David Bouchard’s video Nokum is my Teacher (2010), is rather captivating, and it merits mentioning the distinct contrast between traditional Indigenous pedagogies, and non-Indigenous (settler) approaches to learning.  The way the dialogue moves from traditional learning to incorporating non-Indigenous pedagogies was surprising, as our traditional Indigenous ways of knowing (and our traditional knowledge) have been systematically stripped from our peoples, through government genocidal assimilation practices.  There are undertones of reconciliation when Nokum asks “our we not all the children of the one great Manitou?” (Bouchard, 2010); suggesting our common bond (humanity) between Indigenous people and settler-allies, while acknowledging a need for Indigenous and Western knowledge and pedagogies to ally themselves in our modern world, if we intend to reclaim our Indigenous identity individually and collectively.

The three L’s meet the three R’s in adult learning

Indigenous learning is familial, communal, and observational (visual and auditory) in nature  (the three L’s), look, listen, and learn (Miller, 1996); while non-Indigenous pedagogies are focused on cognitive and skills development that is subject matter specific (the three R’s), reading, writing, and arithmetic.  In the field of adult education, whether post-secondary or within the workplace, there is value to incorporating both Indigenous and Western pedagogies into lesson planning and curriculum development, to create an overall more holistic learning experience.

In professional practice, to compliment the three L’s, I often reflect upon the medicine wheel, and its construct, looking for a balance between the mental (intellectual), physical, emotional, and spiritual aspects of the lesson.  Spirituality is the one aspect that often is neglected during the development of technological skills in the workplace.  Spiritual balance may be attained by changing or controlling extrinsic factors in the workplace/classroom, if necessary.