Indigenous Games Research Articles

Teaching Australian Indigenous Games and Sports Post-Pandemic: Reimagining and Reforming

Indigenous games and sports (IG&S) form a mandated part of the Health and Physical Education (HPE) learning area of the Australian National Curriculum and to encourage the adoption of IG&S, the Australian Curriculum, Assessment, and Reporting Authority (ACARA), the independent statutory authority responsible for the development of a national curriculum, a national assessment program, and a national data collection and reporting program that supports learning for Australian students, developed resources to support teachers. The promotion of IG&S was also assisted by numerous commentators, educators, and academics who advocated for the educational and social benefits of their inclusion. Since their inclusion in the National Curriculum in 2015, their teaching has been minimal and sporadic.

Boosts and Setbacks of Implementing Indigenous Filipino Games: Perspectives from Curriculum’s Stakeholders

Filipinos had enjoyed playing indigenous games long before any other games. Little is known about traditional games and their perspectives among educational stakeholders who support their preservation in the educational system for emerging countries like the Philippines. This study aimed to explore the viewpoints of educational stakeholders regarding integrating indigenous games into the curriculum. A scoping design was used to review pertinent journal articles. Thus 14 were considered after screening and filtering the searched records in three databases. It was found that stakeholders have both positive and negative perspectives on the said implementation. They perceived that implementing indigenous Filipino games a) promotes cultural heritage, b) facilitates convenient learning, and c) strengthens the foundation values, health, and socialization. However, there are some setbacks, like a) limitations in using traditional games in the classroom and b) the endangerment of indigenous Filipino games due to the fast growth of e-games. Therefore, a call to action among curriculum implementers to revisit what areas need to be strengthened in implementing indigenous games despite the continuous advancements of technology that paved the emergence of modern games and even the prioritization of sports games. Although support from the community is needed, and more mandates from the local government to promote these games in playing, especially outside school.

Traditional Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander games and sports in Australia: new perspectives

Our paper highlights that the proliferation of Indigenous sport research has not been focused on examining Indigenous games and sports. Additionally, no one has to date produced a framework for understanding them on their own merits even though these games now form part of a national physical education curriculum. The overwhelming majority of research focuses on Indigenous engagement with the British imports of cricket, the rugby codes, soccer, and Australian Rules football. We argue that this focus serves to diminish Indigenous cultures and adaptability to colonial forces, that, while disruptive, never eliminated Indigenous games and sports which go back as far as 60,000 years. We lay out such a framework in the hopes that future research will ensure that Indigenous games and sports are understood historically and in the present day.

Investigating Indigenous games as Indigenous knowledges and perspectives in PETE: a systematic literature review

ABSTRACT This systematic literature review (SLR) investigates the enablers and constraints which impact the enactment of Traditional Indigenous Games within curriculum. SLR methodology was used to identify all potential literature within Australia and internationally, between February 2022 and April 2022. Searches were limited to peer-reviewed literature, written in English and published between 2002 and 2022. Search protocols employed to investigate relevant literature were based upon the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) model with the following databases explored: A+ Education via Informit online, AEI ATSIS, ERIC Proquest, Taylor & Francis and Sage Journals (Education). The following search terms were used: ALL FIELDS, (‘Traditional Indigenous games’ OR ‘Indigenous games’ OR Yulunga OR ‘Indigenous sport’ OR ‘Aboriginal sports’ OR ‘Torres Strait Islander sports’ AND ‘Australian curriculum’ OR ‘cross curriculum priorities’ OR ‘Indigenous pedagogy’ AND ‘Indigenous perspectives’ OR ‘Indigenous knowledge’s’ OR ‘Embedding Indigenous perspectives’ AND ‘health and physical education’ OR ‘physical education teacher education’ OR ‘health & PE’ AND ‘Cultural competency’ OR ‘cultural safety’ AND ‘Initial teacher education’ OR ‘pre-service physical education teachers’). Results suggest that culturally relevant pedagogy is a dominant enabler, whilst curriculum and teacher cultural awareness are dominant constraints which impact the enactment of Traditional Indigenous Games within curriculum.

