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Ryan Wood

Strengths-based Programming for First Nations Youth in Schools- B.pdf - 0 views

Indigenous

shared by Ryan Wood on 19 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • An understanding of historical context and current environment helps explain these patterns. Providing culturally relevant opportunities for youth to build healthy relationships and leadership skills has the potential to increase youth engagement.
  • Specific strategies include peer mentoring, a credit-based academic course, and transition conferences for grade 8 students.
  • Uniting Our Nations: Relationship-based programming for First Nations youth
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  • A strengths-based approach recognizes that there are developmental assets that universally promote positive outcomes and reduce negative outcomes
  • By placing the high rates of violence, substance abuse, and poverty experienced by First Nations families into the appropriate context of colonization and assimilation policies, it shifts the perceived deficits away from the individual and allows us to focus instead on the resilience many of these youth have demonstrated
  • Consequently, promoting youth assets within a framework that emphasizes cultural connection is a good fit for First Nations youth
  • In order for youth to benefit from these strengths-enhancing opportunities, they need to be engaged by them. Thus, youth engagement is a complementary framework
  • defined youth engagement as the “meaningful participation and sustained involvement of a young person in an activity, with a focus outside of him or herself
  • Youth engagement is a nonspecific protective factor that has been connected to a wide range of positive outcomes including lower rates of school failure and drop-out
  • Mentoring has been identified as a promising strategy promoting positive social attitudes and relationships, and preventing substance abuse
  • It is a particularly appropriate approach with Aboriginal youth, as mentoring is a concept that is woven into traditional values, even though the term may not be used specifically
  • Mentoring can provide the connection to a role model that youth require, and may potentially offset other more negative relationships
  • More generally, having someone to confide in, to count on in times of crisis, someone to give advice and someone who makes one feel cared for are important factors in youth resilience and something that communities can help to provide even where the family is not the support it should be and where peers are more of a hindrance than a help.
  • First Nations mentors are selected on the basis of being positive role models who have made a strong commitment to school.
  • A unique aspect of the Uniting Our Nations Peer Mentoring program is the involvement of an adult mentor from the First Nations community who comes into the school several times per semester, typically to facilitate a teaching circle with the mentoring participants.
  • Youth engagement can be a difficult thing to measure, because it manifests itself in thoughts, feelings and actions. There is no one measure or indicator of youth engagement.
  • One challenge has been youth giving up their free time to be involved
  • Second, there is a need for a timely feedback loop to identify any potential difficulties as they arise
  • Facilitating the return of consent forms from parents has been an ongoing challenge for a number of reasons: some parents are disengaged from the school system, some do not have telephones, and some are wary about their child being singled out for a program.
  • Another challenge we have faced in the development of the program is the shortage of Aboriginal role models in the community available to serve in the role of community mentors.
  • Adults who are strong role models for Aboriginal youth are already very busy within their own organizations or family life and committing additional time for volunteer work is often a challenge.
  • The goal was to create a course that would incorporate the strengths of peer mentoring into the classroom setting where youth would not have the additional demands created by the program being extracurricular and they could also earn academic credit for their significant work (either as mentors or mentees)
  • Selecting mentees who are struggling the most may undermine the course in that they may not engage enough to benefit from it.
  • Teacher buy-in is a critical factor in ensuring the course is delivered to students in the manner it was developed.
  • Dyadic presentations at these conferences have been well-received only when coupled with dynamic, interactive activities for students.
  • We have found that a successful strategy for identifying appropriate speakers is to seek feedback from partners who have seen a similar presentation by the speaker, prior to asking them to present.
  • ather than a deficit-based message that there is something that needs to be fixed in the individual being mentored
  • I would like to see us taking more trips to the rez to see how our lives are different at home than at school. Many of us have families that need help.
  • hese statements of intent should be interpreted cautiously as intentions are notoriously poor predictors of behavior,
  • We are also working on building system capacity through professional development of educators
  • Our biggest success (and hardest to capture!) has been the emergence and development of a core group of First Nations youth leaders in the area of healthy relationships, cultural awareness and leadership.
Ryan Wood

Optimizing Children's Mental Health is a Social Justice Issue - Mad In America - 0 views

www.madinamerica.com/...alth-is-a-social-justice-issue

shared by Ryan Wood on 19 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • helped me pivot in my understanding of mental health as a social issue (versus purely an individual issue) to a social justice issue
  • , I stumbled upon The Spirit Level: Why Greater Equality Makes Societies Stronger by social epidemiologists Roger Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. In this book, the authors clearly demonstrate a causal relationship between income inequality and increased mental illness diagnoses. The US is at the top of that income inequality list. As expected, we have the highest rate of mental illness.
  • “the power of markets is enormous, but they have no inherent moral character. We have to decide how to manage them.” He continues, “it is plain that markets must be tamed and tempered to make sure they work to the benefit of most citizens.”
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  • Stiglitz’s most important point about inequality is that it has been a choice, which “means that citizens and politicians have the opportunity to fix the problem before it gets worse.”
  • We also need people working on bigger-picture, preventive initiatives such as resilience-building in schools and at home through social and emotional learning, child-centered education, parenting classes, and family coaching.
Ryan Wood

