With partners:
Questions for Reflection
1. Consider here what it means to be Australian. Do your students consider themselves to be Australians? If so, what criteria/characteristics do they use to determine this? What experiences have helped them feel more included, and which have made them feel excluded?
2. Consider what is more important to “being Australian” i) having a particular cultural background, or birthplace, or ii) having a feeling of belonging and loyalty to Australia, and making a commitment to respect the laws and freedoms of the country and those of other Australians.
3. In his Australia Day speech (2006), the Prime Minister said: “The truth is that people come to this country because they want to become Australians.” How do you think people from other countries “become” Australians? Do you think you have to let go of something from your past to “become” Australian? Or can you retain all of “who you are” and still “become” Australian?
4. Does the entitlement to citizenship also confer the right to call yourself an “Aussie”?
5. Is there a difference between being an “Australian” and being an “Aussie”? If so, who is an “Aussie”?
6. Many people coming to Australia from the Middle East, Africa and Indonesia, for example, follow the religion of Islam. Do you think it is just as easy, or more difficult, to “become an Australian” if you are a Muslim? Why?
7. Do you think a feeling of “Australianness” can vary within families? For example, if your brothers or sisters were born overseas and you were born in Australia, do you feel you are more Australian than them? Are you more Australian than your parents?
8. Sometimes it is difficult to understand why other people are so different to ourselves. What do you think it is that makes people so different? For example, do you think it is where we were born? What language we speak? Whether we follow a religion and what religion we follow? Can you think of other points of difference?
9. Now that you have thought about what makes people so different, what do you think makes people the same?
10. How does your students’ sense of identity shift depending on where they are? For example, between home and school.
11. How does your students’ sense of identity shift depending on who they are with? For example, playing a team sport such as football against another school, or spending lunchtime with their friends at school.
12. Sometimes “Anglo-Aussie” kids are a minority in the class but continue to call culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) background students, regardless of how long they have been in Australia, “wogs” and “imports”. What strategies can be used, drawing upon the curriculum, to help the students understand that they each have a legitimate claim to call themselves “Australian”?
13. If you could share any story about yourself with other students, and teachers, to help them understand who you are, what would you tell them?
Reflect on these questions as you work your way through the four steps.