Ordination of Firs

A stand of Doug-firs on the northwest corner of UNBC Prince George campus, seen here in February 2020.

Most important things in my life have happened near or under a Douglas Fir tree – Pseudotsuga menziesii – or a Doug-fir as many of us call it. This present adventure – a change in job and a return to school as a student – is no exception, and is reinforced now by the view from my office at the University of Northern British Columbia on a September morning out to a second-growth stand of Doug-firs, the smallest movement there hinting at a breeze, a breath in the forest. 

Walking there, at the edge I can see I am entering a managed ecosystem; some stems have been thinned and the woody debris cleared away, and evidence of a logging history and crisscross of humans and their litter is written on the ground. It is perhaps too close to campus to be called wild, but just a few metres into the stand, the sounds of the university recede and older sounds come through the firs and the willow shrubs. Here, the stand is looking more familiar, with bunchberries and wintergreen and pipsissewa poking through the red featherstem moss that carpets the forest floor. Here, a mushroom brings word of the underground network of fungal mycelium, threads that connect root to root, cycle nutrients and biochemical advice from tree to tree. The mycelial network is likely thriving after whatever setback it faced when this stand was first logged – the trees are sharing secrets in the soil (Wohlleben, 2015). Some of the earliest work that established how trees talk to each other through mycorrhizal associations was done amongst Doug-firs (Toomey, 2016); they have been since, perhaps always, sharing some of their secrets with humans who have been willing to listen. Knowing this for some time, when I walk here, I am aware that a community is at work, sending signals about kin, climate, and food from fir to fir.

From a lifelong fascination with maps, stories, and local geography, I begin to see this as a landscape. In the etymological sense, a landscape is a construct, a land-based representation or portrayal – the ship part (OE scype) refers to an appointment, ordination, or creation (as in a fellowship) rather than a ship (OE scipian) that sails on the seas (Little, et al, 1955, pp. 1874–1875). A ship – an appointment, ordination, or creation. What is being represented here? What layers in the physical and cultural landscape are seen and heard now, and what layers are hidden in this portrayal? What stories are held in place by the humus, stored in the submesic soil in wait for a telling, or being told right now in language I cannot understand? Here, the sightlines of academia are still present, with the sound of a building’s HVAC system coming through the trees like water over rocks, and here is evidence of recent silviculture and what appears to be the remnants of a bike jump; but not long gone are signs of industrial forestry and previous land uses. Here, perhaps, was a hunting trail or berry patch visited by the Lheidli Tenneh; maybe they will be here again when the berries come back. Here, I walk on moss and fir needles. Below the litter is podzolic soil, and deeper still, glacial till, sculpted into spoon-shaped drumlins by the slow violence of ancient ice, and then softened by cold waves in a glacial lake 10,000 years ago. These layers have contributed to the identity of people, place, and land on this campus, this community, this region. These stories, happening many times, are how places are formed (Stafford, 1987), and are all part of what surfaces when the geographer in me asks “what is where, why there, and why care?” (Gritzner, 2002). 

But at this moment, this geographer’s mind almost misses what the Doug-firs are asking of me, carried up from the great fungal threads in the podzol and shipped through the understory by the smell of earth on the small breeze: “what appointment are you seeking here, to what work are you ordained, and what do you hope to create?” This possibility of place, this question from the landscape itself -- a call to ordination from the firs -- is at the root my research. It is also a question that new teachers encounter as they begin their work with students and sort out the kind of pedagogy they wish to establish and what value they hope to find in it. In turn, their students ask similar questions, a wandering about through educational landscapes in search of a path, in search of a horizon. For many educators, a teaching practice that is drawn to place as site and source of learning is an intentional act to engage the questions of their landscapes, to situate and establish their own identity as people who are called to teach, create, and make sense of the paths they walk and the “horizons of significance” they envision (Taylor, 1991), to know who they are in this space. 

