UNESCO Survey on Living Heritage and Schools in Asia-Pacific

Across Asia and the Pacific, many schools and teachers link their teaching to living heritage to make the learning more connected to students’ reality. Living heritage includes cultural practices and knowledge that are meaningful to the communities, are a part of their identity and which they want to continue to transmit to future generations. Music and dances, festivals and rituals, making of handicrafts or agricultural knowledge – they are just several forms of living heritage. Living heritage is everywhere around us. There are many ways to use living heritage in schools:

• Living heritage can be taught as a subject: for example, students learn traditional music, local dances or embroidery.
• It can also be used to help the learning process. For example, students study local weaving to practice a geometry exercise or learn sciences by studying their local environment.
• It can be used as part of the extra-curricular activities, in projects or in many other creative manners.

UNESCO is conducting a survey to understand how living heritage is used for teaching and learning in primary and secondary schools in Asia and the Pacific. The survey is addressed to school principals, vice-principals or other members of the school management team. The survey is available in several languages, including English, Vietnamese, Burmese, Thai, Nepalese, Japanese, Hindi, Sinhala, Korean, Mongolian, and Chinese. The findings of the survey will help UNESCO to promote the teaching and learning with living heritage in schools. They will also support the safeguarding of living heritage of communities in the Asia-Pacific region. The survey should take approximately 15 minutes to complete. Responses will remain confidential and will be used in an aggregated form only. Responses should be sent by 15 November at the latest. For additional information and access to the survey in its different versions, please visit the website of the UNESCO Bangkok Bureau at https://bangkok.unesco.org/index.php/content/have-your-say-how-living-heritage-used-teaching-and-learning-asia-pacific-schools