Acknowledgement of Country
Hello! I haven't posted for a while, it gets quite busy being a Mum of two and running a business! But I wanted to share with you a lovely experience I had this morning. So I got a phone call from my son's kindergarten this morning, and was asked to come in because my dear little three year old had bumped his head and needed a 'mum cuddle' (this of course is not the lovely part of the story!!); so in I go to check on him, and he is sitting there with a little ice pack on his bump, poor little thing, but after a big hug from me he is feeling much better and rejoins his little class. The lovely thing was that while I was there, I got to hear his kindergarten teacher do their first Acknowledgement to Country with the little kinder class!
For those of you that don't know, an "Acknowledgement of Country" is a way that people can show respect for Aboriginal cultures and heritage and the ongoing relationship the traditional custodians have with the land. An example is something along these lines: "I would like to pay my respect and acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land on which this meeting takes place, and also pay respect to Elders both past and present". My son's beautiful kinder teacher did a cute little children's version, which was just gorgeous to hear.
"Here is the land (arms open wide)
And here is the sky (arms pointing to the sky)
Here are my friends (arms pointing to everyone in the group)
And here am I (arms hugging oneself)
We would like to Acknowledge that the Land we are here on today is the traditional lands for the __________ people and that we respect their spiritual relationship with their Country."
Just wonderful to see our little people learning about culture!
For more info about Acknowledgement to Country, see here: https://www.det.nsw.edu.au/media/downloads/dethome/yr2005/welcomecountry.pdf
