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Teacher Stories Indian Teachers Look at Our Ways of Schooling Lucina Yin and Jess Smith from St Mary's Primary School, Victoria, were happy to tell Mrs Suman Nath, Principal of Tagore International School in Delhi, all about Australia when she visited their class Thirteen teachers from India, all wearing colourful saris - here to investigate education 'Australian style' - brightened up a grey winter's morning for Year One students at St Mary's Primary School in East St Kilda recently. The Indian teachers are participating in the Australia-India Exchange Program, a professional development program for teachers run by the Asia Education Foundation at the University of Melbourne's Asialink Centre. Their visit reciprocates that of 21 teachers from around Australia who visited India last January. Funded jointly by the Australia-India Council, Australian education jurisdictions, and the Indian and Australian schools involved, the program is designed to improve educators' knowledge of other cultures and provide inspiration for development of curriculum materials. Resources the Australian teachers have produced to date include visually striking multimedia materials for secondary students about Indian landscape, tradition and contemporary life - from the dominance of the Moghul Empire, and busy river trade on the Ganges, to film stars in 'Bollywood'. A 'lucky-dip' bag made from traditional Indian textiles containing bindi, henna, photos of elephants and tigers, and a tiny boxed replica of the Taj Mahal, can encourage younger learners to look at, touch and experiment with interesting new items from another culture. The Indian visitors are keenly collecting Australian handcrafted items - Huon pine from Tasmania, boomerangs, rhythm sticks and aboriginal artwork, and merino wool from Australia's rural heartland. The teachers visiting Australia are from New Delhi. They include representatives from large public schools where class sizes can reach 45 or 50 students. During their immersion in the intimate community at St Mary's the teachers were impressed by the small class sizes, the diversity of students' cultural backgrounds and the relaxed, friendly atmosphere. Following their short stay in Melbourne, the teachers have dispersed to locations as varied as Moolap Primary in regional Victoria and the Hale School in Perth, where they will spend six days with host teachers, take classes and visit other local schools before heading to Sydney to debrief, and then Cairns to round out the program. Manager of the Asia Education Foundation, Ms Kathe Kirby, says the AEF program is unique on an international level. "No other government in a western country has invested so much in focusing on the inclusion of studies of Asia in school education. Over the five years we have been running the study tours, which are part of the broader Teacher In-Country Fellowships Asia program, more than 750 teachers and curriculum writers have traveled to Vietnam, Thailand, Japan, Laos, Cambodia and China - and our exchange programs with India, Korea and Indonesia are also well established," she says. Source: UNINEWS,Vol 10 No.21, 25 June 2001, The University of Melbourne | More Teacher Stories | Go to the top of the page Contacts Further information on the TICFA program is available from: Ms Kristi Sheldon, Manager, In-Country Programs k.sheldon@asialink.unimelb.edu.au Mr Aaron O'Shannessy, Project Officer, In-County Programs a.oshannessy@asialink.unimelb.edu.au Asia Education Foundation Sidney Myer Asia Centre The University of Melbourne Parkville Victoria 3010 Australia Telephone: 03 8344 4800 Facsimile: 03 9347 1768