This paper is based on an evaluation of Dechinta, Bush University’s first semester, run by Thea Luig in 2010. The evaluation consisted of semi-structured interviews with instructors and students, along with a critical reflection from the founder and manager of Dechinta (second and third authors, respectively). Dechinta aims to promote experiential, land-based learning based on “Indigenous values and ways of relating to the environment” (14).

From the variety of evidence collected from their evaluation, the authors conclude that Dechinta has enormous potential to be a model of land-based instruction. Students have personal, embodied, and experiential learning experiences that lead to “unique understanding… tangible skills, personal growth, and high knowledge retention” (21). It faces the challenge of funding, and dogmatic understandings of what higher education entails. In addition, the authors call for further research to understand learning and well-being in relational contexts.

Abstract:

In June 2010 “Dechinta” - Bush University Centre for Research and Learning ran their first semester of land-based and university-accredited courses. During a three-week pilot session at a remote location in the Canadian Northwest Territories, students from Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal background learned about health promotion, the history of their people, governance, creative writing, and sustainable technologies. Resident Elders, cultural experts, university professors, and artists taught in collaboration through fireside lecturing, writing, and speaking assignments, travelling out on the land, gathering wood, harvesting, moose hide tanning, making dry fish, and more. Experiential learning that engaged students on intellectual, emotional, and physical levels created awareness of various emotional difficulties, their causes, and their effects on health among participants. The experience of interrelatedness with the land and the group, sharing these experiences in storytelling and writing, working and being on the land proved effective in addressing and emotionally integrating these issues. The Elders present contributed to this process by modeling appropriate behaviour in the face of difficulties and conflict. This paper intends to show the varied relationships between the pedagogy of northern Aboriginal people and the promotion of lifelong well-being. It will relate the experience of Dechinta with a theoretical discussion drawing on critical pedagogy, cultural anthropology, and psychology.

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.18848/2156-8960/CGP/v01i03/41181

Luig, Thea, Erin Freelnd Ballantyne, Kyla Kakfwi Scott. “Promoting Well-Being through Land-Based Pedagogy.” The International Journal of Health, Wellness and Society 1, no. 3 (2011):13-26.