Place-based learning gives educators a powerful way to engage students, especially with Indigenous culture and history.

Teacher and IEU member Vince Wall

IEU member Vince Wall believes school excursions are more important than ever. They “shake things up”, he says, because “getting out into the world makes history real”.

“They break the routine and remind students that learning isn’t just something that happens inside four walls.

“It’s one thing to read about the past; it’s another to stand in the place where it happened, to walk in the footsteps of those who came before, to feel that emotional, gut-level connection.”

Vince Wall.

Vince is a history teacher and Artificial Intelligence for Teaching and Learning Project Leader at All Hallows’ School, Brisbane. He holds highly accomplished status with the Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership (AITSL).

All that expertise informs the excursions he designs, in which students experience mapping, 3D scanning and GPS tracking.

Vince says site visits bring hands-on experiences the classroom cannot replicate and change the way students and teachers interact.

“Excursions bring unpredictability – new experiences, new challenges, even those left-field, unexpected moments on the journey there and back,” he says. “The planning, the safety and cultural protocols, the public interactions (sometimes awkward, sometimes eye-opening) – it’s all part of the learning.”

Vince’s students visit sites that “bring Australian history to life”, such as Brisbane’s Anzac Square and Shrine of Remembrance. They explore Australia’s involvement in both World Wars and post-WWII conflicts, especially during commemorations such as Anzac Day and Remembrance Day.

“Students use mobile technology for interactive scavenger hunts, Lidar scanning for 3D modelling of monuments, and Thinglink for digital annotations,” he says. “These tools turn the site into a dynamic, collaborative learning experience.”

Vince’s students also visit Brisbane Heritage Walks and First Nations Pathways, where they walk traditional Indigenous routes and visit heritage sites, sparking “critical conversations about reparative history and the role of history education in social justice”.

The personal touch

Victorian history teacher and IEU member Christine Thompson has taken students to Melbourne landmarks including the Chinese Museum, Jewish Holocaust Centre, Old Melbourne Gaol and Immigration Museum.

She says such sites now have resources and interactive activities that “heighten the experience” for students.

“Many of these places also have guides who can provide personal experiences which adds to a student’s understanding of the topic,” Christine says.

“The fact that questions can be asked and answered makes the experience more realistic – this is of greater value than reading a comment in a text or on a website.”

Research Leader John Guenther

Red dirt teaching

John Guenther, a Research Leader in Education and Training at the Batchelor Institute of Indigenous Tertiary Education in the Northern Territory, has worked primarily in remote schools with First Nations students. He helped pioneer ‘red dirt thinking’, an approach that values Indigenous knowledge, local context and community-driven learning.

John highlights three key benefits of place-based learning:

It is relevant and meaningful to students.
It helps students build strength through a sense of belonging and historical connection.
It draws from the knowledge inherent in the place itself.

“It serves as a springboard to more meaningful learning beyond the place, providing a point of comparison and difference for students to expand their knowledge, and then critically reflect on new information,” he says.

John says place-based learning is about more than geographical locations or history. It can also include culture, social relationships, kinship, language, politics and ecological environment.

“The concept of ‘Country as teacher’ is increasingly used by First Nations scholars and educators to express the more/other than human sources of knowledge that help define identity, reality, values, kinship, spirituality and cosmological understandings for students,” he says.

“It aligns with the aspirations of many people who live on Country. It allows the stories and the language of place to be learnt in a socio-cultural context, without being constrained by colonial interpretations of truth and knowledge.

“Place-based learning therefore adds meaning to what might, from a non-Indigenous perspective, be considered as ‘science’ or ‘historical truth’ or discrete curriculum areas of English literacy and numeracy.”

John says educators need to learn as much as possible about the place where they are teaching – “its history, its culture, the languages spoken, the values, stories and the kinship structures of place”.

“The teacher becomes a learner, withholding judgements about what they observe and listening before they speak,” he says.

“The teacher critically reflects on their own understanding of reality, values and knowledge, recognising the differences, but accepting that their position in ‘place’ is not as the expert.

“Those who belong in place should be seen as their teachers. Educators who do belong to the place where they are teaching students are well placed to draw on their knowledge to provide learning opportunities that are meaningful and enjoyable for their students.”

Sites in the city

Curriculum changes require Victorian schools to enhance their focus on Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander histories by early 2026.

The National Trust of Australia (Victoria) (NTAV) – traditionally focused on preserving historic buildings and monuments – now promotes a “unique, place-based learning approach”, offering “meaningful, tactile learning experiences, allowing students to connect abstract curriculum points to real-world locations and events”.

“Objects and places can convey powerful stories that words alone cannot express,” says Nicola Dziadkiewicz, NTAV’s Education and Public Programs Manager.

NTAV facilitators tailor each excursion to ensure it is “relevant to where students are up to in their classroom”.

The NTAV collaborates with First Nations groups to ensure programs are “accurate and culturally sensitive” and students get the chance to “understand the depth and breadth of the history of our sites”, she says.

At the Polly Woodside, a 19th-century tall ship moored in Melbourne’s South Wharf, Wurundjeri facilitators share the cultural significance of the Birrarung (Yarra River).

At McCrae Homestead, students learn about the intersecting experiences of the McCrae family and the Bunurong community during the 1840s.

“These encounters illuminate wider historical contexts and deepen students’ understanding of the relationships between people and place,” she says.

Beyond learning

Vince Wall agrees with Guenther that it is essential to “recognise the cultural and spiritual significance of place”.

“For non-Indigenous students (and teachers), engaging with the idea that Country is alive, storied, and deeply connected to identity is a vital part of learning,” he says.

“Places don’t just tell stories overtly or in words, they speak through positioning, silences and what is left out. It can open conversations about enduring connections to Country, the way we privilege some narratives over others, and the unfinished challenges of justice, recognition, and truth-telling.”

Vince says well-constructed excursions “go beyond just learning about history –they help students do history.

“They’re a reminder that history isn’t just something we study – it’s something we experience,” he says.

References and resources

Vince Wall’s pedagogical and tech blog is at disruptedhistory.com

Red dirt thinking on education: A people-based system, John Guenther, Australian Journal of Indigenous Education, 2013: bit.ly/41GmYkO

National Trust of Australia (Victoria) education and school programs: bit.ly/3FBHo77

From IE magazine: Putting history in its place