Taking on language - AUSLAN

Continuing on our goal of exploring the purposeful use of languages other than English and summarising October, which brings awareness to hearing loss and hearing impairment, children across the Service have been learning and exploring AUSLAN.

Marissa has incorporated the AUSLAN while singing with children during nature walks. The Kookaburra song you can HEAR and SEE children singing is based on the popular nursery rhyme "Barramundi song".

Sign Language has been proven to be beneficial when used with verbal children. Dr Marilyn Daniels has conducted over ten years of research in the U.S. and the U.K. on the benefits of using sign language with verbal children, and below is a list of those benefits:

• Extensive vocabulary: Children exposed to sign language had larger English-language vocabularies than non-signing children. Introducing sign language to children through music is also a great way to enhance children's vocabulary.

• Reading ability: Sign language involves using hands, body and facial expressions to communicate with those around you. As it is a visual language, learning it consists of using the visual-spatial part of your brain. This is the same part of the brain we use to learn to read.

• Spelling proficiency: Research shows that children who learn sign language can more readily translate letters and words into the written language.

• Stimulate Brain Development: Sign language can stimulate brain development. When learning sign language, you use both the left and right hemispheres of the brain compared to learning a spoken language, which only uses the brain's left hemisphere. It helps develop neural pathways and cognitive processes unique to using visual language.

• Increased Memory Retention: When sign language is incorporated into other learning activities, children are learning visually, verbally, and kinesthetically all at the same time—simultaneously engaging children of different learning styles and creating greater memory retention.

Nature Walks - Rituals

"In The Archetypal Actions of Ritual, two anthropologists, Caroline Humphrey and James Laidlaw, described rituals as a way to foreground what we value. Ritual is not something set apart from daily life, they say, but a quality that can be recognised in a range of everyday activities." [M. Loader & T. Christie; Rituals; 2017; Wellington]

As part of our Nature Walks and Language development, every time we enter the Red Hill Nature Reserve, children gather in a circle to acknowledge the Ngoonawal people, the traditional custodians of this Land. With this ritual, we focus on an ordinary moment, pay attention, and pay respect, so the ordinary moment becomes a touchpoint for who we are and how we make our lives.

At Woden Valley ELC, alongside the children, we developed our version of the Acknowledgment of the Country relevant to us as a Service. Children, starting from the nursery, learn the acknowledgment and make their meaningful promises to the Land, flora, fauna, and each other.

This year we also developed a picture storybook - "My Promise," a visual representation of our acknowledgment, allowing children and their families to transfer already gathered knowledge into home settings.

Taking on language

Language is one of the most important parts of any culture. It is the way by which people communicate with one another, build relationships, and create a sense of community. There are roughly 6,500 spoken languages in the world today, and each is unique in several ways.

This year as part of our Quality Improvement Plan, we are exploring the purposeful use of languages other than English through multiple literacy resources and tools (6.1.2 - The expertise, culture, language, values and beliefs of families are respected and used in relevance to the Service and its program).

Our journey began with Reconciliation Week when the United Nations declared the period 2022-2023 as the Decade of Indigenous Language. By offering fun provocations, the children interact with text and symbols and share meaning and an emerging understanding of the Ngoonawal language. We've used symbols and words on wooden discs, almost like sound buttons, to introduce our youngest to the concepts of texts and phonetics. These discs are designed to be exciting and an open-ended resource. Children have enjoyed jumping on them like an obstacle course, transporting them in many ways, using them in play to share knowledge and understanding, or rearranging them in meaningful ways to them.

Ngoonawal Language has always been a part of Woden Valley ELC Acknowledgement of Country, and the children know the word Narragunnawali as a fun word to shout and hear in response, like announcing we are here. Its meaning, in Ngoonawal, is alive, well-being, coming together and peace.