apy_2010.Kirmayer.fm.pdf - 0 views

shared by Ryan Wood on 19 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • Mental health promo-tion that emphasises youth and community empowerment is likely to havebroad effects on mental health and wellbeing in Aboriginal communities.
  • The social origins of prevailing mental health prob-lems require social solutions
  • Although conventionalpsychiatric practice tends to focus on the isolatedindividual, the treatment of mental health problemsas well as prevention and health promotion amongAboriginal peoples must focus on the family andcommunity as the primary locus of injury and thesource of restoration and renewal
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  • Collective identity, however, isnot simply intrinsic or internal to a specific ethno-cultural group or community. It is created out ofinteractions with a larger cultural surround, whichmay impose disvalued identities and marginalisedstatus.
  • The local identity ofyouth is inscribed in a world culture; indeed, throughmass media and Internet exchanges many Aboriginalyouth participate in a global culture in which theyshare more with distant peers than with other gen-erations within their own communities
  • Mental health promotion with Aboriginal peoplesmust go beyond the focus on individuals to engageand empower communities. Aboriginal identity itselfcan be a unique resource for mental health promo-tion and intervention
  • At thesame time, the knowledge and values held by Aborig-inal peoples can contribute an essential strand to theefforts of other peoples to find their way in a worldthreatened by environmental depredation, exhaus-tion and depletion from the ravages of consumercapitalism
Ryan Wood

Addiction, Trauma and Dispossession - 0 views

www.fnha.ca/...ction-trauma-and-dispossession

shared by Ryan Wood on 19 Jan 17 - No Cached
  • I saw that the sources of addiction do not originate in the substances people use but in the trauma they endured
  • The resonant values, brilliant art, stories and wisdom culture of First Nations people should be introduced in Canadian schools. Canadians must be helped to see their First Nations peers in their fullness, which includes their humanity, grandeur, unspeakable suffering and strength.
  • 50 years ago it was not unheard of for a four-year-old girl to have a pin stuck in her tongue for the crime of speaking her mother language and later endure serial rape by teachers, religious mentors.
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  • Powerfully beneficial traditional healing practices must be researched, taught, encouraged. We need to celebrate the First Nations cultural renaissance, a tribute to human resilience, now taking place.
Ryan Wood

