In considering how such a broad range of diverse content is interwoven between social and environmental concepts, I have struggled to fully grasp the ways in which myself as an educator, can deliver such information to students, in a way that is meaningful, purposeful and relevant within their own individual socio-cultural context.
In reading Appendix 1, it became apparent that in order to do so effectively, key understandings, concepts and big idea's must be highlighted, in order to then successfully build upon previous knowledges and scaffold further learning experiences. In doing so, understanding what is at the core of humanities is vital. According to Gilbert. R, the Humanities as an entity entails information, disciplined knowledge, personal and social development, participation in society and critical social understanding and action. I understand that as an inquiry based unit, students should be exposed to "doing", hands on and interactive processes that not only enhance their own learning, but bring them forward into a world in which they may not have been exposed to outside of their own existence. That is, their own micro environments; their schooling, friends, families, etc. To be able to execute this effectively, I strongly believe that my own teaching philosophy must be cemented, but open ended all at the one time. As hypocritical ,as that may read, I base that off of my own pedagogical belief that teaching is learning. I firmly believe that at the core of any pedagogy, there must be perspectives, attitudes and skills that encircle not only what I believe to be relevant as the educator, but that too of what students see to be of importance also,and bringing this together to create an array of coherent idea's and concepts of the world.
What really stuck within my critical thinking was the motion of not merely teaching content as such, but encouraging the motion of students seeking out information, gathering idea's, analyzing possibilities, challenging their own analytic processes and communication techniques. The reality is that the world we live in is forever changing and this is the case for all human beings, despite race, religion or socio-economic status. Humanities subjects and teachings, if taught thoroughly, has the ability to provide students with an innate ability to deal with the various social/environmental issues happening in the world around them.
Apendix 1:
Gilbert, R. (2011). Studies of Society and Environment in the Australian curriculum. In R. Gilbert, and B Hoepper (Eds.),Teaching society and environment (pp. 2-19) (4th Ed). South Melbourne: Cengage Learning Australia.