Curriculum Focus Grade: 7

As students bead, they reflect on Anishinaabe and Haudenosaunee teachings and consider how drawing on Indigenous ways of knowing and being in addition to Western knowledge system can enable humanity to address complex global challenges more effectively.

Students learn about the Haudenosaunee Great Law of Peace and the Anishinaabe 7 Grandfather Teachings and reflect on how these teachings can position us to address global conflicts in a good way.

Students learn about the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe 13 Moons and think about how they can engage reciprocally with the land during different times of the year.

As an example of how Indigenous people view the land as first teacher, teacher discusses the Haudenosaunee and Anishinaabe Clan System with students.

Students learn about Anishinaabe and Haudenosaunee ceremonies and land-based practices that enter community members into reciprocal relationships with the natural world. Students reflect on their own cultural traditions that encourage reciprocity with the natural world.

Teacher is introduced to the importance of storytelling to Indigenous ways of knowing and being and the value of integrating Indigenous Knowledge into STEM teaching and learning.

Students will be provided with a visual of a healthy ecosystem compared to an unhealthy ecosystem, to which they will then research how different species within that area are affected by contaminants.

Students explore how language affects and mirrors our relationship to land, by learning Anishinaabemowin and Kanyen’kéha words. Students also learn the Indigenous origin of many local place names.

Students discover how while both Western scientists and local Indigenous groups view plants as alive (or biotic), local Indigenous groups view plants as spirited relatives which is generative of the development of more reciprocal relationships between plants and community members.

Students pick an invasive species to research and report on. Research must touch on the impact the species has on Indigenous land-based practices and how management practices are informed by both Indigenous and non-Indigenous ways of knowing.

Students learn about how modern forms of technology can be used to control invasive species impacting Indigenous land-based practices such as Dutch elm disease and phragmites.

Students learn about how controlled burn fires can be used to curb the spread of invasive plants and about the benefits of heating homes with wood.

Students learn about how Haudenosaunee community members in Akwesasne are utilizing a variety of strategies, including planting trees, to manage the impact of the emerald ash borer on black ash tree stands. After learning about the value of planting native tree species students practice saving and planting native tree seeds.

Students learn about transportation methods that transmit and those that can be utilized to reduce the spread of invasive species. Students also discuss the factors that enable species to thrive when introduced into a new area and, therefore, to become invasive as opposed to native or naturalized.

Teacher leads a discussion with students about how black ash trees across Ontario, used to harvest wood to create black ash baskets, are currently threatened by the emerald ash borer.

Students learn about Dutch Elm disease and its impact on Elm trees and Haudenosaunee tools. Through a communicable disease lab students recognize the parallels between the transmission of Dutch elm disease and human diseases such as tuberculosis.

Students learn about the impact of phragmites on cattails and wetland health.

Students learn about the locally pervasive invasive species, garlic mustard, and use a website developed by local scientist, Rob Colautti, to track its presence. As an extension students identify other flowers and plants found nearby and both identify whether they are native, naturalized or invasive and question the implications of this.

Students review different types of invasive species and their impact on ecosystems.

Students learn about snowshoe designs utilized by local Indigenous groups. Next, students can engage in an optional extension activity in which they examine how traditional snowshoe designs reduced pressure upon the snow by dispersing weight over a larger area. Students learn how to calculate pressure by converting metric units into international system of units (SI).

Students learn about the cultural significance of wigwams to the Anishinaabe and engage in an interactive hands-on math activity where they calculate the diameter, area, and circumference of where a wigwam would be constructed using number of steps and other body parts to approximate distance. As an extension students can examine how harvesting materials at different times of the year impacts tree growth and forest health.

Students learn what rope is made from by local Indigenous groups, make their own rope, and practice knot tying. Teachers leads a discussion with students regarding the impact of invasive species such as purple loosestrife on Indigenous land-based practices such as cattail mat weaving, basket making and rope making.

Students learn about the cultural significance of basket weaving to the Haudenosaunee. As an extension teachers may choose to have students weave their own baskets that integrate patterning principles.

Students learn about the Haudenosaunee Ohén:ton Karihwatéhkwen (Thanksgiving Address) and are invited to reflect on all of the things in the natural world Indigenous people rely on locally for their tools and technologies. Students then spend time in sit spots on the land and reflect on what they grateful for in nature.

