For our diverse urban Native context, nestled in a beautiful urban forest, an ONB program can offer a way to restore early learning to knowledge systems that “Indigenous societies have long practiced in which land-based, play-based, inter generational, and applied learning strategies have helped the next generation learn what it means to live in ethical and sustainable relationship with all living beings.” We started off with a leadership team of five and set out to weave in the teaching staff, which at the time was numbered at six. With the initial leadership team, we landed on these three questions that would not only guide our inquiry but also serve as an anchor as to why this was important at this time and to provide a way back should we find ourselves drifting from our goal.These three guiding and anchoring questions came to be through collaborative conversation with the other initial leaders on the inquiry team. With a vague idea and curiosity to build out an outdoor classroom, these questions helped guide our imagination and intent to expand the preschool program as well as gave us a trajectory of how an outdoor nature based curriculum within an urban Native context might take shape. These guiding questions, it later became apparent, were not going to only be applied to the curriculum and pedagogy of the outdoor preschool class but would also become a process to integrate the practices into our indoor preschool classrooms that utilize an out-of-the-box curriculum called HighScope.
This framework of questions gave us an opportunity to adapt our practices and pedagogy in a challenging time and circumstance; to refocus our intentions as an early learning community so that we made sure that the way we learned and played aligned with Native principles. An underlying hope was that our innovation and adaptation would bring forth healing in a time of social trauma, procona London container as well as bring forth a sense of educational sovereignty in which we could self-determine what learning experiences and outcomes look like for our Native and non-Native children.Throughout this initial phase, adaptability in uncertain times remained a centerpiece of the work. Douglas Fir is a species of tree who has lived on Earth for millions of years and they reflect adaptability and resilience in times of change through their appearance. Unmistakable bark protects them from fire.3As challenges arose, Douglas Fir would remind me to consider my inherent resiliency, to recognize when challenging situations may begin to brew and to consider what helps me adapt to these challenges. Adapting to these new and uncertain times meant re-membering and cultivating the genius our ancestors left in our blood. United Indians leadership, including directors like myself, would need to find healthy and responsive ways to be resilient for and with our programs.
For me, I had to find a way to learn and uplift our preschool’s operation pedagogically and financially, as well as consider how to move us forward in a way that was mindful of the Daybreak Star community’s values and expectations of tradition. The adaptation of our early learning program wasn’t to supplant what educators were already used to doing but to bridge the gap that the current Western curriculum and pedagogy couldn’t. Indigenizing education is to help morph and uplift what colonial-settler education systems cannot, and this often means adapting structures to best fit an Indigenous community’s ways of knowing and being. As the discussion went on in the beginning, one of our leaders, our former Family Services Director, Cynthia Savini, spoke to how this is a process of re-membering, not so much as a cognitive recall related to memory but to bring fragmented pieces back together: to reassemble and unite; to make whole. The historical link and context of education and land are woven together for Indigenous and Native peoples, especially here in the United States. Because the Native people of this country have had their land stolen and swindled away from them, education has been a systemic plight and institution of harm. If Native education-based programs can reclaim and re-member their own pedagogies and practices, then perhaps healing and prosperity can be sustained to flourish. I felt, and still feel, that adapting to land-based learning can sustain this.Hawthorne has medicine beneficial to the heart and can alleviate moments of physical and emotional stress. In times of stress and immediate pressure, Hawthorne implores us to think, when I feel isolated, what will nourish my heart and help me feel connected? For me as a new leader, feeling connected meant being courageous in admitting my faults and inviting others in to collaborate.
