I. General Information
School Name: Colebrook Elementary
School District: SD#36 Surrey
Inquiry Team Members: Monica Chiorean: chiorean_m@surreyschools.ca
Inquiry Team Contact Email: chiorean_m@surreyschools.ca
II. Inquiry Project Information
Type of Inquiry: NOIIE Case Study
Grade Levels Addressed Through Inquiry: Primary (K-3)
Curricular Areas Addressed: Applied Design, skills & Technology, Arts Education, Language Arts – Literacy, Language Arts – Oral Language, Language Arts – Reading, Mathematics / Numeracy, Social Studies
Focus Addressed: Indigenous Focus (for example, Traditional Knowledge, oral history, reconciliation), Literacy, Land, Nature or Place-based learning
In one sentence, what was your focus for the year? The focus of the inquiry was to build literacy skills through storytelling/ story making, and to develop oral and written language through local Indigenous stories.
III. Spirals of Inquiry Details
Scanning: The scanning process revealed that students were excited to learn more about how Indigenous people use story telling to share their knowledge and they can use the framework to create and share their own stories. The questions used during the scanning process helped us understand how story can be a source of creativity and joy, and establish connections with the First Peoples Principles of Learning and BC Language Arts Curriculum.
Focus: We chose this topic to support our school’s learning literacy goal. Students were excited to learn more about how to use hands-on activities, like loose parts and story mats to create stories. During our story workshop time, students used their background knowledge, imagination and personal connections with the world to create their stories. Students had the opportunity to develop their oral language skills and practice oral storytelling.
Hunch: Building literacy skills is one of our school’s goals. Students were motivated to explore building literary skills through play by a visit from one of our Indigenous families who shared their knowledge and stories during the Reading assembly. Students learned about the importance of oral storytelling and were eager to learn more about it.
New Professional Learning: Our learning was guided by Leigh Joseph’s book “Held by the Land”. Students explored the land around our school, noticed and recorded the features of the land. They used loose parts to represent the connections between their own observations and knowledge to create their stories. This was a great opportunity to learn more about the stories the land tell us and how we can connect them with our own personal experiences.
Taking Action: A few of the actions we took:
-Connected with local Indigenous people and learned from them
-Attended PRO-d, explored FNESC resource, and the district Indigenous resources (ARC)
-Collaborated with district Indigenous helping teachers
-Explored Joe Brown park
-Collaborated with other teachers in the school
-Used formal assessment to guide our learning and inquiry
-Use the Spiral of Inquiry to guide our learning
Checking: Through this inquiry, students and staff were able to connect and share a common goal: learning more about the land our school is situated, and the importance of oral storytelling. I noticed a bit of a difference in students’ attitudes towards outdoor learning, Indigenous learning, and a boost in self-confidence and self-esteem when using oral language to tell/share their stories.
Students enjoyed telling their stories and extended this activity to other areas of the curriculum: social studies( they shared their own family story) and art (drawing and colouring their story). I believe our inquiry was a success and everyone was happy about their accomplishments.
Reflections/Advice: This inquiry allowed myself and my students to deepen our understanding about the importance of storytelling and placed learning. Students were able to use the local community and environment to expand their learning. They made connection with one of the First Peoples Principles of Learning that states that “learning is embedded in memory, history and story”.
The spiral of inquiry allowed us to re-evaluate our goals, the progress we made, and guide our learning process and experiences. Looking forward, we are hoping to continue our journey into learning about placed base learning through Indigenous lenses.