My own path here, to the Natural Resources and Environmental Studies (NRES) PhD program at the UNBC, began in September 2019 after a 23-year career in K-12 public education as a Social Studies teacher. The first year in this interdisciplinary program featured coursework on the philosophy of science, frameworks and critical considerations for conducting and communication research, and interdisciplinarity. Since the 2004 completion of my Master’s degree in Education from Simon Fraser University and throughout my teaching career, I have been interested in research into Geography education in K-12 schools, decolonizing schools and pedagogy, place-responsive teaching and learning, and the role of student and teacher storytelling in Social Studies. This interest has been expressed in my teaching, most notably in student inquiry projects that explored self and the world in the context of history, geography, heritage, and culture. That was not always the work that I was appointed and paid to do, but it was certainly the work for which I was ordained by the path I followed. I have used the first year of the doctoral program and employment in UNBC’s teacher education program to synthesize these research ideas and develop a new pathway towards expanded horizons of significance for myself and other place-responsive educators who seek authenticity, to be "people who are perceived as 'authoring' their own words, their own actions, their own lives, rather than playing a scripted role at great remove from their own hearts" (Palmer, 2007, p. 117).

References:

Gritzner, C. F. (2002). What is where, why there, and why care? Journal of Geography, 101(1), 38–40.

Little, W., Fowler, H. W., & Coulson, J. (1955). The Oxford universal dictionary on historical principles(3rd ed.; C. T. Onions, Ed.). London, UK: Oxford University Press.

Palmer, P. J. (2007). The courage to teach guide for reflection and renewal. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Stafford, K. (1987). There are no names but stories. In Places and stories. Pittsburgh: Carnegie Mellon University Press.

Taylor, C. (1991). The malaise of modernity. Concord, ON: House of Anansi Press.

Toomey, D. (2016). Exploring how and why trees ‘talk’ to each other. Retrieved October 1, 2020, from Yale Environment 260 website: https://e360.yale.edu/features/exploring_how_and_why_trees_talk_to_each_other

Wohlleben, P. (2015). The hidden life of trees: What they feel, how they communicate - discoveries from a secret world. Vancouver, BC: Greystone Books.

New job

After 23 years of teaching Social Studies, English, Geography, and other fun stuff, sometimes with various pull-outs blocks for leadership or support and coordination, I'll be out of the classroom next year, for at least one year.

I will be splitting my time between Pro-D Coordination (managing the local teacher Pro-D fund and organizing Pro-D events and conferences) and Curriculum Support for senior Humanities teachers.  The first job I've had for 5 years, but the second one is new for me.  I'm thrilled to start this -- in some ways it looks like the work I've done off the side of my desk for years, but it will also involve some new roles.  Here is the concept map that I used to prepare for the interview:

I would like to focus some of this "Curriculum Coach" time on our early career and new assignment teachers as they grow into their roles, even those who may not have senior courses next year.  I will be available for mentoring, curriculum & resource suggestions, inquiry & assessment design, co-teaching or classroom visits, and whatever else may be of use. I'm also envisioning a new addition ro our mentoring series in our district where we connect early career secondary teachers with experienced teachers in an interactive seminar setting -- something like a carousel with hands-on activities. The one-to-one and small cohort models have worked quite well for the elementary teachers but we have not drawn out the secondary numbers we hoped for. The goal here is to impact the development of a vibrant classroom, purposeful teaching & learning, and authentic assessment.

Of course, the other side of this is that I won't be at D.P. Todd next year, perhaps never again as I imagine landing at a new school or situation when my current seconded assignment ends.  I have been at this school for 15 years -- two-thirds of my career -- and I leave with mixed emotions. As I survey the vast hoard of books, lesson material, artifacts, and remainders of student projects that have accumulated in my classroom over the years, I am reminded, mainly, of the things I love about teaching. About teaching high school Social Studies students in particular.  There have been frustrating parts, too, but I've disposed of that evidence and generally suppress those memories because, hey, when you're in in for the long haul it has to be about the passion and positive stuff, otherwise it is time to get out.  I have been really fortunate to have some special students in the last few years, students who may not have been at the top academically, but really stepped up to conduct meaningful research and find creative ways to express their learning.  That's the group I have enjoyed teaching the most.

Governor General Award

This week, the recipients of the 2017 Governor General's History Awards were announced, and I am humbled and thrilled to be counted among them. The award is given to teachers of history and is based on a portfolio submission including a project, supporting work, teaching context, references, and student exemplars. We all gather at Rideau Hall to receive our awards on November 22nd, and have some other activities set up that week in Ottawa for history educators and the guests we bring. I thought I would share the information I submitted to Canada's National History Society, the group that administers the awards.

