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It has been roughly one month since I began my educational journey in the Bachelor of Education program at the University of Northern British Columbia. I have felt overwhelmingly privileged to pursue my academic dreams, while continuing to live, learn, and grow on the traditional, unceded lands of the Lheidli T’enneh, and to have met the incredible educators and mentors taking the time to help guide, and walk along side me in my learning. Recently, we as a cohort were asked to consider our biggest learning opportunity thus far in the program, as well as other unexpected learning outcomes, and what conclusions we have drawn about ourselves in the process. Personally, this first month of the program has been very transformative, the reason coincidentally being my example for all three questions.

The beginning of the Education program coincided with some very dramatic shifts in my life. First, I had very recently been able to get the majority of what had been a long-term bout of debilitating chronic pain under control with the help of an amazing team of medical professionals, and therefore had begun to feel some relief from the emotional toll living with chronic pain can take on a human. Secondly, a myriad of experiences and the reassurance of my very best friend encouraged me to try once more to seek help with certain social difficulties, namely anxiety. In seeking help, I was able to make the commitment to opening up to my social vulnerability, and am making a good deal of effort to own, and work past it. This contextualises what has presented itself as not only a very surprising (to me) learning experience, but also what I consider to currently be my biggest learning opportunity and outcome thus far.

Collegiality, and community. Since my first day of the program, there has been an unfettered sense of community, and welcome amongst my peers, professors, as well as an overwhelming majority of associate speakers and participants we have met as of now. This is an experience that operates on several levels for me; like a new equation to factor into the sum of what I will be in the end of the program, and one which will influence my learning in the future. This sense of community is entirely new to me, and being that it coincides with the decision I have made to change myself, it has provided an irreplaceable opportunity for me to experimentally reach out and make connections with friendly faces. In so doing, I am beginning to learn what it means to build a network of community, and what it means to belong. What this tells me about myself? I, on a personal level, am capable of changing. If I was asked six months ago, I would have confidently said that I was going to do my best to float through this program unnoticed. Not that I would compromise on my teaching intentions, but that I hoped to do my best to be noticed by no one.

Now, I can not wait to continue to make connections, build new friendships, and learn as much as I can about my classmates, professors included. I want to come out of this program with a reason to stay in touch with as many people as possible. To an “average” individual, at least one within the demographic of individuals seeking to become teachers, the concept of that being a new and learned perspective might sound silly, but to me, it has been remarkably eye-opening. This realisation, learning outcome, and experience has impacted me on an intellectual, emotional, and spiritual level in orders of magnitude that I can not wait to explore. To this I owe the incredible individuals that I am lucky enough to share my learning journey with, both inside and outside the classroom setting. I will never forget what you have done for me.

Thank you.

On Friday, September 25th I was fortunate enough to attend the 2020 Lhulh’uts’ut’en We Come Together VIRTUAL Indigenous Professional Development Day as a student attendant. Dr. Dustin Louie led the introductory Keynote discussion, a remarkable conversation which reiterated or crystallised developing thoughts I have had surrounding promoting, mediating, and augmenting social change. In short, change will not happen when it is being filtered through an aggressive lens. It is my desire to hold this fact at the core of my praxis, and to use it as a tool in the development of my pedagogy. Especially when considering some of the topics of discussion surrounding social change in Canada, it is paramount that as educators, we facilitate a space where these discussions can happen in a way that leaves students with enough time to unpack, and leave the conversation feeling safe. I sincerely appreciated the words of Dr. Louie, and very much enjoyed exploring the thoughts I was left with.