Students learn the The Ohen:ton Kariwatehkwen (The Words that Come Before all Else or the Thanksgiving Address) and reflect on how it positions humans in a rich, interdependent web of relationships with elements in the natural that must be related to with reciprocity. As an extension students journal in an outdoor sit spot about what they are grateful for in nature.

Students review the Ohèn:ton Karihwatéhkwen (The Words That Come Before All Else) and consider the centrality of water to Haudenosaunee and other local Indigenous groups.

Students explore Indigenous and Western perspectives on forests. Examining logging protests that occurred in Fairy Creek, BC as a case study, students consider how drawing on two-eyed seeing can help to generate meaningful solutions to complex global issues.

Students discuss what Indigenous land-based knowledge and Western science is with their teacher and generate an understanding of how to foster knowledge mutualism.

Students learn about the holism that exists within themselves and within their family, community, nation, land-base etc. Students set goals on how they can foster holistic wellbeing.

Students learn about the two-row wampum and how it can be used as a metaphor for using Indigenous land-based knowledge and Western science together. Students design wampum inspired beadwork to consolidate their learning.

Students reflect on the plants and animals around them that provide for their holistic well-being and learn about the Honorable Harvest and how it relates to the gifting of tobacco.

Students learn about the ability of Indigenous resurgence to revitalize Indigenous lifeways and engender empowerment within community. Students engage in a beading project as an example of Indigenous resurgence.

Through discussion with the teacher, students discover that while Western scientists categorize elements of an ecosystem as either biotic or abiotic local Indigenous community members view all elements in the natural world as spirited and, therefore, biotic and alive.

Students learn about the grinding stone used by the Haudenosaunee to prepare food and reflect on the importance of caring for the tools we rely on as well as the natural materials they are sourced from.

Students learn how to construct a meaningful, personalized, land acknowledgement in which they articulate the ways in which they are actively working towards reconciliation and striving to live in reciprocity with the land in a manner that will protect it for the next 7 generations.

Students engage in a sit spot activity reflecting on how they can live in reciprocity with the land. Following this, the teacher leads a discussion with students regarding the nature of the Original Instructions that are transmitted through the land to Indigenous peoples.

Students listen to the Anishinaabe and Haudenosaunee creation stories and reflect on how these stories have shaped Anishinaabe and Haudenosaunee culture. Students learn about how Indigenous ways of knowing and being are contained in Indigenous languages and the impact of colonization on language loss.

Together, students develop an understanding of what biodiversity is.

Students explore pollinator gardens and how they can give back to them.

Students will explore and share the importance of Indigenous leadership in protecting biodiversity.

Taking inspiration from Ra’nikonhrí:io Lazare and Katsenhaién:ton Lazare, students will create their own videos that capture our relationships with a specific plant. Duration: Over multiple work periods

Students will explore the Haudenosaunee Ohèn:ton Karihwatéhkwen (The Words That Come Before All Else). Students then participate in an experiment focused on whether indoor plants have an impact on humans.

Students explore the principles of the Honorable Harvest through an in-class activity.

Students explore the meaning of All Our Relations and interdependence by creating a community web that demonstrates these important concepts. Students will also explore how many of the things they depend on in their everyday lives come from the natural world.

Students will explore the impact of climate change on biodiversity, specifically on frog species and their life history traits.

Students will explore the impact of invasive species on biodiversity specifically by looking at garlic mustard. Students will draw a scientific drawing of the plant, play a game to understand how it moves through ecosystems, discover plans on how to eradicate it, and contribute to citizen science.

Students will explore how different landscapes change within 20-30 years from urbanization. Students can then extend this thinking to a timeline before colonization, and how the present landscape will look 100 years from now.

Students learn about the many gifts that cattails provide from local Indigenous community members. With assistance from a community member students harvest cattails and create a cattail mat.

Students are introduced to the Anishinaabe practice of smudging and reflect on how its teaching to see and hear the best in others and speak about others with kind words can inform how students engage in the learning in this Bundle.

Students are asked to identify different logos, plants, and animals and reflect on why in our culture we are more familiar with corporate logos than we are with local plant species.

Students will explore classification processes from different knowledge systems using fallen leaves.

Students will explore the process of classifying species, using an assortment of items and different categories.

Students explore two different types of ecosystems (rich habitat vs. barren habitat) to understand why biodiversity is important for an ecosystem.

Students take steps to form a more meaningful relationship with plants.

Students learn Anishinaabemowin, and Kanyen’kéha words by going on a scavenger hunt for local plants.