Teaching Drama in Education in the University of Ghana: My perspectives about Ghanaian indigenous games

ABSTRACT This proposal reveals the significance of Applied Theatre in Ghana, with special interest in Drama in Education (DIE) as a teaching tool for teachers and learners. As a teaching tool, Drama in Education places tremendous emphasis on Process, Performance and Skill oriented activities to achieve its teaching and learning goals. The dramatic experiences derived from the improvisations; creative dramatics, mime, role-play and other Ghanaian indigenous art forms such as games, symbols, proverbs, storytelling, etc. in the learning explorations expedite transformation in learners. In these dramatic developments, creativity helps to improve not only learners but society as a whole. This paper aims at exhibiting some of the games employed in various sessions with students in the University of Ghana.

Integrating Indigenous Game-Based Activity in Promoting Interactive Learning Development among Grade 10 Students

Achieving quality education in the Philippines remains a knotty long-term task and continues to baffle all sectors of our society. Thus, this study determined the relationship between integration of indigenous game-based activity and interactive learning development among grade 10 students. This study employed random sampling technique in choosing the required number of respondents. They were surveyed on their profile and their level of perception in indigenous game-based activities and development in interactive learning. This study implied a questionnaire as a main tool for data collection. The gathered data obtained from their responses to the administered survey questionnaire underwent statistically treated with frequency and percentage, mean, standard deviation, and Pearson r. The study revealed that the respondents are mostly 15 years old, 52.7% of the respondents are female, most of the respondents has 3 siblings, 40% of them are first child and 75.5% of the respondents are Roman Catholic. The study found that the relationship between game-based activities and interactive Learning among 10th -grade students varied depending on the specific learning scenario. While there was no significant relationship in group work, there was significant positive relationships in small group and think-pair-share activities. Integration of Indigenous Games is highly recommended to contribute to our understanding of how game-based activities can be used to enhance interactive Learning in educational settings, and provide important insights for educators and designers looking to incorporate games into their teaching practices.

Investigating the Effect of Indigenous Game-based Activities on Students’ Performance and Learning Views in Physics

The use of indigenous game-based activities in teaching Physics concepts can eradicate the continuous perception of students that Physics is a boring and difficult subject. This study focused on the development and validation of indigenous game-based activities (IGBA) that can be used as a springboard to teach Physics concepts and enhance the performance of students. It used the Research and Development methodology that includes the validation of the indigenous game-based activities and try-out wherein the researcher used one-group pretest-posttest design to 42 purposively-selected students in a public secondary school in eastern Ilocos Norte, Philippines. Using a researcher-made and item-analyzed pretest and posttest, an adapted students’ views checklist, interview guide and adapted validation tool, the study found out that Ilocos Norte has a lot of indigenous games rich with Physics concepts, using games familiar to students encourages better participation among learners and solicits greater interest towards the subject, thus making the teaching-learning process more appealing to students. The purposively selected teachers strongly agreed that the IGBA is a valid instructional material for teaching Physics concepts. Tryout results show that the material effectively improves students’ performance in Physics. It was supported by students’ views that when the activities are used in teaching, Physics becomes interesting, motivating, challenging, enjoyable and full of fun, not difficult to learn and understand because they are applicable and relevant, not time consuming because they ease students’ burden in problem-solving, elicit maximum participation among learners, and ensure greater retention of the concepts they learn.

Etuaptmumk (Two-Eyed Seeing) in Nature’s Way-Our Way: braiding physical literacy and risky play through Indigenous games, activities, cultural connections, and traditional teachings

Growing philosophical and empirical evidence shows that physical literacy and risky play enriches movement opportunities, while also fostering increased physical activity, wholistic health, and wellness across the lifespan. However, physical literacy and risky play have typically been theorized and practiced from a western worldview. In response, Nature’s Way-Our Way is an initiative designed to ground physical literacy and risky play in Indigenous games, activities, cultural connections, and traditional teachings, as enacted in Early Childhood Education Centres across Saskatchewan, Canada. This article explores Nature’s Way-Our Way’s theoretical underpinnings of Etuaptmumk (Two-Eyed Seeing), adopted to braid together the strengths of Indigenous Knowledges with western knowledge through practices of Indigenous métissage (land and story-based approaches to curriculum informed by relationality). Providing examples of culturally rooted resources, this article shows how the Nature’ s Way-Our Way initiative supports Indigenous self-determination and sovereignty to foster increased physical activity, wholistic health, and wellness across the lifespan.

