SWTP238 - Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and Social Work Practice

Year

Credit points

Campus offering

Prerequisites

Nil

Teaching organisation

Unit rationale, description and aim

Acknowledging, respecting and learning from the experiences of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples is a priority in social work practice. Social workers are responsible for ensuring their practice is culturally aware, responsive and safe. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander content is essential core curriculum in social work education. This unit will introduce students to culturally responsive social work practice with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. The aim of the unit is to provide students with the opportunity to learn and value Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ways of knowing, being and doing in thinking holistically about experience, in a culturally responsive way as relevant for social work practice with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, and all people with whom social workers engage.

Learning outcomes

To successfully complete this unit you will be able to demonstrate you have achieved the learning outcomes (LO) detailed in the below table.

Each outcome is informed by a number of graduate capabilities (GC) to ensure your work in this, and every unit, is part of a larger goal of graduating from ACU with the attributes of insight, empathy, imagination and impact.

Explore the graduate capabilities.

On successful completion of this unit, students should be able to:

LO1 - Identify personal and professional values in social work practice with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (GA1, GA5, GA6)

LO2 - Understand historical and contemporary social and political issues that impact on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples (GA1, GA4)

LO3 - Demonstrate knowledge of culturally responsive social work practices with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples. (GA1, GA4, GA5, GA6, GA7)

Graduate attributes

GA1 - demonstrate respect for the dignity of each individual and for human diversity 

GA4 - think critically and reflectively 

GA5 - demonstrate values, knowledge, skills and attitudes appropriate to the discipline and/or profession 

GA6 - solve problems in a variety of settings taking local and international perspectives into account

GA7 - work both autonomously and collaboratively 

AASWEAS Practice Standards

This Unit has been mapped to the ACU Graduate Attributes and the ASWEAS Profession-Specific Graduate Attributes. The following table sets out the broad relationship between the Learning Outcomes, Graduate Attributes and the ASWEAS Profession-Specific Graduate Attributes provided in the Australian Social Work Education and Accreditation Standards: https://www.aasw.asn.au/document/item/13565  

ASWEAS Profession-Specific Graduate Attributes

This Unit has been mapped to the ACU Graduate Attributes and the ASWEAS Profession-Specific Graduate Attributes. The following table sets out the broad relationship between the Learning Outcomes, Graduate Attributes and the ASWEAS Profession-Specific Graduate Attributes provided in the Australian Social Work Education and Accreditation Standards: https://www.aasw.asn.au/document/item/13565  

Content

Topics will include:

Historical Overview

• Pre-invasion - Dreamtime, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander ways of knowing, being and doing
• Political history

Self-determination and Sovereignty

• Racism
• Human Rights

Theoretical and Practice Frameworks

• Cultural responsiveness
• Identity and intersectionality
• Privilege
• Whiteness theory
• Social and emotional well-being

Working with Communities

• Engagement and relationship building protocols
• Collaborative practice

Professional and Personal Identity

• Use of self
• Social work ethics

Learning and teaching strategy and rationale

Teaching and learning strategies for this unit include face-to-face, recorded and guest lectures, small group discussions and experiential workshops. Tutorials incorporate small group, collaborative discussions and experiential learning. Students will be expected to take responsibility for their learning and to participate actively in class discussions. The approach of this unit is to privilege Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander perspectives, voices, teachers and resources in active respect of how these enrich and deepen student learning. To understand Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures and ways of knowing, being and doing and how these apply to practice, students need to understand and experience the 8 Aboriginal ways of learning. Hence teaching and learning through stories, links to land, using symbols, images and actions, modelling and making links to local community is encouraged. In this way the unit can best prepare social work graduates to continually develop their ability to be culturally responsive and safe in their future practice. As this learning is experiential in nature, there is a compulsory attendance requirement for the experiential workshops with cultural facilitators. Any student who has an approved application for special consideration for non-attendance must consult their lecturer in charge about a replacement learning task. A co-teaching model is critical to ensuring that the learning outcomes are addressed. That is the presentation of content by both Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander and non-Indigenous lecturers. Each lecturer taking appropriate cultural responsibility for unit content role models culturally responsive social work practice in action.

Assessment strategy and rationale

This unit takes an authentic assessment approach which prioritises assessment processes consistent with Aboriginal ways of knowing, being and doing, such as collaborative, experiential and reflective learning.

Assessment 1 requires students to explore their personal and professional values in relation to their own cultural identity and how this may influence their ability to be culturally responsive.

Assessment 2 considering a case scenario, students will identify and discuss key social and political issues for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples and the impact on social and emotional well-being. Students will demonstrate their knowledge of culturally responsive practice approaches for social work with a focus on social and emotional well-being. 

Assessment 3 assesses students’ ability to identify and describe culturally responsive practice with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples for their own developing social work practice. This final assessment is designed to enhance meaningful engagement with the unit content and Aboriginal ways of learning. It assesses students’ self-directed reflection on their learning journey, including collaborative and group learning and their engagement with Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander knowledge holders. This process of reflection encourages growth in self-awareness and professional identity for practice.

Overview of assessments

Representative texts and references

Bennett, B., Green, S., Gilbert, S., Bessarab, D., (2019), (Eds.) Our Voices: Social Work, (2nd ed.). (pp. 3-30). South Yarra, Melbourne: Palgrave Macmillan.

Bennett, B., Krakouer, J., Fernando, T., Phelan, P., Russ-Smith, J., & Wheeler, A. (2021). Aboriginal fields of practice (B Bennett, Ed.). Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

Dudgeon, P., Milroy, H., Walker, R. (Eds.) (2014) Working Together: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Mental Health and Wellbeing Principles and Practice. (2nd ed). Commonwealth of Australia.

Kickett-Tucker, C., Bessarab. D., Coffin. C., Wright. M (2017) (Eds.). Mia Mia Aboriginal community development: Fostering cultural security. Port Melbourne: Cambridge University Press.

Morseu-Diop, N. (2013) Indigenous yarning modalities: An insider’s perspective on respectful engagement with Torres Strait Islander clients. In B. Bennett., S. Green., S. Gilbert., D. Bessarab. (Eds.) Our voices: Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander social work. South Yarra, Melbourne: Palgrave Macmillan.

Pascoe. B. (2018). Dark Emu. Western Australia: Magabala Books.