Skookum Stories -- Project Overview:

“Skookum” comes from the Chinook Jargon - a trade language that developed in BC and the West Coast during the 1800s. It means “big” or “strong” and has crossed over to become a word in the English language. This Skookum Stories project is about telling a strong story that draws on student's roots and culture, and is based on primary and secondary source evidence.

Provide a description of the project you are submitting. Be sure to clearly describe the activities, processes, and outcomes:

Skookum Stories is an inquiry project for BC Social Studies 9. Students set out to find out more about their cultural heritage. This often starts by settling on what "family" could mean and to make an inventory of the people in their life they could talk to and what evidence they might have about the past. Next student decide what parts of their “story” as they know it interests them for further inquiry and then make the effort to talk to elders, preferably two or more generations back, but just one if that is not possible. Students gather evidence and conduct research about either their family’s roots or their culture, with special attention to stories that have a connection to history, place, and ideas. Students for whom 'family" is a real challenge are often led towards local history & community research, or broader sources that deal more with culture than family. Along the way, students design inquiry questions to help guide their work, and organize their evidence and response to their questions. As the project progresses, they build in spoken and visual elements and get feedback from friends, family, and teacher(s) before finalizing the story and presentation. Finally, they share their story collection with class, share the visual elements (usually artifacts or sources), and wrap up with a contribution to a Skookum feast. The inquiry cycle leading up to the presentations happens off and on for about two months, with some class time devoted specifically to research techniques and project work. The presentation cycle takes about two weeks (13 hours) for a class of 25, with another class devoted to sharing of food. Specific outcomes for this project include: 1) Working with "competencies" -- the historical thinking concepts that are now embedded in the BC Social Studies curriculum, 2) Making personal connections with history, specifically themes and events from the Social Studies 9 curriculum, and 3) developing Research, Inquiry, and Communication skills. Unofficially, two of the most important outcomes are to become confident as individuals who have important stories to tell, and to keep alive the evidence of the past that too often go the graves of the people who have gathered it or were witnesses to history. Each time I have used this project with students, I have taken notes on their findings and what they got out of it. While respecting student privacy, I have blogged about the process and highlights of student stories. Any examples I post with potentially identifying details have gone through a permission process with the students and their parents/guardians.

Describe your teaching philosophy and how this project supports that philosophy in your classroom:

I see classrooms as ecosystems, as constant rearrangements of ideas and efforts. Although I teach Social Studies -- generally seen as a combination of history and geography, I think what I'm really doing is identity work, creating space for students to challenge themselves and grow into something stronger than when they arrive. The ecosystem metaphor works on many levels, with inputs such as light, soil nutrients & moisture, species diversity, and time relating to things like instruction, learning resources & activities, inclusions, and pacing. Perhaps my role in the ecosystem is that of the forest denizen, an old tree that provides support for the whole structure. The Skookum Story project taps into all of these things, with students owning most parts of the inquiry, resources, and pace. Very few things we do as a class bring us together as a community than the project presentations. The diverse stories and journeys of discovery really stick with the students, and have changed me as a person and teacher. I have been fortunate for many opportunities to develop and share resources for heritage inquiry in BC, both on the web and at conferences and workshops. I am both honoured and baffled by the number of teachers who have accessed the Social studies resources I’ve posted online over the years. Dozens have tried and adapted the project, and collectively we’ve pushed traditional heritage projects into the realm of inquiry and application of critical thinking.

Explain what makes your project unique and the particular environment (classroom, school, and community) in which it was developed and implemented:

The idea of a heritage-related project is not new in the realm of Social Studies or History classrooms. I think what sets this apart is the sense of urgency to connect students with elders (and their stories, documents, and artifacts) before those connections are lost. I am astounded at how many students discover or rediscover important and interesting stories from their culture and background that no one in their immediate family knew about. This intergenerational cycle is important for cultures to survive and thrive. Another unique aspect to this project are the options for students that have difficult or complex family situations. I have been supported in my work by school staff, in particular my librarian and fellow Social Studies teachers, and by the Pacific Slope Educational Consortium, a collection of teachers who work on critical thinking resources. I also get a lot of support and feedback from students and parents. This project is almost always of value to families, and in some cases has opened up lines of dialogue and facilitated personal change for students and their inner circle of family and friends.