The two seminar sessions I attended were heavily focused on storytelling, and the ways it can be expressed through voice, as well as artwork. Jolene Andrew, a Gitksan Witsuwiten artist and community leader, gave us an incredible lesson on the shapes used in Coast Salish artwork, touching briefly (as thoroughly as she could within the 45 minutes we had together) on the ways in which the shapes were learned and taught, both by the artists themselves, as well as through the inspiration from nature. In my mind, it was incredibly interesting to see how her lecture worked in layers. She was passing along knowledge about the technical aspects of the artwork, so we were learning theory. Simultaneously, she used the lesson in theory to tell us a story, imparting other knowledge on us regarding community, culture, and history. On top of that, there was a third story being told. While educating us about the shapes, while weaving in a lesson about culture, Jolene was also able to use the shapes, and the story to create a wolf on her canvas, discussing how it invokes stories of the wolf, where she could incorporate faces and other significant markings, and what they would mean to her. Finally, she was able to touch briefly on the topic of the ownership of knowledge, specifically in regards to our permission to pass on the knowledge she shared with us.

The second session I attended was hosted by Darin Corbiere, an Anishinaabe educator from Ontario. Darin gave an exceptional synopsis of the Anishinaabe Creation story, and compared/contrasted it against his understanding of the Christian Creation story. In-so doing, he was able to effectively articulate the myriad of differences which can and will exist in the classroom (or any group setting) when concerning individual worldviews, ways of knowing, and the resulting life-ways. I sincerely appreciated having the chance to listen to Darin about these subjects, due to my core belief in the importance of recognising the individual. Theological differences do not simply account for subtle differences in the prayers families might speak, or in the gatherings or ceremonies individuals might attend; they can also account for a tremendous difference in the ways in which an individual processes and interprets information. As educators, we need to pay close attention to the ways in which our own biases, and ways of knowing, may inhibit an individuals capacity to learn, and to be constantly pursuing personal growth in our adaptability to learning strategies and the dissemination of knowledge. Keeping this sentiment in the centre of my learning, I intend to become an educator able to bring a flexible and approachable praxis to my classroom.

My experience throughout my own day of learning was overwhelmingly positive, albeit informationally and emotionally dense. I left the conference with many thoughts present at the front of my mind, but the majority of them led to positive resulting reflections. I am sincerely grateful to the incredible people willing to attend and to share their knowledge. They have made irreplaceable contributions to my journey to becoming an educator, and I can not thank them enough for that. With a renewed sense of passion, and duty, I am excited to continue learning new ways to deconstruct systemic prejudice, and encourage positive social change.

Thank you.

The concept of “Digital Literacy” refers to the amalgamation of ones ability to acquire, process, and disseminate information via digital mediums or platforms. The importance of developing this skill set at a young age, and continuing to hone it throughout the education journey is rapidly becoming more and more critical as the world continues to shift from more traditional forms of information sharing to increasingly fast paced digital exchange. While there are many avenues of investigative and educational opportunities when it comes to learning digital literacy, I feel the topic most pertinent to my own interests is in the analysis and interpretation of bias and reliability of news articles found online.

It seems that I hear the comment more and more as time goes by, “I don’t watch the news, I don’t even have cable anymore! I just watch Netflix, and read my news online.” The problem, as I see it, is how often do we really question the sources of news we find online? Are they being written by a reliable author? What sort of biases affiliated with the network are being brought into the narrative of the story? What are the strategies we can employ when informing ourselves about current events to ensure that the information we are getting is accurate, and presented in such a way that we can formulate our own honest opinion about the topic? With these questions in mind, this blog entry is intended to provide access to a couple of resources that I have found, as well as a couple that I regularly use which provide extremely useful tools for the collection and interpretation/analysis of news and data from the muddy waters of the digital sea.