Re-evaluting resilience.pdf - 0 views

Indigenous

shared by Ryan Wood on 15 Dec 16 - No Cached
  • We seek to reformulate a concept of indigenous resilience that is not viewed as an internalised, individual attribute, but rather as the strength and power of the collective, cultural knowledge of indigenous communities
  • We propose that indigenous resilience is exemplified in the persistence of cultures and collectivities, rather than as traits of individuals.
  • As community psychologists, we take a critical perspective on individual focused theories of resilience
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  • the subsequent uptake of resilience as a positive counterbalance to the disease and social pathology model from which a great deal of research on indigenous communities has been based.
  • The implication is that, for a resilient system, the perturbation leaves no lasting change. This interpretation of resilience is too static and ahistorical to capture the nature of human adaptation and development across the lifespan... [here] resilience usually does not involve simply springing back to a previous state but is a dynamic process of adjustment, adaptation, and transformation in response to challenges and demands.
  • the ability to cope is often tied to individual traits that are independent and unalterable such as high intelligence and emotional competence
  • The discipline of psychology also offers a socio-ecological model of human resilience that views culture, community, family and individuals as nested in various spheres of influence that affect the probability of resilience
  • We propose that the psychological concept of Indigenous resilience is problematic in the context of well-established literature on colonial, collective and intergenerational trauma.
  • Resilience has, however, been taken up by several indigenous scholars in an effort to shift away from a social pathology model towards a culturally appropriate strengths-based approach to Indigenous communities
  • In all cases, resilience was shifted from the individual to the collective, which aligns with an ecological, systems model that involves nesting layers of individual, family and community within a cultural and political context.
  • Indigenous ‘resilience/strength’ is constructed from the original instructions that are held within each Nation’s indigenous knowledge, deep within indigenous philosophies and beliefs
  • Indigenous Nations commonly see these sets of beliefs, world views, ontologies, and understandings of the universe as ‘original instructions’ .
  • indigenous knowledge provides a counter discourse that completes and fills in the gaps of Western knowledge(s)
  • indigenous knowledge is far more than the binary opposition of Western knowledge.
  • although resilience appears as a systems theory, its main effect is to emphasize the need for adaptability at the unit level
  • The literature we have reviewed in traditional psychology largely frames resilience in an uncritical manner as a responsibility of indigenous individuals, families and communities with little or no attention to the external political, economic, and environmental realities of indigenous communities.
  • critique resilience as a concept that facilitates the displacement of responsibility away from governments and which responsibilitises indigenous peoples for their own distress and disadvantage .
  • point to colonisation as the root cause for the poor social, political, economical, and cultural health and well-being that Aboriginal communities continue to endure
  • esulted in the near destruction of all indigenous knowledge systems
  • The loss of this indigenous knowledge was devastating because, as the settler society dismissed indigenous ways of knowing, they denied indigenous philosophies and perspectives of knowledge and reality and supplanted them with foreign concepts of individuality, patriarchy and ownership
  • The unfortunate reality, however, is that most First Nation communities in Canada continue to witness a colonial framework for their institutions of education, governance, health care, child welfare and economic development which are still under the control of the federal governmen
  • revitalisation (i.e. rejection of dominant culture and subsequent, reactive romantic attachment to original culture)
  • We reject the adaptive, assimilative approaches to intercultural contact that require a hiding or capitulation of culture and instead propose a transformative approach that supports revitalisation of culture in concert with social change without denigrating cultural attachment as ‘romantic
  • Given the expectation for indigenous populations to ‘adapt’ to the current circumstances in order for them to be ‘resilient’ , we must acknowledge that many indigenous communities are still in fact under colonial control
  • If the concept of resilience can be stretched to apply to First Nations, as I believe it can, then the best chance for success lie in the efforts of First Nations to reassert cultural sovereignty and to ResIlIeNCe 9 expand the indigenous knowledge base that has allowed them to adapt to and, in some cases, overcome the adversity
  • Indigenous scholars have viewed resilience as a way of coding the strengths of people, communities and cultures against a tide of pathologising diagnoses.
  • strength and endurance in the face of unremitting challenge is not to be conflated with ‘resilience’
  • having to adapt to survive the ongoing cultural assault and social injustice cannot be equated as resilience at the level of the individual or the collective.
  • This reinforces a ‘blame the victim’ mentality by shifting the attention away from political accountability.
  • The resilience of Indigenous cultures holds the promise for indigenous peoples globally to resurge as strong cultural peoples to liberate themselves from the bonds of colonialism.
  • Those communities that have held their identities largely intact, promoting connection to cultures and spirituality, continue to have better outcomes and emerge earlier from the damaging long-term impacts of colonisation
  • For example, through their work with First Nations youth in British Columbia, Canada, Christopher lalonde and several of his colleagues assert that indigenous culture is the most significant protective factor to reducing Aboriginal youth suicide
  • In spite of consciously realising one has agency over one’s life, many indigenous people feel as though they lack any agency whatsoever; therefore, there is much to be learned from liberation theory
  • MartinBaro (1994) acknowledged that the need for change must come from within indigenous communities and proposed that the oppression that controls the lives of the oppressed has to be quelled by the indigenous peoples themselves
  • oppressed people who endure these positions of oppression will suffer a more insidious position that he referred to as ‘internalized oppression’ .
  • the sense of victimhood remains deeply laden in the internal consciousness of indigenous peoples
  • Narratives, for example, are an important vehicle for the transmission, maintenance and reclamation of culture
  • Narrative resilience therefore has a communal or collective dimension, maintained by the circulation of stories invested with cultural power and authority, which the individual and groups can use to articulate and assert their identity, affirm core values and attitudes needed to face challenges, and generate creative solutions to new predicaments
  • A strategy to ensure the survival of indigenous knowledge(s) is needed.
  • The knowledge contained within indigenous ontologies provides the foundations and ways of knowing indigenous reality that are as relevant today as they were thousands of years ago.
  • advances a deeply sceptical view of psychological and neoliberal programmes of resilience as applied to indigenous populations
  • we have raised concerns about the potential of conflating indigenous concepts of strength and autonomy with responsibilising indigenous communities for their own problems and solutions in an ahistorical, apolitical manner that fails to address the ongoing culpability and accountability of states
Ryan Wood

ENGAGING AND EMPOWERING ABORIGINAL YOUTH: A TOOLKIT FOR SERVICE PROVIDERS - 3 views

shared by Ryan Wood on 07 Nov 16 - No Cached
  • ENGAGING AND EMPOWERING ABORIGINAL YOUTH: A TOOLKIT FOR SERVICE PROVIDERS
    • Ryan Wood
      Ryan Wood on 07 Nov 16
       