Explain how your students use the historical thinking concepts in this project using specific examples from your student work submissions:

The project requires use of inquiry questions around each of the concepts.

Significance -- we explore what makes a story interesting versus important, for example is an ancestor's involvement in an event (such as the Northwest Rebellion) significant on it's own or is it the event itself? Of course it depends. This year, I have had students share their connection to many significant events including the Loyalist Migration, Irish Potato Famine, North West Company, gold rushes and railway construction, Red River Rebellion, WWI, Spanish Flu, WWII, Japanese Internment, Residential Schools, and the Sixties Scoop.

Evidence-- students learn the difference between primary and secondary sources and use both to anchor their projects. This year students used journals, photos, military records, interviews, and other documents.

Continuity -- students find patterns in their research that can also be found in history, starting by asking what is different and what is the same. My students often compared homesteading lifestyle with modern conveniences.

Cause & Consequence -- many of my student this year examined the cause/effect cycle related to immigration.

Perspective -- students are challenged to find at least one issue within their research for which they can present differing points of view backed up by evidence. Examples this year include the Japanese internment.

Ethical Dimensions -- students are encouraged to look at values held by ancestors and make judgements as to why they existed and what impact they had. Racism is a common "value" that comes up, as is the idea of patriotism in times of war.

Please provide any additional notes or comments that would help us understand the nature and value of your project in Canadian history:

When I first started doing heritage inquiry in Social Studies, it was often difficult to get my Aboriginal students to take on their own cultural heritage and family stories as a focus for their project. Many of my students had close relatives who experienced various forms of colonization including time at residential schools such as nearby Lejac. Over the years, this has changed; in my mind this has happened for a few reasons. The Truth and Reconciliation Commission process has given many of the elders a safe space in which to share their powerful and often devastating stories. In turn they are now willing to talk to their nieces, nephews, and grandchildren about what they experienced and witnessed. "Being Native" is now less of a stigma -- teachers and Aboriginal Education staff have done great work in the last 10 years to include, develop, and honour Aboriginal perspectives and identity; this has been an emphasis of our revised BC curriculum. I have also gotten better at working with reluctant learners and finding supports for students that have difficult stories to tell or tricky family situations. This also goes for students who have been adopted, live in care, or are not in communication with family members.

Links: list any URLs that house any related material related (e.g., class website, Flickr, YouTube, etc.) and describe the role they play in your project:

Links and resources have been assembled at https://www.thielmann.ca/skookum-stories.html

Skookum Stories 2017

Wow.  We are a few days into "Skookum Stories" -- heritage inquiry for Grade 9 Social Studies students. I have provided a summary of the first nine presentations. These students have been working on these projects off and on since November, and their presentation included story-telling, educating the class about historical events they might not know about, and explanation of the posters, slides, documents, pictures, and artifacts they have brought in to anchor their talk. I especially appreciate how dialed in these students are to what they are talking about, and how they have made connections to history and geography, many of them from the content area of their Social Studies 9 course. See if you can pick that up in these summaries and (in brackets) a reference to the sources they used.

MJ

• Family left Ireland due to potato famine (journals)
• Scottish Immigration to Canada 1906 (ship passenger list)
• WWI vet - Canadian gunner (attestation papers, photo)
• immigration from Utah to Alberta with a family connection to Alexander Galt, a father of Confederation (journals, photo)
• Impact of the death of a family member in Crimean War in the 1850s (journal)

KL

• Great x 5 Grandparents (Scottish) part of the Great Migration to Canada 1820s: ship to Quebec (37 days), steamboat up St. Lawrence, wagon to Upper Canada (interview, journals)
• family migration  to Alberta; worked on CNR, brothers went to WWI (journals, photos, interview)

BB

• Loyalist family, many buried by a New Brunswick church built in 1789 (interview)
• Family contains a WWI vet and many Caribou pioneers, goldminers, and rodeo pros (interviews, photos, 1875 voters’ list)
• New-found connection to Shuswap Aboriginal Nation (interview)

AS

• Ontario Loyalists, later migrated to Prairies (interviews, family documents)
• family departing Saskatchewan for BC upon Tommy Douglas’ election (interview)
• Metis family stories, godfather was Gabriel Dumont, one member became policeman in 1930s but was discharged when a friend used his police vehicle in a bank robbery (interviews)
• Great-grandfather WWII captured at Dieppe raid, survived war but later went missing while goldpanning (interviews)
• Great-grandparents emigrated from Fukushima, Japan to Vancouver, interned in Tashme camp 1941, later left for beet farm in Alberta (map, government identification card issued to Japanese internees, photos, interview)

