[Preparedness 1: Child-centred disaster risk reduction]
[On screen text]
We acknowledge the traditional custodians across all the lands on which we live and work, and we pay our respects to Elders both past and present.
[Gentle introductory music]
[Voice over]
The last decade has seen a major shift towards involving children and youth as genuine stakeholders in disaster risk reduction and resilience. At the international level, the United Nations Sendai Framework identifies children and youth as agents of change who should be involved in the development of policies, plans, procedures, and standards.
In Australia, education policy and practice now emphasise the importance of empowering children and youth as active citizens. This provides a valuable opportunity to design and implement school-based education programmes that not only provide children and young people
with essential knowledge and skills, but support their active participation in disaster risk reduction in their communities.
Dr. Briony Towers has been investigating ways to build synergies between child-centered disaster risk reduction, and contemporary models of education.
She's meeting Neil Munro, a Senior Engagement Advisor from Victoria's Country Fire Authority, to show him what child-centered disaster risk reduction looks like in practice, and to tell him about the research he's been conducting at Harkaway Primary School in Melbourne's southeast suburbs.
[Neil Munro - Senior Engagement Advisor, Country Fire Authority/Safer Together]
So Briony I'm really interested to find out about the project that these students have run. I'm also curious to find out how the ongoing impact from them at home, and in the classroom, and if there are any broader impacts in the community from the work that they've done here. And from an agency perspective, we're always interested in how we can scale, and sustain, this kind of approach going forward. So I'd love to get your thoughts on that.
[Dr Briony Towers - Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC & RMIT University]
I think to start with one of the really important things to recognise is that bushfire hazards and disasters, are actually very abstract concepts to children. So, it's really important that we do the best we can to make the education place-based, that's actually about where children live. It's about their natural environment and their social environment. So, you know, we kind of move away a bit from worksheets and textbooks and kind of generic teaching materials and start to design learning activities where children are actually going out into their natural and social environment to explore and discover how bushfire risk is actually constructed in their own environment.
[Narrator]
Briony's research has identified that a one size fits all approach is not effective when trying to equip children and young people to navigate disaster risk reduction. The best outcomes for learning and action, appear to come from education programmes that can be tailored to children's own interests and priorities, using their local and social environment as the learning laboratory.
[Dr Briony]
We really want to give them opportunities to identify and solve problems because that gives them a real sense of safety and security. And we also know from the research that we've conducted so far that they're actually really fantastic educators, and are really good at identifying problems and finding solutions that are actually feasible and acceptable within their cultural, environmental, economic context. And so that's where the participatory aspect comes in. And we know that the most effective programmes really support children's genuine participation in decision-making about the kind of action that they wanna take.
[Voice over]
As well as identifying an effective educational approach, Briony also has insight into how the bushfire safety agenda can be successfully integrated into the formal school curriculum. Briony believes collaborations between agencies, schools, and subject matter experts can provide the information and support that students need to develop knowledge, skills, and understanding in safe and meaningful ways. But this can be very time and resource intensive. Meaning, that if the approach is to operate on a larger scale, there must be a framework to help put in place and sustain these collaborative networks.
[Dr Briony]
And I think our biggest challenge now is to actually figure out how are we going to build the capacity within our organisations, within our communities to ensure that children can actually have that access to those experts, and how do we do that in a way that is gonna be sustainable and scalable. So I think that's the big task for programme developers like yourself is finding... Yeah, building that capability and harnessing the existing capability to actually deliver that kind of programming.
All right. So, shall we go and have a look around?
[Neil]
Fantastic, yes. Yes.
[Voice over]
Harkaway Primary School is in a high bushfire risk area on the outskirts of Melbourne. The school has been drawing on the existing evidence-base to deliver a bushfire safety programme in which the students take the lead in identifying and solving local problems.
Briony is keen to show Neil how well the students have responded to this challenge. Tom and Ruby, along with their grade six classmates, were supported to gather information from various sources, including subject matter experts, and combine that information with their own local knowledge to develop workshops, websites, videos, and games. All of which were aimed at the Harkaway community.
[Ruby - Harkaway Primary School, Student]
I worked on this specific topic. It was "What to do if it's too late to leave a bushfire". And I think it was really awesome because we had the choice of what topic we wanted to choose. And I felt like that was really cool because we were learning about stuff that we wanted to learn about. And yeah, it was really fun.
[Voice over]
As part of the programme, the students learned about the importance of leaving early, but Ruby and her friends also wanted to know what to do if it's too late to leave. So, they decided to focus on that for their project.