      Provided by Cindy Stover, who met one of the authors, Darryl Thomas, at a conference/session. Author is available to discuss
  • Some programs have been developed without any thought to the unique circumstances of Aboriginal youth. Others have been superficially adapted with respect to program materials, but without a deeper consideration of the myriad programmatic, organizational, and evaluation factors that require fine tuning
  • enculturation has been shown to have considerable influence on physical and mental well-being among Aboriginal youth and adults, whereas more mainstream acculturation levels have been related to physical and mental health risks for Aboriginal peoples
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  • If we view the high rates of violence, substance abuse, and poverty experienced by Aboriginal families in the context of colonization and assimilation, we are able to shift the responsibility for the perceived deficits away from the individual and focus instead on the resilience many of these youth have demonstrated.
  • deliberate suppression and elimination of culture has left a legacy of intergenerational trauma
  • Simply put, colonization has everything to do with who gets to define reality and write the textbooks!
  • promoting youth assets within a framework that emphasizes cultural connection is a good fit for Aboriginal youth.
  • We need to promote strong youth within a holistic framework, rather than target single risk or problem behaviours in isolation.
  • How do mainstream organizations help support Aboriginal youth, families, and communities without further entrenching the existing power structures? We think the answer to that lies in how the work is approached. When youth are approached from a place of respect, a place that recognizes historical context, and a place of partnership, then this work can be achieved in a way that honours all participants.
  • organizations in the dominant culture have an obligation to find ways to offset historical wrongs by helping to bring about wider recognition of the immense value of indigenous knowledge and practices.
  • GUIDING PRINCIPLES FOR SUCCESSFUL PROGRAMMING 1. UNDERSTANDING AND INTEGRATING CULTURAL IDENTITY 2. INCREASING YOUTH ENGAGEMENT 3. FOSTERING YOUTH EMPOWERMENT 4. ESTABLISHING AND MAINTAINING EFFECTIVE PARTNERSHIPS
  • As much as programs can do, there are significant underlying structural and socioeconomic issues that need to be addressed.
  • The history of negative treatment of Aboriginal peoples through policies and programs that were designed to culturally suppress, oppress, and marginalize has created many risk factors. In addition, it has neutralized protective factors that were a natural part of traditional aboriginal cultures.
  • Intergenerational trauma is the transmission of emotional injuries from one generation to the next.
  • Historical loss has contributed to higher rates of various emotional and behavioural problems among Aboriginal peoples, including feelings of sadness, shame, anxiety, loss of concentration, isolation from and avoidance of other people, loss of sleep, and rage.
  • A strengths-based approach focuses on developing assets that are known protective factors, such as strong relationships, life skills, and school connectedness.
  • Many residential schools were essentially work farms that used the children for labour
  • Effective programs target multiple levels of influence, such as individuals, parents, school climate, and teacher training.
  • By definition, a comprehensive approach suggests a reasonable duration and cannot be achieved through single activities, such as a guest speaker or assembly, alone
  • These programs use interactive, skill-based strategies (such as role play) and do not rely solely on information and lecturing approaches to transfer skills. Life skills training is considered an effective intervention across cultural groups, particularly for individuals who face multiple risk factors.
  • Effective programs focus on factors known to be related to the problem behavior. Attitudes and skills, school connectedness, and coping skills are examples of appropriate prevention targets
  • The use of peers is important because youth identify more readily with these role models.
  • parental involvement is regarded as a critical component of effective prevention programs.
  • Effective programs recognize the complex ecology of youths’ lives and work to change these environments. For example, school-based programming may attempt to alter norms about help seeking and build the capacity of educators to respond to violence, thus altering the school environment.
  • Substance use and suicide prevention research has shown that a strong cultural identity can be a powerful protective factor for youth.
  • The concept of enculturation, or the extent to which individuals are embedded in their traditional cultural identity and practices, has emerged in recent research as an important protective factor for Aboriginal youth and adults.
  • Youth who are engaged in prosocial activities, their schools, and their communities exhibit fewer risk behaviours than peers who are not connected.
  • Cultural engagement is an important protective factor against a range of negative outcomes.
  • There are two types of empowerment that are important for youth, particularly those who belong to a culture that has been marginalized: personal empowerment and social empowerment.
  • To target youth empowerment, programs must provide opportunities and support for youth to become agents of social change.
  • Cultural identity is fundamental to how we see ourselves and the world
