Indigenous Pedagogies & Curriculum

Introduction to Indigenous Pedagogy

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What is Indigenous pedagogy?

Indigenous pedagogy is an umbrella term that encompasses the diverse array of teaching strategies embodied within Indigenous communities across Turtle Island.
Indigenous pedagogy is informed from Indigenous ways of knowing and being that are nation and community-specific.
Although immensely diverse and varied across place and community, there are some shared central tenets of Indigenous pedagogy that we can learn from that include:

centering relationality
place-based methodologies
whole body experiential learning
intergenerational knowledge transmission, and;
decentering hierarchy + authoritarian learning

A chart connecting the central tenets sof Indigenous Pedagogy in a circle, so that each idea connects to the next.

What is Indigenous knowledge?

Indigenous knowledge refers to the embodied knowledge of Indigenous peoples that lives and breathes within Indigenous body, land and ancestors. The term embodied refers to the fact that this knowledge literally resides and lives within Indigenous peoples themselves, held by the expanse of relationships that comprise Indigenous knowledge systems.
When Indigenous knowledge is truncated from its web of relationships, or divorced from Indigenous peoples themselves, it simply becomes Indigenous content. Because Indigenous knowledge is embodied and embedded, non-Indigenous people cannot teach Indigenous knowledge, but they can teach Indigenous content.
There are ethical ways to include Indigenous knowledge in various learning environments namely, by having Indigenous peoples themselves teach this knowledge. This can often entail deep and ethical collaboration with Indigenous people, knowledge keepers and Elders.

Indigenous self-determination and collective responsibility

Article 3 of the UN Declaration on the rights of Indigenous peoples states that, “Indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic, social and cultural development.”
Education is an important element of Indigenous self-determination. Indigenous peoples have the right to access education that emanates from their cultural and intellectual traditions, and to see themselves represented within postsecondary education.
We are all on Indigenous land and participate to varying degrees within the settler state of Canada. As such, we are never in a neutral place but instead stand atop histories and contemporary realities of sustained violence directed towards Indigenous bodies and land. It is everyone’s responsibility to make space for, and support, Indigenous self-determination.

Two people kneeling, both working to gut and clean a long fish.

The legacy of Western Education on Indigenous dispossession

Western education is not a neutral institution and has historically functioned to support colonial relations and contribute to the dispossession of Indigenous peoples. From forcing Indigenous peoples to attend the residential school system while simultaneously excluding them from postsecondary education systems, to hegemonizing Western thought, to the construction of representations of Indigenous peoples and their knowledge as inferior, education has always been an integral part of supporting colonialism.
One of the pillars of this strategy has been erasure. Indigenous peoples are not represented within education, or if they are it is as a small footnote in history, a vanishing or already conquered people of little relevancy and much inferiority. Including Indigenous curriculum and celebrating Indigenous pedagogy resists this erasure and contributes to Indigenous communities’ rights to self-determination.
Most universities are attempting to take account for their complicity and action within this cycle of harm. At TMU in our Standing Strong Report, we have a “responsibility to educate,” which denotes specific responsibilities to Indigenous curriculum and pedagogy as a step towards accountability.

“(The) collective memory of imperialism has been perpetuated through the ways in which knowledge about Indigenous peoples was collected, classified and then represented in various ways back to the West, and then, through the eyes of the West, back to those who have been colonized.”

Linda Tuhiwai, Decolonizing Methodologies, p1

A gray all with black graffiti writing that reads "This is NDN LAND" with a heart drawn at the end.

Why is Indigenous pedagogy and curriculum important?

An Ojibway floral design by artist Quill Christie-Peters.

Incorporating Indigenous curriculum and pedagogy into mainstream education resists the mass erasure of Indigenous peoples that is a foundation tool for settler colonialism while also de-centering imperial and colonial thought.
Indigenous students exist in all faculties and departments. Indigenous pedagogy and curriculum ensures these students are seen, supported and that their education is enriching and useful.
Indigenous pedagogy and curriculum also deeply enriches the education of all students of all backgrounds. It teaches them critical thinking, exposes them to alternative ways of thinking and knowing, and encourages a relationship between education and social justice, creating students who care about creating a better world for all.

What is non-compartmentalized Indigenous curriculum?

Mainstream approaches to the incorporation of Indigenous curriculum can compartmentalize the content into limiting, palatable and often stereotypical representations of what Indigenous curriculum is in order to maintain the hegemony and naturalization of colonial thought and knowledge in our society.

Non-compartmentalized approaches to Indigenous curriculum presents the expansive contributions of Indigenous peoples to all topics at hand, and acknowledge how the overarching structure of settler colonialism tethers Indigenous peoples to all facets of society. From this approach, there is always relevancy when it comes to incorporating Indigenous curriculum on Indigenous territory.
Did you know that Navajo weavers helped create circuit boards for early computer devices (external link) ? Did you know that the American constitution is believed to be based off of the Haudenosaunnee conception of democracy (external link) ? Indigenous knowledge and brilliance is everywhere, but it takes some work to uncover these truths.

I am a non-Indigenous instructor, what is my relationship to Indigenous pedagogy and curriculum?

At the very least, we all have a responsibility to learn about the Indigenous territory we are on, which includes pedagogy and curriculum. A great first step can simply be to educate yourself on the protocols, pedagogies and knowledge of the land you are on, accessed through accountable relationships with Indigenous peoples of the territory.
Educators wanting to align themselves with calls for Indigenous self-determination and being accountable to the harms Indigenous peoples continue to experience, can incorporate Indigenous pedagogy, curriculum and knowledge into their classrooms in many ethical ways.
As an educator, you have a responsibility to all of your students, including Indigenous students. Fluency around Indigenous pedagogy and incorporation of Indigenous curriculum sets Indigenous students up for success and enrichment.