In New Media 11 in my first practicum (that “counted”), I brought in a few different videos by Wab Kinew, which had been introduced to me in one of our decolonization workshops on a professional development day. In this media-focused unit, I worked on comprehension (critical thinking) and communication competencies with my students. The first video I used as a demonstration of who this man is and his content. I demonstrated for the students how the video had been created with humour in order to make a tough message easier to hear. I thought this was doubly appropriate due to the long term YouTube video project (ADST) that I had designed for the students. I had two student groups that wanted to do comedy.

I really like Wab Kinew’s friendly, humorous, and down-to-earth manner. It made it easier for me in my own journey of coming to terms with the past and now the steps I need to take as an educator to Honour Truth and Reconcilliation and incorporate indigenous ways of knowing into my practice.

This video I think would be a great introductory video to a unit covering these difficult topics for social studies or social justice, if I ever had to teach them in the future:

Something in this program that I would now like to reflect on, with the lens that I have acquired through the 446 course, is how highly I now value identity-based work in the classroom. At the time I didn’t realize how valuable it was, but now that I’m on the other side of it, I can appreciate how it made me feel as a learner to be honored as an individual and encouraged to share my own story with teachers and classmates. I don’t recall this being much of a focus in my own journey through school, so now that I know what it feels like to be valued in this way, I fully intend to keep going back to “Learning requires exploration of one’s identity,” in my future practice.

Further reflection also brings me to to my 441 course. In this course, a huge focus was placed on the second FPPL “Learning is holistic, reflexive, reflective, experiential, and relational (focused on connectedness, on reciprocal relationships, and a sense of place).” While I didn’t think of it this way at the time, now I realize how my experience in this course encapsulated this FPPL. We reflected a lot, especially on our relationships with past educators. For my final project, I decided to share my personal, experiential journey with archery. While that semester was very stressful, I found I always looked for my 441 homework first because while it was difficult in some ways, it wasn’t in others, and I found it easier to share my story in reflexive practice at that time than to do any of my other work.

In my last practicum, I blended three of the First Peoples’ Principles of Learning into my morning routine to give students a voice and a chance to share their personal thoughts in the classroom. I started each class with a land acknowledgement, then we did a Check In. Here, the students could share anything. We talked about our interests, hobbies, how our mornings were going, worries, and one student even shared her upset over her dog passing away. This Check In gave the students a chance to connect their identity to their peers, the classroom, and to their learning. It also honored them as individuals and gave them space to share their stories in the classroom. I found this model to be the most successful with the grade 9s and 10s, as a lot of them already know each other and are willing to share. The grade 8s took a bit more encouragement to share. While I did provide a silent check in option for students, a box with pencil and paper, only two students ever used it, and once it was for a grade 8 to tell me that they didn’t like band, and the other time was a joke that the student wasn’t sure was appropriate to share verbally in class. I was surprised that more students didn’t use the silent check in, but I wanted it to be available for the introverts in the room anyway.

One particular moment with the grade 9s made me proud of my choices for teaching content regarding the Anasazi people. Instead of having the students watch an old documentary made by historians, I instead chose to share the story of a Navajo Elder speaking on the Anasazi, and the stories from his people that explain who the Anasazi were and where they came from. This engaged two students who I had never seen speak out before in class.