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I love working with staff teams, parent groups, students and community groups, but I wanted to do a quick post just to clarify what I do and what I do not do.
If you are looking for someone to speak about ceremonies, give first hand testimony about residential schools, or speak about something to do with sacred items, or any form of Indigenous arts, you definitely want to invite an Indigenous guest speaker into your class.
This is sometimes possible through your school board! If you are in Ontario, each board is supposed to have an "Aboriginal Advisory Council" which they may have now renamed "Indigenous Advisory Council." You probably also have a First Nations, Métis and Inuit consultant at your school board, who might have connections with community members available to come to your class. Some boards I've worked with even keep lists of Indigenous traditional teachers who they recommended to teachers.
If you have a budget to bring in guest speakers and those options haven't worked out for you, another option is to get in contact with me, and I can attempt to put you in touch with community members whom I have relationships with and are available to do the work.
What I love speaking to classes and teachers about is our responsibility as Canadians to listen and learn from Indigenous peoples, to understand history that we might have not been taught like the Indian Act, the importance of the Royal Proclamation, what colonization actually looked like, the history of Residential schools (and the resistance, or lack thereof from the general Canadian population), and a variety of other historical and contemporary topics. I also speak about debunking stereotypes, terminology, incorporating the TRC's Calls to Action, and practical ideas and lesson plans about how you can introduce these topics to your students, what resources to use, etc.
And I do all of this from my position as a Settler on Turtle Island, modelling that we all have roles and responsibilities in this work.
Finally, I've facilitated conversations and workshops among staff teams, including a visioning process to map Indigenous content throughout a school's entire curriculum.
Questions? Feel free to get in contact!