The Child, Between School, Family and Community: Understanding the Transition to School for Aboriginal Children in Australia’s Northern Territory

2020 ◽  
pp. 135-156
Author(s):  
Gary Robinson ◽  
William Tyler
Keyword(s):  
Northern Territory ◽  
Transition To School ◽  
Aboriginal Children

scholarly journals Hearing and justice: The link between hearing impairment in early childhood and youth offending in Aboriginal children living in remote communities of the Northern Territory, Australia

2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Vincent Yaofeng He ◽  
Jiunn-Yih Su ◽  
Steven Guthridge ◽  
Catia Malvaso ◽  
Damien Howard ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Risk Factors ◽  
Early Childhood ◽  
Child Maltreatment ◽  
Hearing Impairment ◽  
Fixed Effects ◽  
School Attendance ◽  
Univariate Analysis ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Childhood And Youth ◽  
Aboriginal Children

Abstract Background High prevalence of chronic middle ear disease has persisted in Australian Aboriginal children, and the related hearing impairment (HI) has been implicated in a range of social outcomes. This study investigated the association between HI in early childhood and youth offending. Method This was a retrospective cohort study of 1533 Aboriginal children (born between 1996 and 2001) living in remote Northern Territory communities. The study used linked individual-level information from health, education, child protection and youth justice services. The outcome variable was a youth being “found guilty of an offence”. The key explanatory variable, hearing impairment, was based on audiometric assessment. Other variables were: child maltreatment notifications, Year 7 school enrolment by mother, Year 7 school attendance and community ‘fixed- effects’. The Cox proportional hazards model was used to estimate the association between HI and youth offending; and the Royston R2 measure to estimate the separate contributions of risk factors to youth offending. Results The proportion of hearing loss was high in children with records of offence (boys: 55.6%, girls: 36.7%) and those without (boys: 46.1%; girls: 49.0%). In univariate analysis, a higher risk of offending was found among boys with moderate or worse HI (HR: 1.77 [95% CI: 1.05–2.98]) and mild HI (HR: 1.54 [95% CI:1.06–2.23]). This association was attenuated in multivariable analysis (moderate HI, HR: 1.43 [95% CI:0.78–2.62]; mild HI, HR: 1.37 [95% CI: 0.83–2.26]). No evidence for an association was found in girls. HI contributed 3.2% and 6.5% of variation in offending among boys and girls respectively. Factors contributing greater variance included: community ‘fixed-effects’ (boys: 14.6%, girls: 36.5%), child maltreatment notification (boys: 14.2%, girls: 23.9%) and year 7 school attendance (boys: 7.9%; girls 12.1%). Enrolment by mother explained substantial variation for girls (25.4%) but not boys (0.2%). Conclusion There was evidence, in univariate analysis, for an association between HI and youth offending for boys however this association was not evident after controlling for other factors. Our findings highlight a range of risk factors that underpin the pathway to youth-offending, demonstrating the urgent need for interagency collaboration to meet the complex needs of vulnerable children in the Northern Territory.

Tally Ho Boys' Training Farm, Aboriginal children and the intersection of school, welfare and justice systems, 1950s–1960s

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Beth Marsden
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Limited Attention ◽  
Education Department ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Justice Systems ◽  
Post War ◽  
Aboriginal Children

PurposeThis paper draws on the archival records of the Victorian Education Department, literature produced by the governing authority of Tally Ho (the Central Mission), and newspaper reports produced in the mid-20th century about school and education at Tally Ho. This paper also draws on material from the Victorian Aborigines Welfare Board and the Northern Territory Department of Welfare, as well as two historical key government inquiries into the institutionalisation of children.Design/methodology/approachThis paper uses Tally Ho Boys’ Training Farm as a case study to examine the intersection of welfare systems, justice systems and schooling and education for Aboriginal children in institutions like Tally Ho in the mid-20th century. Further, it provides perspectives on how institutions such as Tally Ho were utilised by governments in Victoria and the Northern Territory to pursue different agendas – sometimes educational – particular to Aboriginal children. This paper also explores how histories can be reconstructed when archives are missing or silent about histories of Aboriginal childhood.FindingsThis paper demonstrates how governments used Tally Ho to control and govern the lives of Aboriginal children. By drawing together archives from a range of bodies and authorities who controlled legislation and policies, this paper contributes new understandings about the role of institutions in Victoria to the assimilation policies of Victoria and the Northern Territory in the mid-20th century.Originality/valueScholarship on the institutionalisation of children in the post-war era in Victoria, including the ways that schooling and justice systems were experienced by children living in care, has failed to fully engage with the experiences of Aboriginal children. Historians have given limited attention to the experiences of Aboriginal children living in institutions off Aboriginal reserves in Victoria. There has been limited historical scholarship examining the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children at Tally Ho. This paper broadens our understandings about how Aboriginal children encountered institutionalisation in Victoria.