TE

• Swedish family legacy and immigration in 1870 (family tree)
• descendent of Chief Gw’eh (Kwah) of Ft. St. James, bearer of a pre-contact metal knife (got through trade) and involved in story of early fur-trade, James Douglas, etc. (interview, memorial plaque, photo of knife from museum)
• interwoven stories of multiple Aboriginal relatives from different nations (interviews, family photos)
• father is current hereditary chief of Beaver Clan; ancestors permitted to switch to this clan due to clan imbalance caused by Spanish Flu of 1918 (interviews)
• horrific stories about family members and others Lejac residential school at Fraser Lake, and uncles and aunts taken in “Sixties Scoop” (interviews, photos)

SS

• immigration from India to California in 1908 by steamship (interview)
• Great x2 Grandfather a founding member and of building sponsor of a Sikh temple in California, also made bombs in the 1920s for the Indian Freedom Fighters back in India (interview, photos)

CN

• three different WWII vets in family, involvements with shipbuilding, Battle of the Bulge, and liberation of Italy (photos, interview)
• family member who helped construct beach features at local provincial park (photo, interview)
• great-uncle, a jockey, who rode Secretariat and was later thrown from a horse and paralyzed in 1978 (interview, photo)

EB

• two stories of marriages between German and Dutch family members that were rejected by family in 1800s (journals)
• homesteading activities in the early 1900s, including use of home remedies still in use by family today (interview, direct observation)
• attempts to learn more about push factors for Dutch immigration to Canada met multiple dead ends - story was known but family members didn’t want to talk about it 150 years later (interview)

BG

• Great x2 Grandfather who fought and died at the Battle of Beaumont-Hamel; his will was made 7 days prior, his grave was later shelled in 1918 (multiple military records kept both by family and available online

Casualties of Ideology - Remembrance Day 2016

Coming from a culturally Mennonite background, with its attendant beliefs about non-conformity, non-resistance, and avoidance of military service, there are no war heroes in my family tree. There are, however, too many stories of war survival, of heroic sacrifices and struggles in the face of abject terror, poverty, and prejudice. This photo shows my grandpa Johann Heinrich Enns who served in the Russian Forestry and Non-combatant Medical Service during WWI. As a conscientious objector, this was the alternative duty afforded to German-speaking Mennonite colonists who refused to bear arms against other human beings. The 1917 Bolshevik Revolution ended the war and sent my grandfather home to his family in Neu-Samara, Central Russia (southwest of the Ural Mountains, near the city of Orenburg). It was then that the real terror began for the Mennonites (and almost everyone else) in Russia. The struggle for control of Russia meant frequent thieving raids from the Red Army (and sometimes White Army), wanton murder and molestation from gangs of bandits. In particular, Mennonites who took up arms against the revolutionaries or resisted collectivization were special targets of retribution -- to Russian peasants, communists, anarchists, and other revolutionaries, the Mennonites were wealthy kulaks who were complicit in the class struggle and economic inequality of Tsarist Russia. During and after this Civil War, the Mennonites faced starvation, drought and crop failure, outbreaks of typhus, cholera, and malaria. The reality for my almost all my direct "Russian Mennonite" ancestors was a simple life, religious devotion, and relative poverty leading up to the Great War, followed by severe poverty and premature death for all who remained in the Soviet Union.

In the midst of this chaos, my grandfather married my grandmother Anna Loewen in 1921; their first home was a sod house with a dirt floor on her father's farm. The first two children born to them on the cold Russian Steppe lived 18 months and 6 months respectively before succumbing to typhus and pneumonia. In the growing national fear and acts of state-sponsored terror against all who opposed communism (or held land, or spoke German, or withheld crops, or even their wives and children), many Russian Mennonites fled to Canada. My grandparents left in 1925, not long before this exodus became impossible. They arrived in Quebec on the SS Minnedosa, and "must have looked like a real show piece standing there on the dock in their plain dress with 'Schemadaun' in hand, not knowing a single word of English between them."* By the time they had established a farm of their own in southern Saskatchewan, they managed to get one good crop yield in 1928 before the Great Depression made life difficult once more. Still, they raised 10 children in the Canadian prairies and never saw the ravages of war up close again.

