Articles

A quarter of Australians aged 15 years and over participated in unpaid voluntary work through an organisation in 2020, whilst almost half provided unpaid work or support to others outside their households. In today’s article we speak to Dr Darja Kragt from the University of Western Australia about why people are motivated to volunteer their time, and how it boosts their overall sense of wellbeing.

‘I love to help others and feel genuine satisfaction when I can do something for someone else.’ Principal of St Agatha’s Primary School in Clayfield, Queensland, Anne-Marie Maw shares why she enjoys volunteering her time to help others, and how it has become part of her own wellbeing strategy.

A blob trying to break into the Underworld, a scientist jumping through size-altering portals, and a man who wakes up dazed and confused in a scrapyard – these are some of the protagonists from winning games in this year’s Australian STEM Video Game Challenge.

‘Our strong recommendation is to get creative and put real life contexts front and centre of your lessons, making mathematics relevant, engaging and meaningful…’ Justine Sakurai, Carly Sawatzki and Dave Tout discuss contextualised teaching and learning of mathematics through the exploration of six numeracy contexts, and provide several examples of what this could look like in the classroom.

Australian students report greater levels of respect for people from other cultures and more positive attitudes towards immigrants than the OECD average, according to a new report from the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER). Find out more in today’s article.

Teachers, Students and the Law, written by barrister and educator Vivien Millane, is a plain language guide to the main areas of law relevant to the teacher-student relationship in Australian schools. This exclusive extract offers advice on duty of care requirements and the welfare and safety of students during periods of remote learning, and their return to classrooms.

What is excellence in Indigenous education? And, how is it conceptualised in practice? In this article, researchers from the University of Queensland, Dr Marnee Shay, Dr Jodie Miller and Dr Suraiya Abdul Hameed, share details of their pilot study in Queensland schools that explored these questions.

The latest edition of Snapshots, from the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER), digs into PISA 2018 data to explore the question: How aware of global issues are Australian 15-year-olds? Students were asked to report the extent to which they knew about seven issues. Today’s infographic looks at some of the results.

Our annual reader survey has just wrapped up for another year. It’s an opportunity for you to tell us what content you’d like to hear from us, and this year you told us you’d like more information and support on inclusive education. Inclusive education is something we’ve covered this month at Teacher, so it’s a good opportunity to put it in the spotlight in this episode.

Today’s article, written by Professor Fiona White from the University of Sydney, explores the research pilot she led as a consultant for the new television series airing in Australia on the ABC, The School That Tried to End Racism. The pilot involved 20 students in Year 6 completing a range of activities to challenge their racial biases.