Evaluation of Australian Bilingual Education: Some initial ideas directed at obtaining a just and thorough approach

1979 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 33-44
Author(s):  
M. Christie
Keyword(s):  
Bilingual Education ◽  
Federal Government ◽  
Primary Education ◽  
Education Program ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Aboriginal Communities ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
The Government ◽  
Aboriginal Children ◽  
Aboriginal Languages

In the 1973 parliamentary session, the Australian Federal Government introduced acampaign to have Aboriginal children living in distinctive Aboriginal communities given their primary education in Aboriginal languages…and to supplement education for Aboriginal children with the teaching of traditional Aboriginal arts, crafts and skills mostly by Aboriginals themselves.Following that announcement, a committee was formed to investigate the possibilities of bilingual education and to direct the setting up of some initial programs. Five schools originally changed to a bilingual education program, and the number has grown to almost twenty. The original schools have now been in operation for five years, and there is a call for their evaluation. The government has expended large sums of money on the development of the programs, but there is still discussion concerning their possible future. Some of the key issues concerning bilingual education in the Northern Territory have not been resolved, and much of the development of programs was taken over by people of initiative in individual schools. This may or may not have been a good thing, but for the purposes of evaluation, we are presented with a very complex and freely structured situation. A just and constructive evaluation of all that has happened thus far will be difficult but invaluable for the government, the administrators, and the teachers.

Petrol Sniffing What the Teacher Ought to Do

1980 ◽  
Vol 8 (5) ◽  
pp. 39-42
Author(s):  
D. McClay ◽  
M. Christie
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Aboriginal People ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Racial Groups ◽  
World War ◽  
The World ◽  
Aboriginal Children ◽  
Major Drug

People under pressure often turn to drugs to help them cope with their difficulties. This seems to happen in nearly every culture in the world. Alcohol is the major drug used in Australia – by all the racial groups. Aboriginal children under pressure often turn to petrol sniffing. The habit seems to have been introduced to Aboriginal people in the Northern Territory during World War II. What to do about it is a worrying problem because it often seems that the harder we try, the worse it gets.

Ear Disease and Hearing Problems - FM Radios Help School Children Hear

1988 ◽  
Vol 16 (5) ◽  
pp. 32-34 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sue Quinn
Keyword(s):  
Hearing Loss ◽  
Middle Ear ◽  
School Children ◽  
Northern Territory ◽  
Hearing Screening ◽  
Middle Ear Disease ◽  
Aboriginal Children ◽  
Hearing Problems

Ear disease and hearing problems are alarmingly widespread in Aboriginal children in the Northern Territory. School hearing screening results indicate that between 25% and 50% of Aboriginal children may suffer from middle ear disease and associated hearing loss. This means that up to half the children in any classroom cannot hear their teacher properly.

Nature of Aboriginal Children

1976 ◽  
Vol 4 (5) ◽  
pp. 23-24 ◽  
Author(s):  
Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr
Keyword(s):  
Northern Territory ◽  
Education Department ◽  
Aboriginal Children

Miss Ungunmerr has graciously consented to our publication of the following extracts from “Nature of Aboriginal Children”, the manuscript of which she is preparing for publication by the Northern Territory Education Department.

Distance or Difference in Aboriginal Education

1982 ◽  
Vol 10 (4) ◽  
pp. 3-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
B. Graham
Keyword(s):  
Northern Territory ◽  
Aboriginal Education ◽  
Remote Communities ◽  
Aboriginal Communities ◽  
Aboriginal Students ◽  
Present Complex ◽  
The Social ◽  
Isolated Communities ◽  
Arafura Sea ◽  
Aboriginal Children

The majority of the 27,000 Aborigines in the Northern Territory live in remote communities and on cattle stations, or are grouped around some of the smaller rural towns that are scattered through the 1,347,500 square kilometres of the Northern Territory. These extremely isolated communities may vary in size from, say, one hundred to over one thousand people. There is vast climatic and geographical variation, too, between the tropical communities around the beaches that fringe the Arafura sea, and those in the desert where the harsher climate and terrain have an appeal of their own to those who live there.To educate 7,000 Aboriginal children, the Northern Territory endeavours to maintain 43 schools in Aboriginal communities, plus another 27 which are located on pastoral properties. Apart from two residential colleges located at Alice Springs and Darwin, which cater for secondary-age Aboriginal students, all Aboriginal schools could be regarded as remote, isolated by geographical distance from the larger centres. These 70 schools present complex logistical problems to those who supply and maintain buildings, equipment and staff. However, although formidable, the problems associated with remoteness are insignificant when compared with the social, cultural and linguistic factors that create distance between these traditionally oriented Aboriginal children and our western style of education.

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