Teachers: Resources for the Classroom








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Team C001515

One of the guiding lights in Student Particpation and Active Citizenship over the last 20 years in Melbourne has been Roger Holdsworth. Roger has given time, energy and resources in the promotion of Student Participation and collaborative learning for well over 15 years. We are grateful for the support he has provided us in developing both this section and the Student Council sections of this website.

In December 1989, Roger Holdsworth produced an editorial for "Connect", the magazine he had produced almost single handedly for the previous 10 years. Part of it included the following:

"I remain defiantly convinced that we must develop curriculum directions along the paths pioneered by the schools and classrooms documented in Connect in the past ten years. If education is to make sense ….if the world is to make sense …. And if we are all to learn to exercise control over our lives, then a curriculum that acknowledges the value of students, that affirms that all students can contribute - now- to our society and that challenges students to learn through a process of shaping their world - then, a participatory curriculum is essential." ....Roger Holdsworth 1989

Roger has helped to run numerous programs over the years that have focused on training students to be more effective in their participation in a range of school activities and organisations. He has acted a little like a clearing house of ideas on how to develop more effective curriculum for student participation.

The push to student participation in education was at its peak in the 1970's and 1980's. While it died off for a while, it is interesting that in Australia, the concept of participation has been brought back to life through a program called Civics and Citizenship.