  • In the absence of such an understanding, identity may be equated with rejecting anything seen as part of the dominant culture. Too often that means a rejection of institutions, such as school, that will provide important skills and opportunities for youth in the long run. Thus, incorporating healthy and positive messages about cultural identity is a critical part of providing good service to Aboriginal youth.
  • Facilitate the development of meaningful relationships between youth and the older generation.
  • In contrast to acculturation, enculturation is manifested by practicing the traditional culture and self-reported cultural identity
  • Research is emerging that suggests that the degree to which Aboriginal peoples are embedded in their own culture, as opposed to the mainstream culture, is a resiliency factor against adversity.
  • The highest priority of residential schools was to "civilize" children by erasing their cultural identities and connection to their heritage
  • 10. HISTORICAL AND CONTEMPORARY CULTURAL IMAGES NEED TO BE BALANCED.
  • there are 50 to 60 indigenous languages (belonging to 11 major language families) spoken in Canada.
  • There are some traditions that are more universal and will resonate with a wider range of people. For example, the Seven Grandfather Teachings (right) are subscribed to in some form by a range of Aboriginal groups
  • Some English language names for specific tribes were based on derogatory terms
  • some communities prefer the term Nation to Reserve.
  • the phrase Canada’s Aboriginal Peoples denotes a possessive relationship that many Aboriginal people do not recognize
  • 1. AWARENESS OF CULTURAL IDENTITY NEEDS TO BE WOVEN INTO EVERY STEP OF OUR ACTIVITIES .
  • POSITIVE ROLE MODELS FROM YOUTHS’ CULTURAL GROUPS ARE AN INCREDIBLE ASSET IN DEVELOPING A HEALTHY CULTURAL IDENTITY. All youth turn to their peers for issues of identity, and this process is amplified among youth who are not part of the dominant culture. Positive peer role models are incredible assets in this regard.
  • 3. CULTURALLY RELEVANT TEACHINGS ARE BEST IDENTIFIED BY COMMUNITY PARTNERS.
  • 4. CULTURAL IDENTITY NEEDS TO BE REFLECTED IN THE PROGRAM ENVIRONMENT.
  • 5. CULTURAL COMPETENCE NEEDS TO BE FOSTERED AMONG PROFESSIONALS.
  • Non-Aboriginal youth and adults working with Aboriginal youth have an obligation to become educated about history, culture, and current events
  • 6. TRADITIONS AND SYMBOLS ARE IMPORTANT COMPONENTS OF CULTURAL IDENTITY (BUT THEY ARE NOT THE SUM OF IT).
  • 7. DIFFERENT WAYS OF KNOWING NEED TO BE INCORPORATED INTO PROGRAMS.
  • For example, the use of a sharing circle reflects equality in some First Nations and Inuit cultures and may be more appropriate for Aboriginal youth than a lecture format.
  • One way to make almost any activity or program more culturally relevant is to incorporate a more holistic worldview of health and balance
  • A holistic program strives to incorporate a wellness model that balances all four needs. Spirituality in particular (often misunderstood as religion) is frequently absent from programs.
  • 9. YOUTH NEED ACCESS TO CULTURALLY RELEVANT MATERIAL AND ALSO OPPORTUNITIES FOR SELF-REFLECTION.
  • Aboriginal is not a term that Indigenous People chose for themselves, and most individuals have more specific and accurate cultural identifiers that they prefer.
  • If done properly, youth engagement is a promising strategy for improving outcomes for youth, strengthening organizations, and creating systemic community change.
  • The greatest issue facing youth participants in the Violence is Preventable project is the need to heal from the painful experience of witnessing violence, before they can feel safe enough to trust the processes they are participating in." Shahnaz Rahman, BCYSTH.
  • Commitment to an Initiative An important component of engagement is being able to welcome youth who may differ in terms of their commitment to an initiative at the outset. Providing opportunities of varying intensity and duration will help engage a broader spectrum of youth
  • Lack of Trust. It is unlikely that successful youth engagement will emerge in the absence of a trusting relationship between an adult and a young person.
  • The Centre of Excellence for Youth Engagement has an excellent resource available online that includes questions for adults to ask themselves to help create self-awareness about attitudes and beliefs that may interfere with being an effective adult ally
  • Youth will pick up on a lack of enthusiasm or genuine commitment.
  • How do we foster youth empowerment? It can be achieved by providing leadership and life skills and opportunities to apply these skills to making a difference with others. Youth need a voice in the issues that matter to them and the decisions that affect them. Youth need meaningful access to positive role models. They need to see viable alternatives for leading a meaningful life, regardless of the challenges they have experienced.
  • It is important to remember that youthdriven empowerment initiatives does not mean leaving youth to figure things out on their own. Successful youth-driven empowerment initiatives typically have significant adult support.
  • The Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC) has an excellent Violence Prevention Toolkit available online
  • One of the significant empowerment movements in the past decade has been the healing and wellness movement. This movement has signalled an acknowledgement that many situations of grief have to be dealt with before individuals can find a path to living a more empowered life.
  • ealing and wellness strategies for Aboriginal people have to also deal with grief that is the result of intangible loss.
