MLT VISITS THE INDIGENOUS LITERACY FOUNDATION

April 12, 2017

In March, Clayton from the MLT visited the Indigenous Literacy Foundation (ILF) in Sydney, in particular – Tina Raye, who works as a Program Manager for the ILF. 

Tina is an Arabana woman, who has been involved more recently in working with the Arabana community on language projects, funded in part through the MLT. The MLT was particularly keen to meet with Tina, who is a qualified primary school teacher, and holds a Masters Degree in Indigenous Languages Education. We met to get a better understanding of how her experience of accessing Arabana language media resources on the MLT website has helped her increase her understanding of the Arabana language. 

Tina believed that having the audio resources was of the utmost value. “Being able to hear it (the language) is so valuable….as I’d never met a speaker before”. Up until September Tina had never met a fluent Arabana speaker. She then travelled to Port Augusta to take part in a community language workshop, as part of the continued work the MLT is involved in with the maintenance and revival of the Arabana language. “It would’ve been good if it happened ages ago, as it incorporates looking and hearing.”

Tina said the audio files on the MLT website could most certainly be used as a school teaching resource, which is one way the MLT is helping to bring Aboriginal languages into the classroom. Being able to access the audio files has helped Tina gain an increased understanding of her mother tongue, and – living in Sydney – has been important to her sense of identity and wellbeing, as well as that of her 8 year old son. 

“We are using more language at home.”

If you would like to get in contact with the Mobile Language Team to discuss language development within your community, please call us on (08) 8313 0707, or send an email to info@mobilelanguageteam.com.au