2024/05/26 by Carrie Karsgaard, Brenda Parlee, Alexandria Catholique +2
Social Sciences · #Education Systems and Policy #Indigenous Health, Education, and Rights #Indigenous and Place-Based Education
paper · doi:10.1080/03626784.2025.2456811
openalex publication_date 2024/05/26 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/01
Formal education in Canada has historically been a tool of cultural assimilation and deep harm. Change in education is needed not only to address historical wrongs and the cultural erasure of Indigenous peoples but also to create meaningful learning spaces for youth faced with numerous kinds of colonially induced social and ecological sustainability crises, such as climate change and freshwater ecosystem insecurity. The integration of Indigenous knowledge has been one means of decolonizing education. This is not a tokenistic process; rather, if mainstream education has any chance of truly being decolonized, Indigenous knowledge must infuse our ways of being and doing, including from the very point of curriculum conception and development. Through a critical, place-based approach, this article highlights the opportunities and challenges of grounding curriculum development in Indigenous knowledge within the existing formal program of studies. Drawing on extensive Indigenous knowledge documented through a larger research project, we co-designed 12 modules focused on questions of social–ecological change in the Mackenzie River Watershed. Working in ethical relationality with Indigenous Elders, leaders, and youth, we grounded the educational modules in Indigenous knowledge, which speaks back to the formal program of studies. We conclude that this approach and process for translating knowledge from research into educational resources, while having some value, is limited in impact.