Not so for the other members of Johann's family.  His brothers and brothers-in-law and their families were not able to leave Russia during the 1920s, and thus remained to endure Stalin's collectivization, purges, and state-induced famine. As formerly productive farmers, the Mennonite "kulaks" of my grandfather's colony in central Russia were again made the target of negative attention by the communist government.  They were German-speaking, so during in the wake of Stalin's second Five Year Plan (1933-1937), and again when Nazi Germany invaded Russia in 1941, many of the Mennonite men (including most of my grandfather's immediate family) were rounded up and sent to the gulag, tortured, and killed. Most of this information was unknown to my grandfather in Canada and has only come to light through research by my aunt. The witnesses to these "war crimes" were too afraid to tell their stories until the 1980s.

War and service means different things to different people. For my, grandfather, during WWI, it meant hard work in the forests at Tossna near Petersburg, followed by two decades of hardships. I knew him as a happy, gentle man, and realize that he had it pretty good, including a long life, compared to others in his family and others who lived and served in 20th century conflicts or met their fate because of them.

So, this Remembrance Day I remember my grandfather's brothers and brothers-in-law who were casualties to Stalinist ideology and bloodlust.  At least six of eight died at the gulag in Orenburg. These are my mother's uncles, whose crime was that their ancestors were from German-speaking countries and that they were once productive land-owning farmers:

• Johann Bergman, born 1893, died in prison 1942. His daughter, studying to be doctor, endured incredible suffering during the Siege of Leningrad in 1942; her husband and daughter starved to death)
• Isaak Penner, born 1879, arrested by NKVD and presumed to have died in prison 1939
• Bernhardt Neufeld, b? d?, did not accompany members of his family who left Russia for Germany in the 1920s, possibly killed during Civil War
• Peter Bergmann, born 1890, "ruthlessly taken from his home, falsely arrested and imprisoned, and then shot by the communists" in 1943 
• Heinrich Enns, born c. 1902, "falsely arrested by the NKVD and imprisoned, then shot on November 4, 1942"
• Kornelius Klassen, born c. 1900, arrested in 1942, died in prison. His wife Justina (my grandfather's youngest sister) died in forced labour camp in Kazakhstan
• Peter Enns, born 1905, who, with his brothers, was "taken to the Ural River on Nov 4, 1942, 'with hands tied behind their back with barbed wire.' The prisoners were tortured, cold water poured over their heads before they were shot. Their bodies were rolled into a grave beside the river. The next spring, the waters rose and the bodies came to the surface."
• Aron Enns, born 1906, suffered the same fate as his brothers Peter and Heinrich in 1942

------------------
*This post is modified from a similar version posted in 2013. I have included new information from a 2016 publication, The Aron Enns Family History and Genealogy by my aunt Susan Suderman -- all quotes, and the photo are from this book. Further information came from her earlier volume on another branch of our family.

Here were some earlier thoughts on Peace and Remembrance 2010 and 2011 and 2012.  

Ness Lake Bible Camp

Ness Lake Bible Camp as seen from above

Ness Lake Bible Camp and School District 57 are in the news this week: http://www.princegeorgecitizen.com/news/local-news/bible-camp-policies-challenged-1.2306768

I am glad this story has come out. At the beginning of April I received news that a young lady who worked at Ness Lake Bible Camp last summer was told she could not come back as an counsellor because she expressed sympathy for an LGBTQ cause on her Facebook page. While normally a quiet person, she understandably found this outrageous and was willing to go public with her story. I also learned that the PG Pride president was banned from speaking on the topic of gender at a Rotary event booked at Ness Lake. While it does not surprise me that an evangelical Christian organization has a conservative or fundamentalist statement of faith that they require employees to sign, it is disappointing that they feel confident sustaining homophobic policies in an era where no sane person sees sexual orientation as a choice. I was also disappointed that our school district sat on this news for as long as they did, and appeared to have discouraged teachers to whom the young lady reached out from speaking publicly about this issue. This issue had come to the school district's attention in early April, and was, in my mind, an excellent test of the district's new LGBTQ anti-bullying policy; not so much about something happening at school but nonetheless an important opportunity for the district to show that it supports inclusion and breaking down prejudices throughout the community. It was also important for the school district to deal with promptly as there are many school bookings at Ness Lake Bible Camp for class camp-outs and there should be assurances that all students are welcome there regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. These bookings would have been made before April, with deposits paid, so any move to withdraw school district support for Ness Lake school visits would not come without pain. Understandably, the district wanted to ensure they had all the facts before reacting, although that is something that might have taken days or weeks and not months, and not waited until after the issue had become a news story. I can also understand that decisive actions by the school district around controversial events are rarely swift, and involve many closed meetings before they come up at open meetings. Having read the PG Citizen story about this issue last week, I am relieved that out school district is taking this situation seriously and appears willing to consider withdrawing support for school visits to the camp facilities. While I wished they would have acted sooner, they do have a realistic timeline now to encourage the Ness Lake organization to re-examine their prejudicial policies before next year's round of bookings.

