Indigenous knowledge is a process….

UBC graduate student Amy parent mentioned her interview that Indigenous knowledge was a process, and that youth are at all different points on their journey towards their own understandings. My direction for my research project is going to be along these lines – how best to encourage success for Aboriginal Youth in the classroom, with an acknowledgement that indigenous knowledge is key to that success.

At my school we are preparing to commemorate Nov. 11^th. We have the typical ceremony with poetry, some music by students, a speech by a veteran and maybe an MP or MLA. But we also have a segment of the ceremony set aside every year for our school’s First Nation students and Aboriginal Education (Ab.Ed.) teachers and youth workers. Each year is slightly different. One year they presented a drumming circle and traditional songs. Another year they read the roster of First Nation soldiers who had died in service to Canada, with drumming and a song underneath the reading.  A few of the students had prepared a PowerPoint presentation. Another year saw short statements in all of the different languages the students had access to or skill in.  Last year was very good, with a student dressed in his regalia dancing. Both his mother and grandfather had been dancers, and he was very proud to continue this tradition – he had even won a competition at a recent Powwow. The Ab.Ed. workers in the school work very hard to connect students to cultural knowledge, elder,s and traditions; and the Remembrance Day ceremonies are a very public way to show some of the connections they have been able to make.