8 Reflection
Did you notice points of connection between Anishinaabe educational values and practices, and those supported by the UDL model? Take a few moments and jot down some of your thoughts about this.
Dr. Sinclair’s talk emphasizes land-based learning. Let’s consider the following thinking questions:
- What can we, as educators working with a virtual learning environment, take away from this?
- What features can we replicate in a virtual classroom?
- Are there ways that you can bring the place- and community-oriented approach of Anishinaabe educational philosophy to your online teaching, regardless of your own cultural background and those of your students?
Please jot down whatever thoughts come to mind here.
Did you find it challenging to formulate and express your thoughts on possible connections between these two approaches, or ideas about how Anishinaabe approaches could be adapted for your own online teaching needs? Did you find these questions vague or overly broad, especially if these ideas are new to you?
Take a moment and think about what might make this easier for you. For example, what if you had the opportunity to ask Dr. Sinclair clarifying questions about this relationship, or about his own experiences with online education? Or, if, instead of being asked to engage with these ideas through written text, you had the option to convey your response in a visual format, such as on a digital whiteboard or through photos? Or perhaps if you had the opportunity to discuss these connections with a group of colleagues, orally or in a written discussion post or chat exchange?
For some people – often those who have already successfully navigated advanced academic study – working with ideas through solitary written engagement may often work well. But this is not the case for all learners, whose needs and skills may be quite different. We can reflect on the activity you have just done as an example of how the UDL guidelines may prompt us to think about teaching and learning activities in ways that offer diverse possibilities for approaching how we synthesize and integrate knowledge to create deeper levels of understanding. How could you make this reflection activity more accessible to a novice learner by applying any (or all) of the three UDL principles?
While Indigenous people and communities have a wide variety of perspectives on how Indigenous approaches to teaching and learning and UDL may be integrated, consider exploring the content of this University of Saskatchewan resource on the topic Do any of these ideas dovetail with ones that occurred to you while reflecting just now?
