The formative years of life provide the most important elements to equip children with the capacity to learn. Therefore, underpinnings for art pedagogy for Australian First Nations early childhood education should ensure that educators and teachers may contribute environmental foundations for children’s learning while ensuring that children have effective resources to prepare them for an ever-changing world. The challenge is balancing the expectations of the home with the expectations of teaching and learning in early childhood educational settings.

This chapter recommends an approach to teaching art in the early years that begins with an underpinning layer of post-structuralist theory. Post-structuralist theories help to examine and question some heartfelt beliefs about art in the early years. There are a number of different theories for teaching the arts with young children. Mostly, it is the role of the teacher that is the focus for examination and analysis. Educators can use theory about discourse and the construction of ideas, thoughts and practices to challenge taken-for-granted beliefs and consciously decide on ways they can support children’s arts learning and their wellbeing.

In the ‘betweens’ of art, research and teaching, this chapter adopts an a/r/tographic approach to explore children’s learning through media art within the Anthropocene, a proposed epoch that acknowledges human impact on Earth’s geology and ecosystems. This learning is thought of as ‘connected learning’, a type of learning that emphasises the integration of educational experiences across various settings, leveraging new media to foster innovative approaches to knowledge creation. The idea of connected learning aligns with the linked concept of children’s lifeworlds – which Arnott and Yelland take to encompass the everyday interactions that children negotiate in daily life as well as the less visible social, technical and material forces that shape those experiences – and the significance of Land as a participant in children’s learning. Children co-labour (or collaborate) with words, materials, technologies and Land to make meaning with their lifeworlds (e.g. semiosis as a process of wording and worlding). They do this in situated practice and through speculation (e.g. by asking “What if...?) to examine possible futures and alternative realities.

Music is a powerful resource for human relating and the expression of meaning. From birth, infants are sensitive to music, explore vocal sounds in musical ways and have the ability to process music. Studies examining interactions between infants and their adult caregivers have discovered the fundamental musicality of these interactions, and the more musical these interactions, the more meaningful they tend to be. However, the potential of music functioning as a conduit for meaning expression, particularly in application to the education and care of young children, has largely been overlooked.

The portrayal of infants and young children’s music-making tends to cast their music participation as a process of becoming, potentialities and efforts towards an adult ‘expert’ state of being musical. Such views can lead to a view of young children as deficient musicians, their music-making as inadequate, and a dismissal of the ways in which they use music in their world-making. Further, through a singular focus on the adult ‘expert’ musician, music education tends to be shaped to achieve that outcome instead of a perspective of music education as preparation for lifewide and lifelong engagement. The adult ‘expert’ view of music participation in adulthood is restricted to a particular form of participation that can disenfranchise and silence many adults’ active music. This chapter will explore what happens when we shift our focus from a perspective of young children’s music-making as becoming from ‘emulation of expert adult activity’ to a manifestation of their being, of their agency, identity work and world-making through embodied music and song-making.

This chapter details the fragmented nature of the last sixty years of Aboriginal land repossession across Australia, both in terms of the nature of the rights and the level of restitution. Exploring the limited and uneven national Aboriginal land rights picture in 2024, we argue for an appreciation of the federal dimension of land rights policymaking. Uneven land restitution has resulted not just from spatially varying degrees of land commodification and the differing trajectories of land rights movements, although these were crucial. We aim to demonstrate that shifting state–Commonwealth (or Federal) relations within the Australian federation – crosscut against differing support from states and Commonwealth governments over time, and differing Commonwealth Government attitudes to federalism – led to a spatially uneven set of legislative land rights regimes across Australia. To do so, we narrate the varied responses to the Aboriginal land rights movement across the country in the wake of the Woodward Royal Commission in 1973 with an eye to the federal dimension. We argue that while the Whitlam, Fraser and Hawke governments from 1972 to 1991 all failed to legislate national land rights, they did so for very different reasons, leaving the land rights agenda to the states. Ultimately, it was the centralizing power of the High Court that brought about a national but inadequate and partial resolution to the Aboriginal land question. Finally, we provide a series of maps and tables describing the jurisdictional variation in rights and interests in land restored to Indigenous Peoples at present.

This chapter focuses on dance and learning in the early years, presenting a theoretical framework that reflects the changing Australian cultural context for dance. Building upon an earlier model for dance education, culturally responsive pedagogy is an inclusive approach to dance learning from birth to age eight. Key influences are introduced with attention given to aesthetic experiences, early dance relationships, ‘dance-play’, young children’s engagement with technology and the explosion of dance on screen. Consideration is given to established truths about dance and the emerging presence of Indigenous dance within dance education. Examples of dance artists in education settings, along with visual and transcribed examples, are provided, demonstrating how early years educators may support young children’s agency as critically responsive co-creative participants in dance.

The objective of this chapter is to define socio-dramatic play from a cultural-historical perspective and to describe how teachers can become co-players with children in their play. To do this we present case studies from research and a pedagogical toolbox to support children’s participation, learning and development. The chapter begins by outlining children’s socio-dramatic play using a cultural-historical perspective to focus on interactions in shared play. In socio-dramatic play, imagination and creativity are central as children create narratives together. Play creates conditions for children to express and construct meaning with others and to become co-players in a shared imagined world. Adults in early childhood settings traditionally support children’s play by planning, resourcing and observing, although their role as co-player is less understood.

