Riddim & Poetry
by Devo Devrim, posted 2017-04-19

Idea Description:

We would like to achieve social impact by engaging Indigenous children with Aboriginal languages, poetry and various rhythms. Initially, this will have two impacts: the first one is regarding Indigenous children's engagement with school, and the second one is regarding improving their literacy skills using Aboriginal languages and poetry. The project is divided into four stages. Please see an outline of the stages of the whole project:

Stage One (1) involves: (almost complete – funded by Equity and Diversity Research Network, School of Education, UNE)

1.1 Information gathering from the Indigenous community

1.2 Literature review of work of this nature

Stage Two (2) involves:

2.1 Designing workshops in collaboration with Beyond Empathy

2.2 Implementation of workshops in Minimbah School

Stage Three (3) involves:

3.1 Presentation of students’ works in collaboration with Beyond Empathy

3.2 Preparing DVDs of Riddim & Poetry workshops and students’ works

Stage Four (4) involves:

4.1 Evaluation of the project

4.2 Planning the second cycle of the action research

Community Benefits:

Previous work on the effects of drumming workshops on Aboriginal children has demonstrated significant effects on Aboriginal children’s engagement with their cultural heritage wellbeing and school performance (e.g. Drumbeat Program by Peter Lawson in Central Australia - the award-winning Drum Atweme Project, 2004 to present). Building from this work, this project will explore the potential of rhythm and poetry workshops for young Aboriginal children's literacy development in Armidale. The project adopts community based action research and arts based research as methodology. Community based action research aims to design educational programs through gathering information from the community, designing programs and constantly revising programs to improve them in relation to the needs of community (Boughton, 2001). Arts based research, on the other hand, aims to reach a deeper understanding of the artistic process by using art forms for data collection and analysis and/or representation of social science research (Leavy, 2009). By combining these two research methodologies, this project aims to develop a culturally sensitive community based understanding of how to design and deliver rhythm and poetry workshops, with a view to improving young Aboriginal children's engagement with school and literacy skills. Furthermore, the project aims to train Riddim and Poetry workshop facilitators who are members of the Aboriginal community.