Indian Education Teacher Marcia Watkins helps Clarence Michiel Elemen- tary student Thomas Daniels deveiop his reading skills with a culturally rele- vant curriculum which offers increased learning opportunities to Native Students. ‘Native students get course to: learn - about themselves The Native Indian Education Program at Clarence Michiel ~ Elementary School picks up where a similar program at E.T. Kenney Primary left off, ‘‘To increase and enhance the learn- ing opportunities for Native students,’’ according to Clar- ence Michiel Indian Education Teacher Marcia Watkins. Watkins said the program is a staff effort to bridge a cultural gap identified by School District 88 teachers and that her role is to find appropriate resources in the ' community to help native stu- dents develop needed skills to successfully compete in the stan- dard school curriculum, “One of the major focuses is on language development,’’- Watkins explained. ‘‘Many students come to school with language abilities which are different from those required in the present cur- riculum, and part of the pro- gram is to try to strengthen their facility with ‘school’ language.” She added that the program goes even further with older students, providing additional support and assistance on a one- to-one basis to small groups who are working on regular class- room assignments. ‘Rather than being a rigid classroom environment, she said, the program is evolving, through staff effort, to match teaching and learning styles for maximum gain to the individual student. “There appear to be dif- ferences in the ways that stu- dents learn,” she explained. “Possibly as a result of dif- ferences in upbringing, culture, lifestyle and life experiences. __.‘As a staff, we work on iden- tifying the learning styles of native students. and try to adapt our teaching styles ac- cordingly.”’ One way to bridge the gap, ac- cording to Watkins, is to devel- op a “culturally relevant curri- culum ”’. Watkins said that with the cooperation of native resource - people, who are willing to come into the classroom, - students receive demonstrations of skills such as native art, crafts, cook- ing, music, dancing and story- telling. “In my instructional pro- grams with students, I try to use material and content which is pertinent to the various native cultural groups which are rep- resented in Terrace,’’ she said, adding that any suggestions or volunteers from the community who ‘could help provide that necessary ‘‘cultural experience’’ for her-students would be a valuable contribution to the pro- gram, The true value of this program becomes most obvious if you visit the classroom and witness the happy and enthusiastic re- sponse of Watkins students to classroom activities, Ask the students what they do in class and you will hear answers like, ‘‘There’s a guy that plays a drum and makes us “sing Indian songs then we do In- dian arts,’ or a more tradi- tional, ‘When we come to class we work on fun stuff.’ But the simplest response came from a young student who was actually referring to a classroom project, He summed ‘up the program by saying, “We're working on a book that’s all about us.”’ et and Qasy... 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