In 2015 the National NAIDOC theme is We All Stand on Sacred Ground: Learn, Respect and Celebrate.
Taking place from July 5-12, 2015, NAIDOC Week, as always, presents educators across the country with the opportunity to discuss and celebrate Australia’s rich indigenous culture.
If you haven’t celebrated NAIDOC Week before, NAIDOC originally stood for ‘National Aborigines and Islanders Day Observance Committee’, who would organise the events for this week of celebration, but has since become the name of the week itself. The week is dedicated to activities centred on supporting and celebrating Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders.
The NAIDOC website suggests a few points on how you can go about celebrating this year’s theme:
- Invite elders or others to talk about local sacred sites or Indigenous culture
- Learn the Traditional names and stories for places, mountains, rivers etc around your region
To celebrate Indigenous culture in a more general sense you might like to:
- Read a Dreamtime story
- Create your own Aboriginal art
- Listen to Indigenous music
- Take children to visit local Indigenous sites of significance or interest if possible
Expanding our knowledge and understanding of our history and culture is such a special part of learning, and being Australian we have a rich Indigenous history that deserves to be recognised and celebrated.
Here we also have for you some ideas, that can be used for celebrating NAIDOC week at home, in a centre, for a school holiday program or an incursion.
NAIDOC Week is the perfect time to do this and you’ll find plenty more information and resources via their website: naidoc.org.au