We are teacher researchers from Raymer Elementary who learn alongside our Gr. 2/3 learners in our Osprey community. We value student-centred learning, in an environment where everyone has a voice and their opinions matter.
We have learned, and continue to learn from and with our Indigenous Peoples and teaching, and embrace learning on, and with the land.
Last year we had an amazing learning opportunity to observe another beautifully talented educator in our District, Parvina Panghali. The Instructional Leadership Team knew we shared a similar pedagogical stance, so they made it possible for us to visit and learn alongside Parvina and her little humans. We were blown away at the way they embedded the Four Food Chiefs and Competencies into their all day learning experiences.
We knew at that moment, that was our next step in our journey. We are so grateful for all of the learning opportunities we have had, so we thought we could share our story with others in the hopes of sparking someone else’s thinking and valuing reciprocity!
Earlier this year, we hosted a two part webinar series with Anona Kampe, a Syilx Knowledge Keeper who lives in Penticton, called: How is the story of the Four Food Chiefs shifting our ways of thinking and being within the classroom?
In the first webinar, Anona beautifully shared with us the story of How Food Was Given.
In the second webinar, we shared how we have been learning with our students as we explore and reflect on our questions: How is the story of the Four Food Chiefs shifting our ways of thinking and being? What might you discover about yourself and others in our Learning Community as we explore the Four Food Chiefs? Click here to listen to us share our story on that webinar.
If you are interested, we are happy to share somes of the resources we have used throughout this journey:
The beaded timeline that Anona Kampe shared, and the modified beaded timeline created with Anona's local information.
We documented our students thinking and used their words to build collective knowledge as we explore our two questions. Here is the slide deck we used throughout this journey.
Here is the link to the Indigenous Education Resource Menu we used to access resources.
Here are two documents we used with students:
As a continuation of our story, Robbi Martens will be hosting part 3 of the webinar on Thursday, May 27th from 4:00 - 5:00 pm. The session is called: Illuminating Bitterroot & Relational Learning: What becomes possible in a culture where thoughts, feelings, and actions are at the center of the learning? If you are interested, please register for the session here.
by Jody Crumb and Kim Koch