[Ruby]
I think the biggest thing that I found out is that if it was too late to leave, you have to stay home. Because that would be the last thing that I would have done. I would've just tried to get out, try to escape the fires. I remember when I told my mum, specifically, she was really surprised because she thought like me, the first thing she would have done if there was fire is to leave and just run and get out of there. So, I think that was a big surprise to her and pretty much a lot of people that I told.
[Voice over]
When the students started the programme, Tom's family had just moved to the area. So he wanted to find out what the risk would be to his property. Tom and his friends learned how they could use online maps to access levels of bushfire risk.
[Tom - Harkaway Primary School, Student]
I found out a lot about certain areas of where there are high risks and lower risks. I did tell my family about the map, like we were 10 metres away from it. So it was like... Like I've said before, like the hard truth. But the important thing was that we moved on from that, the fact that we are close, and we decided we needed to think of a plan for it.
[Voice over]
Outcomes from the students classroom projects included the formation of a bushfire safety committee, development of a bushfire safety manifesto, and practical changes to the school's emergency management plan. The student-to-student learning element was something that Tom and Ruby found particularly powerful about the approach.
[Tom]
I ran a little workshop with two of my friends who were in the group with me, and we had our computers out to show everyone the maps. So we type in their address so they could see their risk, and help them prepare for what might happen. If a kid just like you, who's your age in your school that you're friends with and you know tells you about it, then it might have better profits. You can digest it and process it a lot easier.
[Ruby]
If you're talking to kids, they might think, "Oh, that person's doing it. They're like me. I can do that, too." So then it just gets more people helping because it's like a thing that you need everyone kind of into.
[Voice over]
Harkaway Principal, Lee Johnson, recognises the importance of including children as stakeholders in disaster risk reduction. He also sees its value in providing lifelong learning skills.
[Leigh Johnson - Harkaway Primary School, Principal]
It's really important for our kids not to simply have some knowledge or facts about bushfire and bushfire safety, but actually to be safe. To understand the land around them, to see grass, to feel the wind, to look around, and have a sense of "Is this a bushfire danger environment that I'm in?" And so what we're trying to do is give our kids the power to just naturally have a way of being in the world where they can just sense and pick up on the risk that they're facing by, by being and living in the bush. So at school, well, you know, one of the most important things we can teach our kids is how to learn, and learning that familiarity with their landscape is super important.
[Voice over]
A key element of bushfire education in schools is the influence it has on preparedness and awareness in the broader community. Neil is meeting Tom and Ruby's mothers to find out what impact the child-centered approach has had on their lives.
[Neil]
And did you notice any change in your children throughout this process as they were learning?
[Sam - Ruby's mother]
Oh, absolutely, absolutely. And I'll say it again, and I've said it from the very beginning, that children given the opportunity to learn the way they want to learn is so important, which is you know, we at Harkaway, we do the discovery learning. They get a topic, they resource, they work together, they work alone, they do it their way.
Learning that way, it engages children, you know? And yeah, it's just growth. It has to be growth. It's amazing.
[Adele - Tom's mother]
Yeah, and the understanding and language that's coming from Tom, it's really relatable. And it's almost like going back to a space of not knowing anything and then having his perspective and just his breakdown on what to do and where we live and what our risk is.
And adults have worries just like children. So yeah, to have that confidence in what he's telling us and then talk about it as a family was awesome. It was really cool. It was a whole different take on bushfire safety I spose.
[Gentle instrumental music]
[Voice over]
Back at the office, Neil has had time to think about his day with Briony at Harkaway Primary School, and to consider how the research findings might inform his own approaches to bushfire education. Neil has been impressed by the levels of bushfire understanding the children have achieved and their enthusiasm for the content.
[Neil]
I think as agencies sometimes we underestimate the capabilities of children, and what they are able to learn, what they are able to, What actions they're able to take, what impact they can have in the community. I'm bringing that back into the organisation because I know now that it's possible to get children really invested in the projects, and to develop a really deep understanding of bushfire and how they can make a difference.
[Voice over]
One of Neil's learnings is that with the right collaboration and clearly defined parameters, fire agencies have an opportunity to share the load when it comes to designing and delivering bushfire safety education. This is important if child-centered disaster risk reduction education is to be delivered at scale.
[Neil]
For a long time, agencies are being considered the teachers or the imparters of knowledge and really, our role probably should be more supporting teachers. So the fire agencies are the subject matter experts when it comes to bushfire, and educators are the subject matter experts when it comes to pedagogy and teaching. And so, therefore, it's a case of working together for a common goal.
This isn't just up to us as one fire agency to develop it, drive it, to deliver it. You know, we've realised that we just don't have the resources available to do that. We don't have the expertise available to do that, but when we work with other agencies and with the education sector, we're much more powerful.