Author Archives: se770214

MODULE 2 – Entry 5: The Indigenization of Educational Institutions, through Gardening

Public Domain photo taken by Karen Arnold

Indigenous Garden Series: Intro (Oral Storytelling):  This site shows how the Indigenization of educational institutions are beginning to exist and how decolonization of the schooling systems are coming into effect. The art of storytelling gives instruction on how to live and relate to the living land, and how passing on this knowledge on to the present and next generations, so that the circle of a healthy and happy life may continue.

Indigenous Garden Tour by Justen:  A behind the scenes of the K’nmaĺka? Sənqâĺtən garden in the Okanagan Valley, where an Indigenous student, Justen Peters, explains the history of the lands and its people of the Okanagan.  He identifies various fruits, seasonal plants, recipes that tie in with special Indigenous ceremonial events.  He is creating a reconnection and a connection with his viewers by sharing his knowledge of his people to a viewer, like myself, who is learning and feeling a more meaningful connection with his fantastic oral storytelling skills.  The goal is to continue growing a healthy community and reach and share with as many people through this beautiful virutal tour.

 

References:

Okanagan College. (May 26, 2021). Indigenous Garden Series: Intro (Oral Storytelling). [Video].YouTube. Retrieved May 24, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6DcCWj8JTDs

Okanagan College. (May 26, 2021). Indigenous Garden Tour (Justen).  [Video].YouTube. Retrieved May 24, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lfu4VRUNmLg

 

 

MODULE 2 – Entry 4: FINDING MEANINGFUL RESOURCES

Early Years Indigenous Cultural Safety Resource Guide.  BC Ministry of Children and Family Development:

I feel, the earlier we can help support our Indigenous students the better their chances will be for success in every aspect of their lives. The purpose of this guide is to help educators who work with younger Indigenous children, families, and communities find appropriate and meaningful resources that will increase their ability to provide culturally safe and respectful care.

Where can I learn more about Indigenous people in Canada?:

This site includes resources for children of all ages.  It lists Indigenous themed picture books, comic books, reading books, video games, colouring pages, fun booklets, online crossword, interactive games, “Did You Know Q & A” and a bead amaze art activity.  If you click on “Explore the Indigenous Culture” it leads to more topics for children to go through, like the following: Indigenous History, Totem Pole info, Indigenous Resources, Fun Facts (Food, Language, Sports, Dance), First Nations (People, Books, Crafts).  CBC Kids’ Indigenous resources display items and activities that would expose the younger generation to the beautiful culture of the Indigenous peoples in fun, simple creative ways that would capture many children’s hearts and minds in an engaging and informative manner.

The BC Aboriginal Child Care Society (BCACCS)-Centre of Excellence for Indigenous Early Learning and Child Care:

This particular site looks into helping Indigenous communities  develop high quality, culturally grounded, spiritually enriching, community child care services that are based in the child’s culture, language and history.  There is a team of dedicated people who help provide leadership, training, resources, and services to support Indigenous early learning and child care. They honour the memory and dedication of those that came before us and have joined them in this journey to support Indigenous early learning child care. There are amazing links to projects and videos linked to the BCACCS, for example the “The Documentation Project,” various workshops, curriculum kits and services like including hosting two preschool programs that provide quality demonstration and learning sites, outreach, networking, research, resources, and training to support early childhood educators and the Indigenous children and families they serve.

Public Domain Photo, taken by the University of Saskatchewan

References:

BC Ministry of Children and Family Development.(2018). The BC Aboriginal Child Care Society (BCACCS)-Centre of Excellence for Indigenous Early Learning and Child Care.[Site]. Retrieved May 29, 2021 https://www.acc-society.bc.ca/about/

Canada Media Fund. (2021). Where can I learn more about Indigenous people in Canada? [Site]. Retrieved May 29, 2021,https://www.cbc.ca/kidscbc2/the-feed/where-can-i-learn-more-about-indigenous-people-in-canada

Province of British Columbia. (March 2021). Early Years Indigenous Cultural Safety Resource Guide.  BC Ministry of Children and Family Development.[Site]. Retrieved May 29, 2021,https://www2.gov.bc.ca/assets/gov/family-and-social-supports/child-care/ics_resource_guide.pdf

MODULE 2 – Entry 3: Revising Teaching Practices in Canada with Respect to Indigenous Youth and History

In this presentation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbQGhP4xQkw, Anne Tenning tackles the issues faced by her own experiences and those of the Indigenous youth in the education system. She discusses approaches that educators can take to improve representations of and engagement with Indigenous peoples and their histories in the classroom.

