I. General Information
School Name: BESS
School District: SD#91 Nechako Lakes
Inquiry Team Members: Jesse Kennedy: jkennedyburgoyne, Deborah Koehn, Jeanette Lapre, Margie Alec, Beth Milne
Inquiry Team Contact Email: jkennedyburgoyne@sd91.bc.ca
II. Inquiry Project Information
Type of Inquiry: Indigenous Education Impact Initiative
Grade Levels Addressed Through Inquiry: Intermediate (4-7), Secondary (8-12)
Curricular Areas Addressed: Applied Design, skills & Technology, Arts Education, Career Education, Language Arts – Literacy, Other: AB ED
Focus Addressed: Indigenous understandings (for example, Traditional Knowledge, oral history, reconciliation)
In one sentence, what was your focus for the year? Our focus is improving student engagement by using local knowledge and traditional activities.
III. Spirals of Inquiry Details
Scanning: Last year, we were able to interview all of our grade 3-12 students. We used the 4 key questions and learned that our students felt a deep connection to the school and the staff. This was a major win considering a few years back many students did not come to school and struggled to form connections. However, our scan revealed that nobody could describe what they were learning in a meaningful way.
Focus: We decided to focus on engagement because our students showed a considerable lack of interest and awareness into their school work. We decided to start by focusing explicitly on local knowledge and teachings because this is the #1 interest point for most of our students.
Hunch: We had a few hunches including that we were not yet doing a great job of showing students how their classroom learning could impact their lives. We also hypothesized that students were not able to see themselves applying the classroom teachings given a lack of opportunities in our local community, thus contributing to the lack of engagement.
Reflections for Year 1: We have learned that by bringing in local experts and emphasizing traditional teachings in our school, we could help improve engagement among our students and help them to develop their communication, thinking, and personal/social skills. One of the main successes was seeing the development of our drum group and our student leader. At the end of the year he lead us and a group of visiting students through our 2 songs. This was incredible development for this young man.
Plans for Year 2: Our goal for next year is to weave more local Indigenous knowledge and activities into our ‘academic’ activities to help boost engagement in their literacy and numeracy learning.