This chapter explores young children’s semiosis (meaning-making) and transformations when immersed with artworks that were made by professional artists. Paintings and sculptures (static, moving and sound-making) ‘resided’ (were installed) in their classroom for two school terms. The first part of the chapter provides a brief context for how artworks as mediating tools elicited children’s meaning-making through individual and social activity and describes how the children’s communication and representation of meaning was multimodal. The second part of the chapter delves into Illustration of Practice 7.1 based on recent research, where semiosis was studied through two key processes: (1) noticing, or becoming aware of signs within artworks, based on an individual’s perceptions, knowledge and emotions; and (2) immersion into the artworks. Immersion involved mediating signs through perezhivanie (a cognitive-embodied-emotive encounter that requires working-through) and transmediating (translating meaning from one mode of expression to another). Illustration of Practice 7.1 highlights how young children’s representation and communication of meaning are socially mediated, cognitive, affective and embodied.

This chapter provides theoretical and practical examples of how children’s meaning-making is enriched through teachers’ mediation. It shifts attention away from a traditional literacy perspective to a semiotic orientation that honours young children’s symbolic communication through art, music, play and dance. Exemplars are given of how children’s sign-making practices in the arts are of equal significance, and are the precursors, to sign-making in language and literacy. Indeed, the arts are children’s ‘first literacies’ because they help children find their way into the sign systems of reading and writing. Illustration of Practice 8.1 demonstrates the notable link between playing and drawing, and how children cross between graphic, narrative and embodied modes to communicate meaning. Illustration of Practice 8.2 foregrounds art making in a Reggio-inspired preschool classroom. Concluding sections focus on the building blocks of meaning-making, with an emphasis on its co-creation and the importance of documenting and interpreting children’s creative processes and learning.

This chapter describes how conceptual learning is mediated by interactions, the environment and a range of semiotic modes. Using a case study approach, Illustration of Practice 3.1 presents four-year-old children’s dance-play and drawing-telling as exemplars of powerful forms of meaning-making and communication. The nexus between theory and practice is illustrated through an innovative model that supports children’s creative dance improvisation and experimentation, and links to graphic and narrative modes. Children’s sophisticated levels of thinking, feeling and relating are addressed, and the role of the teacher is foregrounded with regards to supporting transformative learning outcomes for young children.

The Introduction starts by considering stand-up in Mort Sahl’s terms, as ‘a primitive form of theatre’. Using a quote by Tony Allen to pin down its key feature, it argues that stand-up is defined by centring on the performer themself, a direct relationship between performer and an active audience, and the appearance and possibility of spontaneity. After briefly considering the history of stand-up in the USA and UK, it goes on to recount the less familiar story of how it developed in Australia, from the emergence of Rod Quantock to the rise of the modern comedy club in the 1980s. It then considers its rapid expansion around the world in the last 30 years – paying particular attention to India, Estonia, and Belgium – and its continuing relationship with the English language even in non-anglophone countries. It finishes with an explanation of the scope and structure of the rest of the book.

Critical to successful engagement in any organisation is an understanding of the important elements affecting good communication. There are many dimensions to the study of communication in the 21st century, both generally and in health service settings, in the 21st century. This chapter considers the foundational concepts, with references to help students discover more about communication in organisational, social and cultural settings. Many believe that even the definition of communication is worth questioning. As a notion it is so discursive and diverse that any definition other than the simplest becomes so complex as to cease being useful.

Managers and leaders need to critically analyse their own thinking and decision-making processes so they can objectively evaluate the problems and issues they face every day. To do this they need to understand their personal preferences, prejudices, values and cultural beliefs, and their motivations and desires. It is also important for them to understand how these factors shape the biases managers and leaders take to decision-making. To achieve success, they require the ability to analyse, synthesise and evaluate material, and to assemble their thoughts in a logical argument.

Effective strategic planning, implementation and management drive organisational performance. Healthcare managers have recognised the increasing importance of strategic planning and management as the healthcare industry has become more dynamic and complex. However, development of feasible strategy can be difficult, and implementation of even well-developed strategy is often challenging. This has become increasingly complex as healthcare organisations aim to implement triple bottom-line (TBL) reporting to better ensure sustainability. This chapter provides advice on leading and improving strategic planning and management for sustainability in health-service organisations.

Values permeate every aspect of our lives, shaping individual actions and giving meaning, direction and scope to our work environments and organisational cultures. Defining positive behaviours and identifying unprofessional, disrespectful or negative behaviours shape and define every aspect of our work and personal lives. Values also have an emotional component: when we act in accordance with our values, we experience positive emotions; conversely, when we act against our values or are placed in situations that compromise our values, we experience emotional dissonance. It is this emotional component that drives us to seek values alignment in our personal and professional lives.

In the evolving landscape of healthcare, quality and service improvement are the forefront, driving the shift towards more efficient, effective and patient-centred care. Quality in healthcare includes not only the excellence of medical interventions but also extends to the patient experience and ensuring safe, effective care. The importance of quality is highlighted by the Institute of Medicine’s (IOM) six dimensions: safety, effectiveness, patient-centredness, timeliness, efficiency and equity. These dimensions provide a comprehensive framework for evaluating and enhancing healthcare quality and services. This chapter seeks to broaden the comprehensiveness of the healthcare quality and service improvement model suggested by the IOM and provides real-life case studies in which each of the 12 dimensions is examined and discussed.