This presentation by Anne Tenning is part of the “Teaching and Communicating Indigenous History” Panel at the 9th Canada’s History Forum, Engaging Authentic Indigenous Histories that was held on November 27, 2016 in Ottawa. This event was organized by Canada’s National History Society and the National Centre for Truth and Reconciliation. Anne speaks of educators who continue to commit themselves to seeing the reconciliation of Indigenous students and how she was given more opportunities to succeed because she knew one teacher who made a life-changing difference in her life.

Quote by Anne Tenning, found in the same link below.

Reference:

Canada’s History. (January 13, 2017). Revising Teaching Practices in Canada with Respect to Indigenous Youth and History. [Video].YouTube. Retrieved May 24, 2021, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fbQGhP4xQkw

 

MODULE 2 – Entry 2:  Seeds of Promise: Grandview/?Uuqinak’uuh* School in Vancouver

 

Public Domain photo taken by Amanda Mills

This site is linked to my final assignment as are the entries I will continue to share in our UBC Blogs. It is a community story regarding the issue of poverty and how teachers in a local school are still to this day very committed to advocate for better conditions for the Indigenous children and their families in the city of Vancouver east end. This is an area that tends to be avoided for decades, due to the area being synonymous with crime, poverty and despair. In one corner of the district, however to this day, there are determined group of educators, children, parents and volunteers who continue to create a garden oasis for play and learning in what has always been a gathering place for people in the drug, crime and sex trades. The children of Grandview/ ?Uuqinak’uuh Elementary School now have access to a playground complete with food, flower and butterfly gardens, stands of maple trees and a Coast Salish longhouse.  Since the 1970s to today, some good changes, like having committed advocates for Indigenous children and their families continue.  After almost 50 years of observations from my own mother, who was a teacher in this exact area, and almost 40 years myself, we can still see that the inequity issues, like poverty, are affecting the Indigenous peoples in our local community. The key question is whether Canadians are willing to understand and address the issues of poverty?

 

Reference:

Caledon Institute of Social Policy. (January 25, 2000). Seeds of Promise: Grandview/?Uuqinak’uuh* School in Vancouver. [Site]. Retrieved May 18, 2021,  https://maytree.com/wp-content/uploads/223ENG.pdf

 

 

MODULE 2-Entry 1: Being a Non-Indigenous Ally

Public Domain Picture by John Hain

This video clip https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2RP4V30h60, introduces Hannah Morikawa who talks about how being a non-Indigenous ally can change the world.  What is ally-ship?  Being a non-Indigenous ally takes a lifelong process of learning and building of relationships in order to amplify value and support to those voices that are wanting to be heard. Having the privilege to NOT speak for the Indigenous peoples, rather to use your privileged platforms and opportunities that many do not have so that we can all responsibly help implement systemic changes that includes and reflects Indigenous ways and knowledge.   So we can all help begin to reverse the systemic and individual racial issues, stereotypes, discrimination, colonialism and the inter-generational traumas that the underrepresented Indigenous peoples have been subjected to for generations and will be subjected to for generations to come, if things do not change for the betterment of the people.

We can continue the healing process once we as a whole country and world begin to recognize that Canada was and still is a settler colonial country.   Killings, rapes, kidnappings and enslavement of the Indigenous peoples-happened, how settlers manipulated nations to sign treaties to take their land-happened, to the controlling of resources/trades and profiting from it aka stealing-happened, the breaking up/separation of countless families happened,and the creation of reservation schools by government and church-happened, stereotypes and discrimination produced by mass media about the Indigenous culture-happened, how they were seen by most of the non-Indigenous public as ¨problematic/unacceptable¨-happened, and subjecting children to the worst forms of abuse, unfortunately also happened.  (In regards to the very recent devastating news about the Kelowna reservation school, and what happened there…my eyes well up and my heart continues to break as I write this blog, for all the children and lives lost due to hate and/or ignorance.)

This resulted in the eradication of the Indigenous peoples, and the repercussions of these events leads us into the state we live in today.  Where natural resource companies have more rights than the Indigenous peoples, where thousands of Indigenous girls and women are murdered/missing and no one was/is helping, where the majority of Indigenous communities have still have no access to food nor clean water, where half the children in foster care are of Indigenous descent-my list can go on.  My question to you is, do you feel this country and its government are currently working for or against the Indigenous peoples?  And can ally-ship help begin to rectify the wrong?