To know when I’m picking up pieces of others’ unfinished work and all the emotional residue associated with it. Operating a preschool is challenging enough, let alone navigating the ins and outs of starting up an outdoor nature-based preschool, but I knew that given the times we were facing, living in a pandemic, it would be a worthwhile attempt and investment to start up an outdoor nature-based program that met families’ needs for care and education, and did so in a way that also answered concerns of being indoors. I sought out not only the space to have such a classroom on the premises of Daybreak Star but also the resources and partnerships that might help actualize this. Beginning within the United Indians of All Tribes Foundation community, I sought and received permission from the executive leadership team, as well as the wisdom of one of our elders who has an intimate knowledge of the land we are on. It was encouraging to know that many people at UIATF loved the idea of an outdoor preschool being a part of the community, and I found myself being cognizant of balancing my ambition of leading our preschool in a new direction and doing so in a good way. Though to be truthful, my ambition and determination often got in the way of consistently consulting with the community about my intentions. There were, and still are, moments when I was scrutinized by members of the community who brought their concerns and questions to a virtual community listening session. The first of these shone a light on areas where I could grow as a new leader in the UIATF community, and it also highlighted the need for the community to heal, as past transgressions and frustrations were made relevant to our current experience. We learned from a handful of community stakeholders that our first step should have been to address the accessibility of the outdoor class. This meant getting our two school buses up and running, without a long-term funding plan. “Before starting up this outdoor class, you should have first prioritized having Indian children who could attend,” one community member expressed passionately. They continued about how without engaging the community first, I was whitewashing the program. Interestingly enough, this community member, as well as others, would remind me of my “colonizer mentality” and acts of whitewashing the preschool program in one sentence, cut flower transport bucket and then in the next glorify the Head Start programming model, which carries a lot of bureaucratic red tape and out-of-the-box curriculums, and essentially is a modern form of assimilation for Indigenous children. Over the almost two-hour listening session, it was clear that a lot of this was a fear response to change: change to new ideas, new people, new world. While this initial community listening session felt somewhat deflating and isolating, I knew I had to muster a bit of courage to push forward with this idea that I felt, in my heart, was a worthwhile course of action. To muster that courage, I found myself reframing criticism as shared questions. This wonderful reframe came from the wisdom of Tarajean Yazzie-Mintz after one of our in-person Reflective Inquiry Sessions and helped shape my perspective and mindset moving forward. This mindset of reframing criticisms as shared questions keeps me grounded and really subdues my own feelings of taking criticism personally, redirecting criticism of me individually into questions that drive a collective inquiry.
In this incident, once I felt there was a bit of a lull, and that everyone seemed to be awaiting a response from me, I decided to implement a listening technique and said something to the effect of, “You’re absolutely right. My not consulting with stakeholders in the community reflects these issues you’re expressing. I will forever keep this in my mind and heart as we continue this journey, and I wonder what you suggest for me to consider moving forward?” This seemed to disarm the most vocal community members, and they shared that they just want me to make sure that Native children have access to this opportunity. I agreed and named a few ways how we were planning to do that.If it wasn’t for natural disasters and human disturbance, it is said that Hemlock would dominate the Northwest forests. They outlive other trees and can grow in full shade. Hemlock begins their life on stumps and logs, tiny and vulnerable, but over time become resilient and strong, often living over a thousand years. Hemlock teaches us humility by reminding us that we should always be learning and growing. Instead of defending our impulse to be right, we can own up to our mistakes and learn and grow from new perspectives. We can embrace the value of not knowing and show a willingness to discover with others. This relationship with the First Light Education Project and the Indigenous Early Learning Collaborative kept the motivation for having an outdoor preschool classroom going and it deepened my capacity for being curious by focusing on a key element of curiosity: inquiry. In this experience, I found that inquiry is the process ofrevealing what you might be curious about; it’s the boots-on-the-ground approach to satisfying a curiosity. However, the process of inquiry is never isolated, it is dependent on relationships. Those relationships happen not just among people, but with whatever is used in the process of inquiry: environment and materials, for example. But most importantly, the personal relationship within the individual person embarking on a process of inquiry. Additionally, I have come to understand and respect that authentic learning happens with a hefty amount of humility. In order for one to learn and for that learning to turn into meaningful action, the learner must humble themselves to other ways of thinking and teaching. “Empty your cup,” as one of my kung-fu Sifus would say, or as I have more recently learned: steady one’s mind.Considering this impactful piece of wisdom, humility for me meant being aware of how I was maintaining a steady mind. The community listening sessions were lessons in humility; they opened my eyes to what I needed to do to empty my cup, forget about myself, remain steady in mind, be like our Hemlock tree relative, and be humble to cultivate wisdom and strengthen relationships with others. This act and practice of humility helped me identify those shared questions brought in the community listening sessions. One of our long-time community members told me a story of a past director of the preschool. He explained that this director was approached by some community members about some ongoing issues typical of preschools and that this director kept stating what he wasn’t able to do. The community member said that he asked the director, “Well what are you able to do?” I took this story as a lesson in humility, to not defend what can’t be done, but to find collaborative opportunities to discover what can be done. However, in collaborative moments it is important to balance expectation and reality. One group may have an expectation that can’t quite be realized because of the realistic circumstances, but a leader can see these moments of opportunities: I get to figure this out with and for the community.As mentioned before, in our community listening sessions, we learned from a handful of stakeholders that our first step should have been to address the accessibility of the outdoor class, in addition to the general program overall. This meant identifying funding for the use of our stagnant bussing service for Native families who may not be able to drive to our somewhat isolated location within the city, our island on an island.