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Biodiversity and Contaminants

Instructions: Contaminants in the Environment as a Threat to Biodiversity By reviewing study students learn that bitumen has a powerful impact on many species including wood frogs. This is especially problematic since wood frogs have many important functions in an ecosystem including, helping to control insect populations, acting as a food source, filtering water as

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Culminating Activity: Becoming a Change Maker

Instructions: Students will contact community leadership about a climate change related issue that they feel is important. Leadership should include local Indigenous community leaders as well as their MP and/or mayor etc. Students will be expected to express their understanding of the issue using drawing on Indigenous land-based and Western Scientific examples. Students will also

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Living in Reciprocity

We recommend inviting an Indigenous community member into the learning environment to share teachings related to local Indigenous agriculture. Instructions: Depending on the time of the year this Learning Bundle is taught and if/when students grow beans in Learning Activity 10: Western STEM Connection- Engaging with Reciprocity and Interdependence students can engage in seed starting,

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Engaging in Reciprocity to Mitigate the Impact of Climate Change

Instructions: Extension Activity: The Ohèn:ton Karihwatéhkwen  Students prepare a “Snapshot of Resistance” focused on the work of a local community member who is fighting to protect Manoomin. Work should include information on the positive impact of wild rice on local habitat (ie: wild rice filters water and provides food and nesting materials for animals such as loons and

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Utilizing Different Ways of Knowing to Understand & Counteract Climate Change

Instructions: Using Multiple Sources of Knowledge to Investigate Northern Environmental Change: Regional Ecological Impacts of a Storm Surge in the Outer Mackenzie Delta, N.W.T. (Smol, J) https://www.queensu.ca/pearl/media/Dead%20Zone%20project/ Study Summary: This study combined data gathered by environmental scientists with information gathered during workshops with local Indigenous hunters and community members. The Inuvialuit are experts on the delta

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Lakes and Oceans as Sentinels of Climate Change

Instructions: Teacher discusses with students how Western scientists often look to lakes and oceans to understand the impacts of climate change. Oceans play a significant role in understanding and slowing climate change as they are massive heat sinks. Teacher reviews this vocabulary word with students along with atmosphere, lithosphere, cryosphere, biosphere, and hydrosphere using the

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Western STEM Connection-Engaging with Reciprocity and Interdependence

Instructions: Western STEM Connection: The following study shows the manner in which reduction in precipitation caused by climate change impacts plant biodiversity locally. The study also points to things that can be done to live in reciprocity and interdependence with the natural world ie: watering and using fertilizer: Serafini, J., Grogan, P., and Aarssen, L.

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Minds On: Introducing Climate Change

Instructions: The teacher takes students outdoors and asks them to think of an area or green space that they have visited throughout their lives (could be a street, city park, conservation area, etc.). Ask students: In their Outdoor Learning Journals (introduced in Teacher’s Guide) students write about: Teachers then leads a discussion with students regarding the changing climate.

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Using Fire to Curb the Spread of Invasives

Spotlight on Language: Fire Anishinaabemowin: Shkode Kanyen’kéha: Ó:tsire Indigenous Fire Keeping Activity: Western STEM Connection-Benefits of Fire: Heating with Wood Barto, D., Cziraky, J., Geerts, S., Hack, J., Langford, S., Nesbitt, R., Park, S., Willie, N., Xu, J., and Grogan, P.  2009. An integrated analysis of the use of woodstoves to supplement fossil fuel-fired domestic

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Factors Enabling Invasive Species to Establish and to Thrive

Instructions: Western STEM Connection: Sinclair, J. S., Lockwood, J. L., Hasnain, S., Cassey, P. & Arnott, S. E. (2020) A framework for predicting which non-native individuals and species will enter, survive, and exit human-mediated transport. Biological Invasions, 22(2), 217-231. Sinclair, J. S., & Arnott, S.E. (2017). Relative importance of colonist quantity, quality, and arrival frequency

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Invasive Species

Instructions: Review of invasive species Discussion: Invasive plants: can be very harmful to an ecosystem by out-competing native species for resources such as light, moisture and soil nutrients needed by all species to survive and thrive. As a result, species composition can change, affecting wildlife that depend on native plant communities. For example, red-winged blackbirds

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Rope Making

This activity is offered at the Elbow Lake Environmental Education Centre. Note that if harvesting materials from the land to make cordage an Indigenous community members should be invited into the learning environment to provide teachings related to the Honorable Harvest. Instructions: Extension: Western STEM Connection: Students review the following study by reading through handout

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Oil Spill Cleanup

Instructions: Following the Oil Spill Cleanup.pdf students use an egg carton to learn about how contaminants spread in a watershed and get into groundwater. Students question how the contaminants can be removed and talk about the implications of contaminants getting into groundwater.  Activity adapted from: https://learning-center.homesciencetools.com/article/water-pollution-demonstration/  Optional Extension: Students learn the difference between crude oil

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Biomagnification Tag Game

Instructions: This activity is a hands-on activity that visually demonstrates how microplastics, toxins, and mercury accumulate in fish and humans, and illustrates the interconnectedness of living things. The toxins in the lakes/oceans are consumed by small fish and stored in their flesh and fat. Bigger fish who rely on fish lower in the food chain

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Broken Promises and Access to Clean Drinking Water in Indigenous Communities across Canada

Instructions: Ojibwe and Odawa Knowledge Keeper Liz Osawamick from Wiikwemkong Unceded First Nation on Manitoulin Island and Ojibwe and Odawa Elder Shirley Williams from Wiikwemkong Unceded First Nation on Manitoulin Island shared with QUILLS that there are many communities, Indigenous and non-Indigenous, from across Canada and the world that have threatened water sources. Indigenous communities

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Law of Water

Instructions: Teacher leads a discussion with students about what the Indigenous law of water is. Métis Knowledge Keeper Candace Lloyd from Cross Lake Island, Saskatchewan and Sault St. Marie, Ontario shared with QUILLS her understanding of the Law of Water. These understandings are expressed in Law of Water.pdf. Teachers should review this source prior to

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Water in Song

We recommend inviting an Indigenous community member into the learning environment to share water songs with students. Community members may also feel comfortable discussing the holistic nature of water songs and their spiritual connection. Instructions: Optional Extension: Through independent research students learn about the history and impact of protest music. Students choose an issue they

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Where is Water?

Instructions: This activity demonstrates that the water cycle is more complex than the 2-dimensional cycle of evaporation, condensation, and precipitation that students should be familiar with. By understanding that water is in the ground, the air, bodies of water, animals, etc., students will build an understanding of the importance of protecting our water. 4. Discussion.

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Two-Eyed Seeing

Instructions: Spotlight on Language: Words for Science Anishinaabemowin– Aki gikendaasowi Kanyen’kéha– Sha’oyé:ra Definition: Two-Eyed Seeing: “To see from one eye with the strengths of Indigenous people’s ways of knowing, and to see from the other eye with the strengths of Western ways of knowing and to use both of these eyes together.” 

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