1. The News Literacy Project or NLP ( https://newslit.org/ ) The NLP is a database of programs and resources that advise both educators and students on making responsible and intelligent choices in their consumption and reiteration of online information. It has useful tools such as quizzes and guides, such as an article titled “Sanitise Before You Share” which is a four point “sanatisation” system to be used prior to sharing information found online. This system includes checking if a fact check has been done, gauging how intensely your emotions are feeding into your initial response and thereby influencing the way you might share the information, doing a quick tertiary search to verify similarly available information, and asking directly for the source of the information. There are tabs to navigate to spaces of the web-page dedicated to educators, the general public, as well as a global education.  The density and availability of informative articles, and tools provided by NLP is absolutely worth checking out!
2. Lingro ( http://lingro.com/ )
   Lingro is an online resource freely available to anyone with internet access. What it allows the user to do, is to input the address of a web-page they are viewing, and Lingro will reopen the page in a version that allows the individual to click on any word on the screen to get several definitions on the word, and other useful information. Lingro is also able to translate into eleven major languages, with a dictionary containing over eight million translations. This is an extremely useful tool for use when reading articles with unfamiliar words, or concepts, and also allows readers to access content written in languages they are not familiar with, allowing for a more holistic information gathering skill-set.
3. Snopes.com ( https://www.snopes.com/ )Snopes.com is a nonpartisan fact checking site which is a derivative of Snopes Media Group. Snopes started in 1994, and is the oldest and largest fact checking database available online. Users are able to query topics relating to current, or historical events, and find available information pertaining to the accuracy of the claims. Using this tool is extremely useful when attempting to verify information being postulated by unfamiliar (or familiar) parties, and sources.
4. Interactive Media Bias Chart ( https://www.adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart-2/ )This interactive chart is an online tool that operates on an X/Y axis, where X represents political bias, and Y represents overall source reliability. Popular news networks are then categorised onto the chart based on these parameters, so that the user can identify and approach articles presented by these networks with the appropriate lens.

Digital literacy, as both a theory and a practice, are becoming exponentially more important with the global shift to digitisation. By compiling a tool set of resources, it is my intention to not only enrich my own information gathering, and educational practices, but also to provide other learners with access to reliable means by which they may do the same.

Thank you.

Works Cited

The coolest dictionary known to hombre! (n.d.). Retrieved September 23, 2020, from http://lingro.com/

Interactive Media Bias Chart – 2. (2020, September 01). Retrieved September 23, 2020, from https://www.adfontesmedia.com/interactive-media-bias-chart-2/

News Literacy Project. (2020, September 22). Retrieved September 23, 2020, from https://newslit.org/

Snopes.com. (2020, September 16). Retrieved September 23, 2020, from https://www.snopes.com/

Don’t Panic, activate the Improbability Drive.

My most influential teacher throughout my K-12 experience, was my 7th grade teacher, Mrs. Woode. She was a fantastic teacher as far as the standards of the time were concerned; fluent in the subjects she taught, punctual, wise, strict but fair, level headed, etc. This was not unique, at this time I had learned from several educators who fit that description, but there was something different about Mrs. Woode. The reason that she stood out so clearly, is that she was the first teacher I had who I felt was able to recognise the fact that I was a much different type of learner than many in my class. She took the time to identify, and accommodate my environmental and conversational needs, and for the first time in my educational journey I can remember distinguishing between an adult who was friendly, and someone who I greatly respected as an educator. Someone I related to, who I felt understood me.

It took me until much later in my education before I solidified the words and thoughts surrounding why this experience impacted me the way it did. I realised that what really spoke to me about Mrs. Wood was her ability to acknowledge and accommodate a variety of learning types in her classroom. This allowed me to directly observe the difference in learning outcomes created by a relationship between educator and student with two distinct controls: one where students were being taught as if they were “X” number of clones of the same One, and another where students were instructed and then educated based on their individual strengths.

Observational opportunities like this, in hindsight, I feel have greatly enriched my motivation to pursue a career in education which not only allows me to teach in a relatable way which reaches learners of all types, but also carries through to different circles within the educational community. I believe this skill of interpreting and relating to the learning type of the individual is paramount in addressing trauma, and alleviating the damage it has caused. I will forever be grateful to the educators, and peers I have shared my educational journey with who have enriched and informed my perspective on “fitting-in,” and the relationship between relatability, trauma, and healing.

Thank you.