Some Language-related Observations for Teachers in Torres Strait and Cape York Peninsula Schools

Abstract

Newly-graduated non-Indigenous teachers who go to remote Torres Strait and Cape York Peninsula (CYP) schools may experience a range of difficulties. This paper makes some observations about one of them: the difficulty of teaching students whose first language is not English and for whom English may well be only one of several languages spoken. Moreover, none of these other languages belongs to the same Indo-European language family as English. The ramifications extend far beyond the intellectual recognition that language, normative modes of thinking and reasoning and social values are interwoven, mutually reinforcing and almost impossible to disentangle.