  • Intergenerational trauma is an intangible loss. The British Crown and the Canadian government deliberately and thoughtfully created several extermination and assimilation policies from the late 19 th to the mid-20 th century.
  • The patterns present in these dysfunctional families have since transcended several generations, and now there are very dysfunctional communities.
  • such a need to develop innovative processes to circumvent these patterns of dysfunction. The challenge is how to develop the means of sustainable, transformative change.
  • Grief is such a powerful emotion because it makes us feel so full and so empty at the same time.
  • This time of great sorrow is described as “having a loss of vision.”
  • However, for sustainable empowerment, you must go deeper and address how these individuals may endure grief.
  • if you send an empowered individual back into a self-defeating environment, his empowerment will eventually fade away.
  • Strategies for these individuals must contain a process by which they can help effect change in their families and communities as well.
  • Individuals must find a process to maintain their empowerment.
  • What good is having “vision” and not having any power? To really effect change, to truly empower Aboriginal communities, you must combine “vision” and “voice.”
  • When examining strategies for the entire community, you have to find a collective voice and vision. This voice is created through collaboration with others. If you create a collective vision and voice, then you will ultimately create a truly transformative change because when you have everyone “buying in,” you will see empowered individuals begin to empower their families, which will in turn empower entire communities.
  • BCYSTH ABORIGINAL CAPACITY CAFÉ
  • The two groups then come back together for testimonials, a quick debrief of what happened in each group, and a celebration.
  • Four generations attend each event: Elders, grandparents, parents, and children.
  • Includes a celebration consisting of awards, honoraria, recognition, and door prizes to acknowledge the hard work, commitment, and knowledge of everyone who participated.
  • Provides participating youth with a half-day session to prepare them for their role with the larger group.
  • Through the power of a positive and healthy relationship, youth being mentored have access to a strong role model, someone with whom they can discuss plans and worries and celebrate successes.
  • Mentoring is not a unidirectional enterprise; both parties gain valuable experience and skills in the process.
  • Personal or social mentoring fits well with the values of many Aboriginal cultures in several ways:
  • Mentoring, by definition, is a more holistic approach than focusing on one area of skill. It is also a means of transferring knowledge from a traditional perspective.
  • Traditionally, mentoring relationships with specially designated “aunties” and “uncles” were formalized in many Aboriginal cultures.
  • The type of relationship that emerges as a result of mentoring provides an excellent forum for teaching and strengthening cultural practices.
  • 1. Mentoring should not be seen as a stand-alone, narrowly targeted program, but rather as an activity that is entirely supportive of community values and goals and that is fully integrated with other community education, healing, and capacitybuilding activities.
  • 2. Mentoring should be embedded in existing programs.
  • 3. A community advisory group should be established at the outset of any mentoring program to inform and guide the development, evolution, and maintenance of the program.
  • Mentoring in groups instead of on an individual basis may be a good fit culturally and can also address the potential difficulty of recruiting enough mentors for one-on-one mentoring.
  • All mentors, whether adults or other youth, require some training and orientation to the mentoring process.
  • The extent to which program organizers can look after the logistics (such as meeting time and place, inclusion of meals) will facilitate regular and productive mentoring sessions.
  • Allowing sufficient time for the recruitment and selection of both mentors and mentees and choosing appropriate candidates will increase the likelihood of the program’s success.
  • The Aunties and Uncles mentoring program uses adult community mentors. It focuses on children aged 10 and older, with the goal that the Aunties and Uncles (mentors) can secure positive relationships with the participants before they begin the transition to young adulthood.
  • In many Aboriginal cultures, raising children was the responsibility of the entire community. It was believed that many carried the responsibility of assisting the parents. The extended family as well as any member of the community, if they were older, would be acknowledged as auntie, uncle, or grandparent.
  • The Uncles and Grandfathers would sit the young man down and describe his future responsibilities as a man, walking with him through the challenging years of adolescence, spending time with the young man and challenging him about his role and responsibilities.
  • The Aunties and Grandmothers would take on the responsibility of guiding the young woman into womanhood by teaching her about her connection to the natural world and the responsibilities she carries as a woman. The purpose was to ensure that values, traditions, and identity were seen as a source of courage, strength, honour, and pride for the future. In modern society, this rite of passage is very rarely performed.
  • oung people struggle a great deal with the challenging years of adolescence. Mentoring helps support youth during this time of transition.
