Online materials for schools valued outside classroom

A unique opportunity to present culturally-relevant learning materials to Aboriginal school children has resulted in an amazing collection of videos and text resources. But the materials are also proving popular with the mainstream population and others outside the classroom-setting who wish to know more about Indigenous culture, spirituality and traditions.

Sykes Powderface sits on the Elders’ Advisory Group for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit for the curriculum development branch for Alberta Education and says the intent was to develop resource materials for teachers.

“But the original documents did not accurately reflect the Aboriginal community as there had been no input. We were shocked when we saw and said, ‘hold it’. They wanted non-Aboriginal teachers to be teaching our languages,” said Powderface, citing one example of the issues that had to be addressed before completion of the materials.

The resulting videos and other teaching aids accurately reflect the diversity of the Aboriginal community, entitled Walking Together: First Nations, Métis, Inuit Perspectives in Curriculum. Videotaping in different languages took place and was uploaded for all to see at www.learnalberta.ca, along with other materials that are both informative and interesting. Subjects explored include oral tradition, connections to land, language, culture, world views, and treaty rights. Click on any of the topic stones and viewers are led to a further selection of subtopics which are often followed by a video of a knowledgeable member of the Aboriginal community further explaining the material.

Powerderface explained that people outside the classroom are getting excited about the knowledge. “We won’t restrict it to the classroom. We said we wanted to move ahead to let people know who we are, so you will see what we’ve done over the last eight years, that’s how long we’ve been working on this.”

A deliberate effort was made to utilize people from all First Nations so that the diversity of the Indigenous peoples was demonstrated. Then the videos were shown to the communities that they portrayed, causing a further often-lengthy consultation process that ensured the accuracy of the materials.

Ramona Bighead, a contributor and instructor at the University of Lethbridge, agreed. “You’ve got the Alberta curriculum here and the Blackfoot culture there, how do you put the two together?” she asked. “That was the problem.”

Bighead will be using the resource in her course for first and second year education students. “Each of my students will become experts in one of the 12 topics and present their responses to the rest of the class.”

Bighead’s video states that students have “done things like make drums and cook traditional ceremonial foods; these are things that you can’t get if you open up a social studies textbook, or a language arts textbook.”

Non-Aboriginal teachers will have an authentic and accurate source that they can share with their students throughout the province.

 “It is intended to help them to teach culture and bring awareness of Aboriginal people into the classroom,“  said Powderface.