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.
Identify personal and professional values in socia...
Learning Outcome 01
Understand historical and contemporary social and ...
Learning Outcome 02
Demonstrate knowledge of culturally responsive soc...
Learning Outcome 03
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
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
Assessment 1: Journal This requires students to e...
Assessment 1: Journal
This 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.
20%
Assessment 2: Written assignment (Essay) This req...
Assessment 2: Written assignment (Essay)
This requires students to consider 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.
40%
Assessment 3: Reflective assignment This enables ...
Assessment 3: Reflective assignment
This enables students to demonstrate how their engagement with the unit content has facilitated their learning of culturally responsive practices with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
40%
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.
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
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.