  • SCHOOL-BASED MENTORING BY OLDER PEERS: UNITING OUR NATIONS PEER MENTORING PROGRAM
  • Although the program began as a paired mentoring strategy, it has evolved to group-based mentoring, which the students seem to enjoy and is a structure that helps minimize the impact of absenteeism.
  • Mentors receive a full day of training prior to the program starting and a manual to assist them in their role.
  • A unique aspect of the peer mentoring program is the involvement of an Aboriginal adult mentor from the community who comes into the school several times per semester, typically to facilitate a teaching circle with the mentoring participants.
  • In 2007, the first issue of SEVEN Magazine was launched as a newsletter,
  • Recognizing youth in ways that are meaningful to them can make a lasting impact beyond their involvement in a program. Consider ways to recognize youth publicly within their peer group settings or at school and privately by taking the time to get to know them. Recognizing youth for their successes tells them they are important, significant people.
  • Assembly of First Nations (AFN) - www.afnyouth.ca Métis National Council (MNC) - www.metisnation.ca/youth Inuit Tapiriit Kanatami (ITK) - www.niyc.ca Native Women’s Association of Canada (NWAC)– www.nwac-hq.org/en/youthcouncil.html Congress of Aboriginal Peoples (CAP) - www.abo-peoples.org/youth.html National Association of Friendship Centres (NAFC) - www.nafc-aboriginal.com/ayc.htm
  • Effective partnerships are perhaps the single most determinative factor in providing enhanced services for Aboriginal youth.
  • It is important to choose partners carefully to ensure that they are respected by their own communities and will be appropriate role models for the youth involved.
  • Committing to collaborate over a period of time sets the stage for the development of these relationships
  • Each partner brings different perspectives and mandates to the table, and acknowledging them up front and appreciating these differences will strengthen your partnerships.
  • Praise, flattery, exaggerated manners, and fine, high-sounding words were no part of Lakota politeness. Excessive manners were put down as insincere, and the constant talker was considered rude and thoughtless. Conversation was never begun at once, or in a hurried manner. No one was quick with a question, no matter how important, and no one was pressed for an answer. A pause giving time for thought was the truly courteous way of beginning and conducting a conversation.”
  • Community credibility is the single most important characteristic of your community partners
  • In an effort to seem friendly and interested, it is possible to inadvertently be intrusive in the types of questions you ask.
  • Your credibility in working with Aboriginal partners will be based on how you conduct yourself at meetings and how your actions match your words. Your formal credentials and job title mean very little compared to your integrity and the extent to which you meet your commitments. There is a historical context to meaningless promises being made by non-Aboriginal individuals (often in the context of extending “help”), and your partners may be understandably wary.
  • Asking people to serve in an advisory capacity when they do not have a true voice can lead to resentment and relationship difficulties.
  • Women are key decision makers in many First Nations, Métis, and Inuit communities. They are role models for youth and need to be given a voice in committees and partnerships.
  • Community members often enjoy attending an event where youth are honoured.
  • irst Nations children and youth on reserve have almost no access to the broad range of prevention and quality of life services provided by the voluntary sector. 21
  • Providing a different type of experience in the school setting can lead to more positive feelings about school in general. School connectedness increases the likelihood that youth will attend regularly and experience success.
  • Aboriginal children are among the most marginalized children in Canadian society. Despite some advances, by almost any measure of health and well-being, Aboriginal children—First Nations, Inuit and Métis—are at least two or three times worse off than other Canadian children.
  • The residential school system played a large role in negating the protective factors of culture and community for many youth, resulting in widespread mistrust of the formal education system.
  • Working with educational partners from the outset, rather than presenting a finished idea to the local board, can increase the likelihood that a program will be adapted and used.
  • Supporting educators to become more responsive to Aboriginal students requires them to have a greater awareness of shared history and cultural traditions, but at the end of the day, they also require specific, action-oriented strategies.
  • Designing programs with an understanding of the realities of the school system from the outset will increase the likelihood of the implementation and eventual adoption of a program, rather than trying to make the program fit after it has been developed.
  • Language and terminology are critical issues and need to reflect the local realities and preferences.
  • Innovative programming plays a major role in improving outcomes for Aboriginal youth in schools; however, innovations in developing new staff positions are just as important.
  • For community organizations, large-scale, welldesigned program evaluation studies with control groups are nearly impossible, given their mandates and resources. Satisfaction surveys, exit surveys, and other participant feedback mechanisms serve as useful alternatives.
jenndigian

