Page 450 - Cultural Studies of Science Education

35 Australian Torres Strait Islander Students 425

Students employed their home languages in the classroom. When studying the
concept of force, Philemon noted students using terms such as poke, meaning to
poke, prod or jab; puse and pusem meaning to push; prese meaning to press or
switch on; pule (var. puli) meaning to pull; and pulap meaning pull up. These students
are the most likely group to be designated as “poor” performers on achievement
tests and constitute the “lower” end of “the gap” because they cannot formally
express what they know in Standard Australian English even though they have the
cultural resources of TSI Creole and other Islander languages to call upon when
making meaning in the classroom.
This problem is compounded when we examine the nature of classroom interac-
tions, the habitus of these indigenous classrooms, where all participants (including
the teacher) are using a second, third or fourth language to learn the mandated science
content and processes. Philemon wanted to investigate whether lack of facility in
English is associated with an unwillingness to actively participate in classroom
learning. Active, participatory learning is a highly desired pedagogy in middle
school science curriculum in Queensland. Philemon set up many hands-on demon-
strations and activities and made detailed observations of how his students acted
and conversed in formal lessons.
Excerpt from Philemon’s Research Diary October 2007
I observed my [Torres Strait Islander] students were learning instruction words in science
and using body action and Creole substitutes for these instructional words, though they
could not be directly translated. I observed the key to understanding these words for my
Torres Strait Islander students was to putting science instructional words to action, which
is putting the science instruction words in body action combined with Creole language
substitutes. There was evidence of students with facility in English translating and
demonstrating what the instructional science word meant, example is when student B1
attempted to translate and demonstrate: “yupla (you me fellows) this kind”, while demon-
strating the actions of collating data.
Philemon’s dilemma was this, as he explained to Hilary: “If I continue to
encourage my students to use their Torres Strait Creole substitutes in their talking,
writing and labelling of drawings, am I promoting a ‘science language’ that is not
recognised by science educators, a ‘science language’ that would guarantee my
students to ‘underachieve’ in the state, national and international assessments? If I
discourage my students to use their Torres Strait Creole substitute words, am I not
conveying to them that their language is inadequate or inappropriate? And, what
about my own language? Denying my students use of their cultural capital is
against everything I stand for, since the main purpose of this research is to consider
how I can do better for my students and learn how to mobilise these students’
cultural resources when learning science.”
Philemon’s second layer analysis attempted to capture students’ comfortable-
ness and confidence to engage actively in science learning. Were they able to hold
productive learning conversations with him or with each other? Were they willing
to take the lead and contribute to class discussions or did they hold back? Were they
shy or reluctant or distractible? Only five students (11%) were observed and
categorised as Category 1 active learners. These were independent students who