Integrating Ivatan Indigenous Games to Learning Module in Physics: Its Effect to Student Understanding, Motivation, Attitude, and Scientific Sublime

The Philippines is lagging behind in physics education based on recent results of national and international assessments. With a continuing endeavor to address this problem, a game-based learning module was innovated using the ADDIE model, integrating Ivatan indigenous games in a learning module in physics, to probe the effect of the developed module on Ivatan students’ understanding, motivation, attitudes, and scientific sublime. Furthermore, the study aimed to reintroduce the Ivatan indigenous games to the younger Ivatan learners of Batanes, Philippines, through physics, in an attempt to help preserve its culture and traditions by integrating it to the teaching-learning process. The module underwent validation among four experts which yielded a Highly Acceptable and a Good Agreement rating. The material was tested with twenty SHS students under the STEM strand in a quasi-experimental research setup. A thirty-item test, the PMQ-II, the CLASS, and open-ended journal questions were the instruments used to test the module’s effectiveness. Results revealed a significant difference [Mdiff= -2.65] in student understanding with a 0.31 small effect size; students’ motivation revealed a significant difference [Mdiff = -0.91] with a large effect size of 0.86; and student attitudes revealed a significant difference [Mdiff = -0.44] with a medium effect size of 0.78. The correlation between understanding, motivation, and attitudes [rund-mot = 0.65; rund-att = 0.83; rmot-att = 0.72] were all positive uphill relationships. Lastly, responses from the journal revealed that the most common feedback among learners was the extreme feeling of happiness while generating only 5% of sublime feelings such as extreme awe/amazement/overwhelmed. These results revealed that the developed material effectively improved students’ understanding, motivation, and altering attitudes to a favorable state while realizing that it is unsuccessful in fostering scientific sublime.

The role of indigenous games in education: a technology and environmental education perspective

ABSTRACT This conceptual study explores the role that indigenous games can play in teaching Technology Education (TE) while integrating Environmental Education (EE). Relevant literature is reviewed to achieve this aim. Indigenous games can assist TE teachers in their teaching while also shaping learners’ attitudes toward the environment. Waste, among other things, presents an opportunity for TE teachers to teach the subject meaningfully to indigenous learners. Indigenous learners will be able to use what they have learned through indigenous games to address the problem of environmental degradation. Waste reduction, recycling, and reuse enable learners and teachers to apply their imagination and creativity to care for the environment within each of the four TE themes. The integration of indigenous games into learners’ learning activities makes learning relevant to learners’ cultural knowledge and worldviews. It also helps TE teachers overcome school resource limitations and learn while modifying the TE content and teaching techniques.

Teachers’ experiences of indigenous games in the early grades

Background: This research foregrounds inclusive education (IE) values by way of indigenous games. The outline of the South African national curriculum states that its main aim is to teach its children and youth to become members of a refinement that supports the values which are democratic, the human rights, and communal justice. However, the associated instructional methodologies that have long been a societal tool in instilling these values at an early stage of child development have been largely disregarded in achieving this goal. Indigenous games rely on specific values and traits from children’s cultural heritage.Aim: The study aimed to find out how teachers experience the use of indigenous games in teaching mathematics in IE schools.Setting: Six IE schools in the KwaZulu-Natal province in South Africa.Methods: Semistructured interviews and teacher narratives, framed by the philosophy of ubuntu, were employed to generate data. These data were analysed in conventional qualitative methodology fashion.Results: The study showed that teachers believe that indigenous games encourage and endorse spontaneous interaction among learners as they communicate with their classmates and recognise the form of play from their community life.Conclusion: Teachers require specialised IE programmes as well as pedagogical formats to advance indigenous games.