DreamCatcher Mentoring | Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada - 0 views

www.bigbrothersbigsisters.ca/...default.aspx

DreamCatcher Mentoring is an innovative e-mentoring program designed to empower students realize the rewards of staying in school.

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  • jenndigian on 10 Nov 16
     
    "DreamCatcher Mentoring is an innovative e-mentoring program designed to empower students to realize the rewards of staying in school."
jenndigian

Supporting Aboriginal Learning - - 0 views

youthrelationships.org/supporting-aboriginal-learning

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  • jenndigian on 10 Nov 16
     
    The purpose of this DVD is to help educators and other professionals working with youth to understand some of the challenges Aboriginal students face as they transition from elementary to secondary school. The DVD presents Aboriginal students discussing the successes and challenges they have encountered through their experiences in school.
jenndigian

Aboriginal Perspectives Program - - 0 views

youthrelationships.org/aboriginal-perspectives

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  • jenndigian on 10 Nov 16
     
    Sample lesson plan: Unit 3, Lesson 1 - Wheel of Wellness
jenndigian

Aboriginal Programming - WE - 1 views

www.we.org/...aboriginal-programming

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  • jenndigian on 09 Nov 16
     
    Sacred Circle: Incorporating two universal Aboriginal principles, the Seven Teachings and the Medicine Wheel, as well as the communities' perspective by involving elders and Aboriginal mentors, ME to WE delivers a three-day workshop aimed to empower Aboriginal youth as leaders.
jenndigian

http://www.ncwcanada.com/ncwc2/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Statement-Kirmayer-Healing-Tr... - 0 views

www.ncwcanada.com/...irmayer-Healing-Traditions.pdf

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  • jenndigian on 09 Nov 16
     
    Objective: To identify issues and concepts to guide the development of culturally appropriate mental health promotion strategies with Aboriginal populations and communities in Canada.
jenndigian

http://www.edu.gov.on.ca/eng/literacynumeracy/inspire/research/toulouse.pdf - 0 views

www.edu.gov.on.ca/...toulouse.pdf

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  • jenndigian on 09 Nov 16
     
    Aboriginal students require a learning environment that honours who they are and where they have come from. These strategies nurture the self-esteem - the positive interconnection between the physical, emotional-mental, intellectual and spiritual realms - of Aboriginal students.
jenndigian

http://www.pimatisiwin.com/uploads/953417969.pdf - 1 views

www.pimatisiwin.com/...953417969.pdf

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  • jenndigian on 09 Nov 16
     
    In response to a perceived need for Aboriginal mentoring programs, agencies are beginning to explore methods for developing such programs in ways that will meet the diverse needs of children, youth, and communities. To facilitate this process, and identify some of the critical issues that must be addressed, we examine the concepts and components underlying traditional mentoring programs and compare them to Aboriginal perspectives on mentoring. To gain additional insights into these issues, we also interviewed individuals experienced in developing and administering programs for Aboriginal children and youth.
Ryan Wood

Uniting Our Nations Programs (Aboriginal Programs) - - 2 views

youthrelationships.org/uniting-our-nations

Indigenous

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  • The inclusion of culturally-relevant experiences has been identified as a best practice in programming. Mentoring has also been identified as an effective and important mechanism for supporting Aboriginal youth.
  • The Uniting Our Nations programs were developed in collaboration with Aboriginal educators, students, counsellors, and community partners. The following programs are available for Aboriginal populations:    Fourth R Aboriginal Perspectives Program (curriculum-based, secondary school) Cultural Leadership Course (curriculum-based, secondary school) Elementary Mentoring Program (elementary school) Peer Mentoring Program (secondary school) Cultural Camp (secondary school) Grade 8 Transition Conference (elementary school) Supporting Aboriginal Learning: Reflections from the Voices of Our Youth (resource DVD)
Ryan Wood

Resiliency ACES paper tiger documentary - 4 views

acestoohigh.com/...ormed-high-school-say-the-data

.

shared by Ryan Wood on 28 Oct 16 - No Cached
  • suspensions dropped 90%, there were no expulsions, and kids’ grades, test scores and graduation rates surged.
  • Severe and chronic trauma (such as living with an alcoholic parent, or watching in terror as your mom gets beat up) causes toxic stress in kids. Toxic stress damages kid’s brains. When trauma launches kids into flight, fight or fright mode, they cannot learn. It is physiologically impossible.
  • Sporleder and his staff implemented three basic changes that essentially shifted their approach to student behavior from “What’s wrong with you?” to “What happened to you?”
  • ...6 more annotations...
  • Teachers and staff held and expressed values of hope, teamwork, healthy family feeling, compassion and respect; more conversations that matter increased the quality of relationships that reinforced the values.
  • Conversation–relationship normative practices – The more “conversations that matter” that took place – the “What happened to you?” conversations — the more descriptions that occurred of behaviors of compassion and tolerance, the more behavioral norms were set and enforced.
  • “Resilience trumped ACEs among students who had gained resilience at Lincoln High,” says Longhi. “Resilience completely moderated” the negative impact of ACEs on students’
  • “The impact trauma has on creating negative talk, negative scripts, negative outlook, is strong, and helping a student shift from that sense of failure is not easy.”
  • What’s useful to understand about Lincoln High School ‘s new approach is the context in which it made those changes – in particular, the large role the community played.
  • Adding new programs focused on students may not be enough to break the intergenerational cycle of ACEs. Breakthrough impacts…can only come from collective impacts of changes in adult caregivers, including teachers and parents, and in the communities where students live.”
Ryan Wood

CYF project halves child suicide rate - 2 views

www.cyc-net.org/...ft-childsuicide.html

suicide

shared by Ryan Wood on 17 Oct 16 - No Cached
  • David Alexander said the project set out a simple way of questioning all children about their mental wellbeing when they came to CYF's attention. Depressed and at-risk children were then referred to special mental health clinicians, management plans were drawn up for each of them, and social workers were given professional help from psychologists to monitor their progress.
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