Teaching Cultural competency in course...

Infograph on teaching course

This week, I've been busy working on an Infogram for explaining the course that I teach at Te Wananga o Aotearoa. It's a level 4 foundation year-long programme called 'Te Kunenga o te Ao Tikanga' course that embodies rangahau - Indigenous research and incorporating skills in Cultural competence.

I discovered this when I began researching around the course and found out that Careerforce, a government-appointed body that supports work-based training across all sectors, endorsed our level 3 Certificate in Tikanga Maori as a qualification equivalent and accepted for cultural competence (an 18-week course).

Our 36-week fees-free course builds on this and supports cultural competency through teaching:

• 8-weekend noho Marae cultural experiences (4 on-campus and 4 at various Auckland marae)
• Tuesday tutorials of 3 hours that include discussions, practical exercises/scenarios and keeping up to date with current issues
• 39 weeks of 4 assessments through 9-week modules of discussing important topics i.e. mana tangata (people), mana whenua (environment), mana reo (indigenous language/s) and mana ao turoa (development)
• Indigenous research field trips

This course is especially important for non-Indigenous teaching professionals, health workers and community workers etc. who work or support Maori, Pasifika or other indigenous peoples in their workplaces.

This has been an important concern that I've observed over the years as a teaching professional and in working within our communities with predominantly Pasifika, Maori and other indigenous peoples where situations can go very wrong if cross-cultural communications aren't observed.

Courses such as these are important for cross-cultural understandings and learning to work alongside people with indigenous backgrounds and understandings but it's also important to know your own lens and that's important to learn about as well...