Mathematics teachers’ knowledge of indigenous games in teaching mathematics

We explored junior high school teachers' knowledge and the impact of indigenous games in teaching basic mathematical concepts. The researchers employed the qualitative phenomenological design to address the purpose, objectives and research questions. The accessible sampling was used to sample 70 teachers (65 males, 5 females) for phase one of the study. Out of 70 teachers, five (three males and two females) were purposively sampled for the study's second phase. Two instruments, a semi-structured interview guide and an observation checklist were used to collect data. The data was analyzed thematically to reflect the research questions. The findings of both phases revealed that most teachers had adequate knowledge of indigenous games and knew the impact of indigenous games on students’ learning of mathematics. In particular, the observation checklist showed that some teachers still adhered to the traditional approach (a direct teaching method) and required the knowledge of indigenous games to enhance their teaching skills and techniques. Therefore, in-service training, workshops and other continuous professional development should be organized to update teachers' knowledge on the effective use of indigenous games in the teaching and learning of mathematics.

Board games and social life in Iron Age southern Africa

• Boardgames pervasive in Iron Age southern Africa. • Boardgames played a vital role in education, skills development and relaxation. • Boardgames were played across class, age, and gender categories. • Meanings and names of boardgames in southern Africa different to that of other regions of the Indian Ocean. What games did the inhabitants of ancient southern Africa play to enrich their lives during the Iron Age (500–1900 CE)? We address this question by drawing from archaeological fingerprints of board games ( tsoro / mufuvha ) documented at farmer and forager sites in different parts of southern Africa. The typology of games and their spatial locations in the archaeology were compared with historical and contemporary gaming in selected African communities to map continuity and change in social significance temporally and spatially. Within limitations imposed by a lack of well-resolved chronologies for the material remains of board games, the comparison provided a platform to make inferences about how and why the games were played in the everyday life of Iron Age communities. Based on the strong correlation between the ethnographic and archaeological data, the conclusion of the paper is that board games were played for edutainment, skills development, gambling, and social engineering. However, this is tentative and opens possibilities for further research into the role of indigenous games in the development of ancient southern African communities.

Speculative Materialities, Indigenous Worldings and Decolonial Futures in Computing & Design

This intra-view follows a round-table discussion that took place during the New Materialist Informatics conference on 25 March 2021. The discussants – Indigenous researcher and game designer Outi Laiti, artists and researchers Luiza Prado de O. Martins, Femke Snelting and Caroline Ward – start with their own artistic, academic, and creative practices and discuss how these practices relate to otherwise-worldings in computing that engage materialist, anti-racist, decolonial, Indigenous, and trans*feminist thinking and doing. This discussion, facilitated by artist Ren Loren Britton and researcher Goda Klumbytė, brings up questions of collaboration and infrastructures needed to support otherwise practices in computing and design.

2 - Using Indigenous Games to Teach Problem-solving in Mathematics in Rural Learning Ecologies

This article explores the use of morabaraba, a board game, as an example of indigenous games to teach problem-solving in mathematics. This approach is part of a rural learning ecology informed by the theory of community cultural wealth that posits community members as experts and empowers communities to find their own solutions to local issues. It is based on the existence of knowledge which learners possess but is not used in the teach- ing and learning of mathematics; there is no deficiency in the marginalized knowledge of the excluded people (Yosso 2005: 79). The author tapped into the marginalized knowledge of subaltern communities to teach problem- solving using participatory action research in generating data, hence the involvement of community members (parents, traditional leaders), education experts (teachers, mathematics subject advisors, lecturers from institutions of higher learning) and learners themselves. The primary data was generated using a tape-recorder and video camera, analysed using Van Dijk’s (2001) critical discourse analysis to identify instances of ‘discursive injustices’ in text and talk, and to acquire deeper meanings of the text. It signifies a form of resistance to unethical and unjust social power relations.

