According to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2008), “Indigenous individuals, particularly children, have the right to all levels and forms of education of the State without discrimination”. This calls on the significance of me, an early childhood educator, being more culturally responsive and culturally competent. A culturally competent teacher has the ability to accept, understand and communicate effectively with people from diverse cultural backgrounds (Perso & Hayward, 2015). The term ‘accept’ refers that teachers are able to value and respect Indigenous cultures, recognize and respond sensitively to the cultural difference among students, validate Indigenous students’ identity through daily interactions. As a pre-services teacher, I should be developing knowledge and understanding of the Indigenous history, and the historical and current relationships between the Indigenous communities and the dominant society. Perso and Hayward (2015) suggested that teachers start to realize what racist behaviors they have demonstrated before by learning about the Indigenous culture and by feeling the hurt to have their country forcibly taken. By building cultural empathy, I place myself in the positions of my students. Thereby, there are less chances for me to impose any racist behaviors on Indigenous students and will …show more content…
Different tribal groups speak different languages and have diverse cultural practices. Teachers should recognize the cultural diversity among these regional groups and be cautious of holding perspectives that all cultural practices are the same among all the tribal groups (Perso & Hayward, 2015). To build the knowledge of the wide variety of cultural difference among so many Aboriginal community groups, I should put efforts in communicating with children, families and Indigenous community members. Cultural difference also reveals on the child-rearing practices. The cultural backgrounds of children have significant influences on shaping children’s learning styles, communication courtesy, self-identity, disposition and ways of viewing the world (Perso & Hayward, 2015). This means when Indigenous children come into schools which are dominant by Western perspectives, they might know nothing about the Western social norms, rules, protocols and communication styles. Perso and Hayward (2015) maintained that teachers should not be making assumptions that Indigenous children are familiar with the protocols existed on the dominant society. I should explicitly teach Indigenous children about the Western ways of schooling to reduce children’s feeling of terrifying and alienating in the