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Land and Language Program flourishing
BY GABRIELLE LEE
For over 10 years now, a unique, noteworthy program has been operating out of Ladysmith Secondary. What started decades ago as a simple effort to include Coast Salish culture in the school foyer has flourished into a full course, offered to students in grades 10 to 12 in the second semester of each school year.
The Land and Language Based Learning Program was co-founded by yutustana:t, a Coast Salish Elder who also goes by the name of Mandy Jones, and William Taylor, a long-time secondary school teacher.
Twenty-five years ago, staff recognized the need to incorporate Coast Salish elements in the school building to honour the land and allow all members of the community to feel welcome and acknowledged. This effort sparked discussion with administration, the securing of funding and, eventually, the establishment of an Indigenous learning program delivered within the BC curriculum. Nowadays, it’s staffed by Taylor, Tanya Heidelbach, Brenda Kohlruss, Elder yutustana:t, and Gena Seward-Wilson who’s also known as yutustana:t, and shares this name with her aunt. From yutustana:t’s teachings, heritage and culture, the course was born.
The objective of the program is as simple as it is powerful. “The main goal … is to create understanding between Indigenous and non-Indigenous people … it’s to honour local Indigenous culture and practice … [and] to help share traditional teachings,” Taylor states. “One of our Elders, Jerry Brown … says that the best way to move forward is to respect one another, and to [do that], we need to listen to each other. … One of our core goals is to create that understanding between people.”
In many ways, the program diverges from Western education practices that are familiar to many and, instead, makes room for another method of learning. “As closely as possible, [the program] follow[s] Indigenous ways of teaching and understanding,” Taylor expresses. “Hul’qum’i’num’, the language of the land, is an integral part of our work … [as is] Coast Salish protocols. … In day-to-day practice, that looks like no desks, no books in our room … [the] follow[ing] of oral teachings … hands on teachings ... [and] storytelling.”
Students participate in hands-on work such as drumming and singing, weaving and listening to stories of the land. They’ve taken part in mapping projects, creating audio recordings of yutustana:t speaking Hul’q’umi’num’ to be featured in Google Earth’s “Celebrating Indigenous Languages” Voyager collection. Voyager combines Google Earth’s visual features with stories and audio to highlight Indigenous languages and cultures from around the world. Even more, with the assistance of Dr. Brian Thom, students are currently assembling a place names map, one embedded with stories and pictures so as to incorporate Coast Salish oral culture. Thom, an anthropologist from the University of Victoria, is coordinating with the Google Indigenous Mapping team to bring the project to life.
In line with the Coast Salish belief that wealth is stored in blankets, participants also construct the coverings from start to finish, beginning with fibres from sheep and then cleaning, carding, teasing, dyeing and spinning them into usable cloth. Moreover, they’re hardly contained to the indoors; Taylor explains how previous lessons have included students taking part in Indigenous community events or exploring the land to harvest Coast Salish plants. Vitally, as students take part in this hands-on work, they hear the stories behind and significance of the practices.
The implementation of formal lesson plans, grading and assessments are incongruent with the Indigenous ways of teaching or understanding and, therefore, remain absent. Instead, educators use the two blocks available to them in a flexible manner based on the Elder’s words and pull from four core learning principles to provide feedback to students. Participants are evaluated by the pillars of presence and preparedness, listening, telling the story back, and sharing their personal gifts with the class.
Students are exposed to a new way of thinking and explore ideas such as relational accountability – a concept that is perhaps best explained by a simple statement: speak to be revealed and listen to be changed. Taylor elaborates on this concept, saying, “In our colonial world, we talk about resources like, ‘Oh, there’s a tree, it’s a resource, we can cut it down.’ ... It has monetary value. We can make it into these things. In the Coast Salish world, that tree is alive, and it’s … there to help you … you can use it … you can be in relationship with it.” The work done in the Land and Language Course challenges students to evaluate their ideas of values, work and learning. “By offering another way of looking at the world [and] ... encouraging people to see that there is more than one way to base your ontological understanding of how you live … that brings some understanding,” Taylor expresses.
Taylor offers all his credit to the Coast Salish Elders for sharing their culture, history and stories; without their leadership and knowledge, he stresses, the program would have never come to fruition. Indeed, as the education curriculum in BC continues to evolve, innovative courses like the Land and Language Based Learning Program are indicative of the progress that is likely to come. The program is in talks to expand and create a culturally appropriate building, and Taylor has noticed “the way that the teachings have kind of percolated out into the school,” leaving a mark on many. The incorporation of Indigenous learning has “filtered into other classrooms … [and introduced] this notion that there are different ways to think about a thing.”
Despite their importance, these very lessons have long been excluded from provincial curricula, left untouched by the majority of students. After years of collaboration, contribution and understanding, at Ladysmith Secondary, they finally have the space to be shared.