Reference:

TEDx Talks. (2018, May 28).Being a Non-Indigenous Ally -Keynote Speaker, Hannah Morikawa. TEDxCarletonUniversity. [Video].YouTube. Retrieved May 24, 2021,  from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y2RP4V30h60

 

MODULE 1-Entry 5: JADE FEVER, B.C.’s Reality T.V. Show

 

From Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository Revision as of 10:47, 9 September 2020 by BotMultichill

This past week, I came across a Global News topic regarding a reality television show, I have never heard of, based here in British Columbia.  It is called “Jade Fever,” which is about a family operated jade mining business running for decades in Jade City, British Columbia. This show debuted in 2015, and is currently in its 7th season.  It is about a German family, the Bunce’s, who have become the major excavators of a jade quarry.  They have taken advantage of the region’s rich, emerald green, mineral deposits to mine for the precious jade in Northern B.C.’s Cassiar Mountains. This reality television series follows the family’s operation, and the employees, who are mostly made up of the town’s residents.  Their main goals are to turn their various claims into elusive million-dollar jackpots. In addition to highlighting dangerous mining adventures, with adventurous storylines and the relationships among the employees and family members, there is another controversial side to this reality show.  Getting the perspective of the Indigenous peoples of that region is not portrayed in this show, but their perspectives were shared briefly on Global News several days ago.  Here, you can see a B.C. First Nation opposes jade mining, and how he and others want the reality television show ‘Jade Fever’ taken off the air.

Click here to watch the Global News video:

References:

Wikimedia Commons. (2020, September 9). Wikimedia Commons, the free media repository. Retrieved 06:17, May 22, 2021 from https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Jade_001.jpg&oldid=453141753

Wikipedia contributors. (2021, April 29). Jade Fever. In Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Retrieved 05:59, May 22, 2021, from https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Jade_Fever&oldid=1020420944

 

MODULE 1-Entry 4:  Storytelling through Local Art – How Communities Create: Visual Arts with Ovila Mailhot

 

Public Domain Picture, Coast Salish Artist, Oliva Mailhot

Last year, I was driving through Robson Street, when I noticed a beautiful mural.  A few seconds later, I drove off, but the picture stayed with me.  It was so creative, colourful, and mesmerizing, that I went home and tried to find it on the internet to see who painted such a unique and creative piece of visual art.  I surprised myself, when I actually found it and I emailed the artist just to compliment the artist for their amazing work, and that something about his Mural on Robson Street made me smile and made me happy, and I wanted to thank him for that.  He is an amazingly talented Coast Salish graphic artist, and his name is Ovila Mailhot.  There is a video link below that leads to his bio, and a link to the mural that caught my eye!

Video Link:

Storytelling Through Visual Art with Coast Salish Graphic Artist, Ovila Mailhot

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1763297859587

Mural/Gallery/Bio:

By Coast Salish Graphic Artist, Ovila Mailhot

https://www.salishsondesign.com/projects

Public Domain Picture, Artist: Oliva Mailhot

Public Domain Picture, Artist: Oliva Mailhot

Public Domain Picture, Artist: Oliva Mailhot

MODULE 1-Entry 3:  Covid-19 & How It’s Affecting the Indigenous Communities Around the World:

Published March 25, 2016, Free Domain Picture from the MI’KMAW Spirituality website.

I always felt it is important to know what is happening in our own backyards, but in others’ backyards as well.  Humanity has been struck with a pandemic called COVID–19.  Since November/December of 2019, and it continues to affects us all, but not equally. Below are some links I researched, to get an idea of how the Indigenous peoples around the world are being “treated” or not treated at all…

Canada-COVID-19 vaccines and Indigenous peoplesof Canada- May 2021

https://www.sac-isc.gc.ca/eng/1606941379837/1606941507767

South America-Indigenous South Americans and COVID-19-March 2021

https://www.borgenmagazine.com/indigenous-south-americans-2/

Asia-Indigenous Peoples in Asia Battle COVID-19 on Many Fronts-

https://www.culturalsurvival.org/news/indigenous-peoples-asia-battle-covid-19-many-fronts

USA-Indigenous populations: left behind in the COVID-19 response-June 2020

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)31242-3/fulltext

CDC data show disproportionate COVID-19 impact in American Indian/Alaska Native populations-August 2020

https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2020/p0819-covid-19-impact-american-indian-alaska-native.html

