Module 1 – Post 4 – Chatting with Sean Lessard

This picture was retrieved from: http://www.ammsa.com/publications/alberta-sweetgrass/lessard%E2%80%99s-passion-fills-halls-school-success-stories and shows Sean (on far right) chatting with some his students from EPSB.

Yesterday I spent some time chatting with Sean Lessard about some of the work he is doing with FNMI youth in Western Canada. This is the kind of ethnographic research any MET student would like to do – eating hot wings (especially created for Sean) and hanging out.

We were discussing how to create alternative programs for FNMI youth focusing on student summer “school” opportunities, camps, course credit, learning models and student engagement.

Here’s some information about Sean: http://www.ammsa.com/publications/alberta-sweetgrass/lessard%E2%80%99s-passion-fills-halls-school-success-stories

For me, Sean emphasizes the power of storytelling. He is passionate about the fact that youth are learning in a wide variety of ways (especially unique cultural projects) and that hey are not getting credit or “value” for their learning.

We specifically discussed what kinds of learning models could be used for his summer projects and how I could support him from an “online” perspective.

Our focus revolved around NOT “creating content for the students”, instead, having the students “create their own learning through storytelling” and tracking the learning for themselves.

I think that “tracking” my own exploration of “alternative blended learning design” with FNMI as the focus, is a possible research project?

I’ll keep thinking…

Verena 🙂