Indigenous Ways of Knowing: Land, Culture, and Learning
Indigenous Ways of Knowing: Land, Culture, and Learning
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Workshop Description:
This two-day workshop offers participants an in-depth opportunity to explore the history and ongoing impacts of colonialism in Canada, particularly how colonial policies have affected Indigenous peoples, families, and communities. Through a respectful, inclusive, and participatory approach, attendees will gain foundational knowledge about the legacy of residential schools, the Sixties Scoop, and other government practices that have contributed to intergenerational trauma and systemic inequality. It will also introduce the principles of cultural safety and how to apply them in professional and community settings. Participants will gain tools to provide culturally relevant services and foster respectful, inclusive environments.
- Develop a clearer understanding of Canada’s colonial history and its enduring impact on Indigenous populations.
- Learn about Indigenous worldviews, knowledge systems, and the spiritual and cultural values that shape Indigenous ways of life.
- Explore the concept and application of cultural safety—what it means to create and sustain environments where Indigenous people feel respected, seen, and safe.
- Gain tools for offering culturally relevant and respectful services within schools, social services, healthcare, and community organizations.
- Learn how to foster culturally safe and respectful workplaces that support reconciliation and Indigenous self-determination.
This workshop is experiential in nature and grounded in Indigenous pedagogy, which emphasizes relational learning, storytelling, land-based teachings, and ceremony. Participants will engage in individual reflection, group dialogue, and ceremony designed to challenge assumptions, foster empathy, and deepen cultural humility.
- Registration Fee: $249 per person
- Max Capacity: 30 persons
- Length: 2 Days (7 Hours each)
- Start Time: 9:00 a.m.
- Facilitators: Dawn Isaac, Chantel St. Germaine, Elder Cheryl Thomson
Dawn Isaac |
Dawn Isaac is Anishinaabe-ikwe from Sagkeeng First Nation. She holds a bachelor’s degree in human Ecology and a Masters degree in applied communications. She has several years of experience in research & training with a focus on intergenerational, developmental, and organizational trauma as well as Indigenous issues in both a historical and current context. She is passionate about promoting a wide-spread understanding of trauma-informed and trauma-responsive services as a best practice approach across multiple sectors. Dawn is also committed to advancing Indigenous knowledge(s), resilience, healing practices, and creating safe spaces, as well as fostering reconciliatory relationship building. Dawn spent more than a decade working as part of an intergenerational team (grandmother-mother-granddaughter) facilitating workshops and healing sessions on intergenerational trauma and resilience. Through this transfer of knowledge, she has been part of an interdisciplinary team developing a Reconciled Healing Model as an overarching clinical framework for organizations in the healing and helping profession. Dawn has also worked closely with Dr. Sandra Bloom, to pilot Creating Presence; a new and innovative clinical approach to transform organizations and foster trauma-resilient practices. |
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Chantel St. Germaine is a proud Indigenous woman who has a great amount of passion for what she does. Chantel brings forward a Bachelor Degree in History, and teaches our youth the importance of Indigenous culture and Culture Identity. Chantel is also a crafter and teaches our youth how to make Ribbon skirts, beading, drums, rattles, traditional foods, attends ceremonies with the youth and so much more. She takes pride in who she is as an Indigenous woman and passes her knowledge and teachings on in a respectable and honest way. Outside Marymound she also carries out cultural workshops for different organizations and enjoys attending ceremonies with her children. |
Location
Prairie Tides Training Centre, 442 Scotia Street