Australia-Protecting Indigenous Populations From Covid-19: The Australian Example-May 2021

https://www.forbes.com/sites/williamhaseltine/2021/05/05/protecting-indigenous-populations-from-covid-19-the-australian-example/?sh=29a6adc1801f

Reference:

Muin’iskw (Jean) and Crowfeather (Dan). (March 25, 2016). MI’KMAW Spirituality. http://www.muiniskw.org/pgCulture2c.htm

MODULE1-Entry 2: My Global Knowledge on the Indigenous Peoples from Torres Strait Islander aka Australia and Aotearoa aka New Zealand

Published on January 18, 2019-The person who associated a work with this deed has dedicated the work to the public domain.

On one of my travelling experiences, I was fortunate enough to visit Torres Strait Islander aka Australia and Aotearoa aka New Zealand.  I was able to absorb the beautiful cultures and the beautiful landscapes in both regions, but I also learned some brief history about these regions and the Indigenous peoples who this land belongs to.  I learned about how the Indigenous peoples in Australia were also colonized similarly to the Indigenous peoples of Canada, and this saddened me deeply, and allowed me to inquire more into the history of how and why this could happen worldwide?  Historically speaking, “prior to British colonization, more than 500 Indigenous groups inhabited the Australian continent, approximately 750,000 people in total.[1] Their cultures developed over 60,000 years, making Indigenous Australians the custodians of the world’s most ancient living culture. Each group lived in close relationship with the land and had custody over their own Country.”

This made me stop and think, how would I have felt, if strangers barged into my home, demanding all my earthly and worldly posessions and took my freedoms away?

It’s also important to recognise that, ” from the beginning of colonisation, Indigenous people continually resisted the violation of their right to land, and its impact on Indigenous cultures and communities. It’s estimated that at least 20,000 Aboriginal people were killed as a direct result of colonial violence during this era of Australian history. Between 2,000- 2,500 settler deaths resulted from frontier conflict during the same period.[8]

Published: Aug 11, 2008
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License

References:

Australians Together. (November 17, 2020).  Colonisation, Dispossession, Disease and Direct Conflict. https://australianstogether.org.au/discover/australian-history/colonisation/#colonisationreference8
DocDolly. (August 11, 2008). Aussie Animals by DocDolly. https://www.deviantart.com/docdolly/art/Aussie-Animals-94559821
Wilkinson, T. (January 18, 2019). Aboriginal Artwork. Art Gallery Of Western Australia.  https://www.flickr.com/photos/electric_soup/46058004144/

MODULE 1-Entry 1: My Very First Visit to a Local Community Garden!

Please click on the following link;Grandview/¿uuqinak uuh Community Garden and select Google images to view the various pictures. Here you will get a glimpse of what my mother started back in 1979! My mom taught me about respecting Mother Earth and all it’s children, young and old.  She was an educator at the small neighbouring school Grandview Terrace Daycare, which was a preschool in an innercity area, for well over 40 years.  She noticed many of her students, ages 2-5 were mal-nutritioned, and the food that was available in her school did not meet the requirements for a proper and nutritious diet for any growing child.  So around the time I was 2 years old, my mom began to do what she does best, she started to grow a little community garden in a little patch of soil just behind the school. She would take me to work with her and spend time teaching, working on the garden and taking care of me.  She used this garden, that bore so many fruits and vegetables, to feed the children and give the remaining to the students whose families were in need.  Her name is Sneh (which means love in our culture), and she has fed so many little tummies, and filled so many hearts and she is my mentor and hero! —-,—‘-(@

She is still teaching many around our neighbourhood how to garden to this day!  Sneh is a teacher, friend, colleague, gardner, landscaper, protector, and most of all advocate for all the children, from various backgrounds, the majority being of Indigenous decent.  Back in the 70’s and 80’s, community gardens were non-existent, just like government funding and proper food programs for those in need.  Without getting too much into my very first blog, I just wanted to give everyone a chance to see what one person can do, and what it can lead to over time.

I added some links below for you to see and read about the ¿UUQINAK’UUH community garden and elementary school, wow has it grown!!!

Grandview Grows!

https://www.vsb.bc.ca/schools/grandview/Teaching-and-Learning/Programs/Pages/Community-Garden.aspx

http://www.cityfarmer.org/grandview.html

Grandview/¿uuqinak’uuh Elementary sets a high benchmark