Socio-economic and awareness correlates of physical activity of government school children in India

Physical activity is pivotal for development in young children. Physical activity strengthens the body at a young age, reducing chances of getting cardiovascular and other diseases later in life. Research demonstrates a significant number of adolescents worldwide do not engage in sufficient daily physical activity. This study hypothesized that socio-economic factors such as income, parental education, and demographic setting affect the amount of physical activity government- school children engage in each day. We administered a questionnaire containing 25 questions to 272 government-schooled students between the ages of 12 to 15 and found that parental follow-ups were a significant factor impacting physical activity. Children whose parents reminded them to exercise every day (n = 138) exercised on average 0.455 hours more. Girls (n = 150) on an average exercised for half an hour less than boys (n = 122) each day. Moreover, 66% of girls were unaware about the importance of exercise as compared to 52% of boys. Children who lived in urban areas (n = 140) tended to exercise for on average 0.396 more hours per day than their rural counterparts. These results highlight the need for encouraging girls and students in rural areas to exercise through indigenous games and everyday activities, such as increased use of stairs, cycling, walking, and helping with household chores. Schools and communities can play a positive role by promoting creation of environments that promote movement and exercise during the school day.

Teacher Trainees‟ Perception of Indigenous Knowledge in Mathematics at Colleges of Education in Northern Ghana

The continuous search for better ways of improving the teaching and learning of mathematics in schools leading to improved learning out comes on the part of learners have posed a great strain on mathematics educators in the 21st century. This paper examines the perceived indigenous knowledge in mathematics within the Colleges of Education in Northern Ghana. The survey design was adopted for the study. Population was made up of teacher trainees’ of Bagabaga, Tamale, St John Bosco and NJA colleges of Education. A sample size of 500 trainees was used for the study. Questionnaire was the main instrument used for data collection. Frequency counts and percentages and narratives were the main tools used for data analysis. It revealed that indigenous game (Man-to-Man) within the college communities contain concepts and skills in mathematics. It therefore recommended that mathematics teachers at the various colleges of education should tap and use these concepts during the teaching and learning of mathematics.

Entrepreneurship Potential Indigenous Martial Arts, Sports and Games of Manipur

The meiteis play various martial arts, sports and games originated in the soil of their birth and treasured them as rich traditional heritage culture of the community since hoary past to till date. Sarit sarak, Mukhna, Mukhna Kangjei, Thang Ta, Sagol kangjei @ Polo, Kang @ Surface billiard, Ten Kappa, Ching kaba are some of the well known indigenous sports and games which are facing strong competition from modern sports games played and practice by the people of Manipur. In fact, indigenous sports and games are struggling for survival on its soil of birth. At this critical juncture, to save these indigenous activities from gradual extinction, Entrepreneurs can do Entrepreneurship program for these sports and games to save, preserve and popularize them through economic activities.

Gambling in Ancient North America

Gambling in ancient North America was primarily an intergroup activity. This position as a liminal practice, taking place on territorial frontiers and at large intertribal gatherings, puts gaming on the very forefront of cultural transmission and knowledge exchange, with several implications. Intergroup gaming results in a shared fluency of games, transcending barriers of language and ethnicity. Evidence of common methods and materials allows ancient, region-spanning social networks to be identified. And subtle variations demonstrate a repeated and ongoing negotiation between groups over time as objectives and participants change, with this evolution of gaming practices continuing to the present day. The freedom to adapt to changing conditions, contrasted with notions of a static “traditional” past, is not just a matter of sovereignty relating to Indigenous games. It is a reflection of the nature of Indigenous gaming as it has always been.

When two worlds collide: the unsettling experiences of non-Indigenous volunteers at 2017 World Indigenous Nations Games

ABSTRACT Foregrounding the ethical demands for non-Indigenous people to be relationally accountable to Indigenous Peoples in settler colonial societies as well as the potential of sport as a site for social change, this study examines the experiences of a group of non-Indigenous sport volunteers at the 2017 World Indigenous Nations Games (WIN Games), an international event hosted simultaneously with the ‘Canada 150ʹ celebration. The findings reveal four themes related to non-Indigenous volunteers’ unsettling yet meaningful experiences. This research highlights how responsible and reflexive engagement through sport, e.g., volunteering, might contain critical educational value and be mobilized as a modest way of action in unsettling settler colonialism.