be so much fun. My expectations

consisted of not being creative with the game, no understanding of the theories, and

how difficult it might be to implement the theories and social justice issue into my

KLA. In reality, my group had taken out those expectations and has left me

astonished on how well our group worked together. The social justice issue that our

group focused on was ethnicity and from our group you can see the different ethnic

backgrounds we all identified as; Rayanne is Arabic, Dannii is both Chinese and

Vietnamese, and I am Croatian. Just our group having diverse ethnic backgrounds,

had furthered my understanding of how important it is for society to stop the

discourses between “white” Australians and “other” Australians. Before this

assessment I knew how important it was to teach students the discourses in ethnicity

and help them understand different ethnic backgrounds. The critical race theory,

sociological theory, has furthered my knowledge of understanding ethnicity of how

society still subject those of different ethnic backgrounds as a minority 1. This theory

has helped me implement ideas for the game along with ideas for my teaching

practice. These ideas correlate with the concepts of intercultural understanding

curriculum and the outcomes in the Music syllabus. These include recognising

culture and developing respect, interacting and empathising with others, and

reflecting on intercultural experiences and taking responsibility2.

Pedagogical theories that I have found that may influence and enhance learning and

teaching is the social identity theory and the self-perception theory. Social Identity

theory implies that an individual’s sense of identity is determined by what group they

affiliate with3. Groups can associate with sport, gender, class, and most commonly

ethnicity. Students will become accustomed to a group they connect with and never

really associate with another group and sometimes even discriminate other groups4.

Self-perception theory involves people, who are socially influenced from the attitudes

and behaviours of those from their community5. This theory emphasises that our

actions are interpreted through our observations of what others interpret their

actions6. These pedagogical theories do go hand-in-hand. My awareness of these

theories has provided me inspiration of how teachers can use this as a guide to a

negative approach on providing equity in ethnicity and how we can change that. In

1
Destabilising privilege, pg. 79
2
Australian Curriculum, Intercultural Understanding
3
Insko, Tajfel and Turner’s Social Identity Theory
4
Social Identity Theory
5
Bem, Self-Perception Theory
6
Self-Perception Theory
the Music syllabus, one of the cross-curriculum content points was Multicultural and

stated, ‘to develop understanding and appreciation of a variety of cultural contexts’7.

Students have the opportunity to listen to folk music, world music, as well as the

diversity of music within Australia.

A teaching strategy I feel would be most effective would be student direction.

Allowing students, the freedom to choose music from an ethnic background that they

might associate with or are interested in learning, may incorporate a sense of

belonging as a whole class. This can enhance their understanding and provide

connections between all of the students and have something in common. Discussing

what style of music students enjoy or an artist they connect with by playing a song

and calculating how many students are familiar with a song. Students might not

realise how much they might have in common with someone from a different

background and might want to discuss their views of the songs and artists they like

or dislike. Finding and discussing comparisons and similarities in this activity can

also enhance higher-order thinking in the classroom. Closing the gap between

segregated groups by finding similarities and connections in a less discriminative

way. A learning activity that teachers might use is for students to write music for that

particular culture and later perform it. For example, in Irish folk music, they have a

name for different types of rhythmic melodies and the certain notes they use in them.

This may provide higher use of metalanguage and explicit quality criteria. Allowing

students to use different cultured music as an inspiration to creating their own music.

Using these activities may also help understand ethnicity in other subjects such as

7
Board of Studies, Music: Years 7-10, pg.22
history and geography. Our game would be perfect in promoting awareness and

understanding of ethnicity and how we should respect other ethnic backgrounds.

Overall the assessment has opened up my mind in the world of many social justice

issues such as ethnicity. I have found a lot of inspiration in how to apply ethnicity and

other social justice issues into my teaching practice. The assessment, although had

me worried and expected so little, had become something so fascinating and fun. It

has made me realise how important it is for students to understand the diversity in

society and how we must respect those of different ethnic backgrounds with respect.

This assessment was a great experience in creating new ways for promoting respect

between ethnic backgrounds in school and even making friends.

References

Australiancurriculumeduau. (c2018). Interculteral Retrieved 15 May, 2018, from

https://www.australiancurriculum.edu.au/f-10-curriculum/general-capabilities/intercultural-
understanding/
Bem, D. J. (1972). Self-Perception Theory. Advances in Experimental Social
Psychology, 6(1), 2-62.

Board of Studies. (2003). Music: Years 7-10. NSW Education Standards Authority.
Retrieved from http://educationstandards.nsw.edu.au/wps/portal/nesa/k-10/learning-
areas/creative-arts/music-7-10

Insko et al.. (1992). Individual-Group Discontinuity from the Differing Perspectives of

Campbell's Realistic Group Conflict Theory and Tajfel and Turner's Social Identity
Theory. Social Psychology Quarterly, 55(3), 272-291.

Lampert, J., Burnett, B., & Morse, K. (2015). Destabilising privilege. In T. Ferfolja, C.
J.Diaz & J. Ullman (Eds.), Understanding sociological theory for educational
practices (3rd ed., pp.76-92). Port Melbourne, Australia: Cambridge University
Press.