Importance of Understanding Education and Culture for Educators

Running head: Thinking education 0
THINKING EDUCATION

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Thinking education
Table of Contents
Introduction......................................................................................................................................2
Option 1...........................................................................................................................................2
a. Personal experiences as a learner in primary and secondary school............................................2
Impact of political and social forces............................................................................................2
Impact of cultural forces..............................................................................................................2
Value learning..............................................................................................................................3
Hidden curriculum.......................................................................................................................3
Examinations................................................................................................................................3
My learning..................................................................................................................................4
My personal expectations regarding learning..............................................................................4
b. Importance of a critical educational and cultural understanding for educators...........................4
Understanding of education and culture......................................................................................4
Negative impact of being influenced by dominant culture and politics......................................4
Importance of an advanced understanding of culture..................................................................5
Positive changes in learners and learning....................................................................................6
Conclusion.......................................................................................................................................6
Reference list...................................................................................................................................7

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Thinking education
Introduction
A clear understanding of education, society, culture and politics is highly needed especially for
the educators and teachers in order to impart a holistic and unbiased value based teaching and
guidance to the learners. So, this study focuses on two segments among which the first part deals
with my own personal experiences as a primary and secondary school learner. For that reason,
my experiences regarding the schooling, teaching, examinations, curriculum and more have been
recalled and recorded in this study. In addition, some impacts of social, political and cultural
forces have also been mentioned here as per my experiences. On the other hand, the study
includes a discussion on why the educators need to have a better understanding of education and
culture while teaching the learners. For that reason, the negative impact of some age old cultural
values has been illuminated that affects not only the learning but also the lives of the learners.
Moreover, the positive impact of exercising a critical understanding of culture on the part of
educators has been highlighted further in the study.
Option 1
a. Personal experiences as a learner in primary and secondary school
Impact of political and social forces
The time when I used to be under primary schooling, the public schools used to be under
governmental regulatory control. However, gradually, the public schools have been made for
market based and less governed by Australian government. As a result, the school authorities
such as the principals got the autonomy to lead the schools. I can recall that there were some
teachers in my primary schools who were rebuked by the parents and were also disliked by most
of the learners because of their teaching techniques. However, the complaints of the parents
could not make any changes at that time as the power of firing the educators were not solely in
the hands of the school principals at that time. This issue has been solved after the quasi
marketization of the Australian schools (Gobby & Walker, 2017). The emergence of neoliberal
government has also impacted the schools sociologically. As per my experiences, I can tell that I
experienced a learner centric and skill based teaching learning environment in my secondary
schooling. The reason behind is the social forces that changed the position of learners in the
learning and started viewing the learners as human capitals who are need of constant nurturing.
Impact of cultural forces
Being an Australian, I have been lucky to be around people of so many cultures.
Similarly, when in school, I used to learn together with learners coming from various
communities such as the aboriginal communities, learners belonging from different economic,
social and cultural backgrounds. However, I can remember that there were not many efforts from
the part of the schools to foreground the celebration of diverse cultures in the school. On the
contrary, the curriculum used to be surrounded by materials that were used to illuminate only the