Integrating Indigenous Learning for Holistic Approaches in Teacher Education

This chapter questions how Indigenous knowledge, languages and practices can contribute to a holistic education approach, and to bridging Global North and South perspectives, especially in the face of global environmental challenges. Two of the authors are Pasifika, from Vanuatu and New Caledonia-Kanaky (NC-K), and the other two are Europeans working at the Sorbonne University in Paris (France), and the University of Melbourne (Australia). n this chapter, we develop an analysis based on our teaching, participatory observation, experiences, and interviews with teachers. We show how we have addressed multiple perspectives on North-South issues in lecture and seminar spaces. We also question how Indigenous learning can be integrated into teacher education at the university level. The examples come from New Caledonia-Kanaky Teacher Education and Vanuatu sand drawing as part of schooling. Both places illustrate the challenges that former colonies are facing in amending educational systems to offer pedagogy that is more closely aligned to local epistemologies and worldviews moving beyond colonial mindsets.