I find this story personally compelling because I enjoyed attending Ness Lake Bible Camp for many years as a child and teenager and have had friends and relatives serve as counsellors, maintenance staff, directors, and board members. I grew up in Christian setting and as a youth accepted the conservative interpretation of biblical writings that homosexuality was a choice and a serious sin, and that serious sins land the sinner in some kind of eternal lake of fire. It was not until university when I was exposed to other, less judgemental faith traditions, some science on human sexuality and, more importantly, to gay friends, that I came to accept that homosexuality was not a choice and that there were many Christians who did not condemn others based on their sexual orientation. In fact this was a key theological issue that began a long complex deconstruction of my own faith, a parallel unravelling of the differences between my inherited (and cherished) faith traditions and my "Mennonite" cultural heritage, and the subsequent reconstruction of my current evolving understanding of the meaning of life (and a new appreciation of my cultural heritage). Suffice it to say that there is not a homophobic God at the centre of this construct. This, in turn, led to a difficult decision to leave my home church in the 1990s. I did not feel that it was a place where I could challenge my own faith and beliefs without incurring negative reactions from others, and, although the place and people had all kinds of significance for me, there were too many barriers to inclusion. For example, the church barred women from leadership positions at the time (against the policy recommendation of their parent organization). I believe they have finally put that issue to rest (about 20 years too late), and perhaps one day they will tackle the idea of a homophobic reading/interpretation of biblical writings next.

Ness Lake provided me with great friends, mentors, memories, canoeing skills, confidence in and a love for nature. I fondly remember leaping off the platform onto the jungle swing, paddling into the Lagoon, telling jokes in the cabin at night, singing in the chapel, bat-watching in the huge attic of the old gym, pillow fights, shooting real arrows, BBQs in the Rose Bowl, trying to figure out the opposite sex, playing "mission impossible" in the forest at night, cleaning dishes and cabins (this never caught on at home), lots of running at full speed from one end of the camp to another, debating ideas in my mind and with others in response to the daily religious talks, having thoughtful adults challenge my thoughts and behaviours, and learning (often through mistakes) to become a leader and a teacher. I was a camper there every year from age 7 to 16, plus winter camps, retreats, church picnics, clean-up days, and visits with friends on staff. Ness Lake was also a full immersion into the formulaic version of evangelical Christianity (steady pressure to confess, convert, and convince others to do the same) and consequently a key source of the "lake of fire" rhetoric that made me unreasonably judging of others and what I thought of as their sin. On the whole I do not regret my time at the camp -- it was one of my favorite places on earth and definitely one of the most formative; I agree with the statement by Julianna Ferguson in the PG Citizen story: "It was amazing, it was like a second home to me... [i]t's just been a place where I can feel accepted and be myself".

My 11-yr-old daughter has loved her school visits to the camp, and I would send her there in a heartbeat as a summer camper, but not until they bring their employee code in line with the Charter of Rights. I read and understand the bit in the Citizen article about the BC Human Rights Code governing religious non-profits (rather than the Charter) but I am of the belief that (Section 2) religous freedoms end at the exact moment in where they violate (Section 15) equality rights. Sending a volunteer staffer the message that her sympathy for an LGBTQ cause makes her unsuitable to work with children is plainly discriminatory and unethical. I don't expect the organization behind Ness Lake Bible Camp to change their belief system instantly in response to this news story -- to me this is more about reminding the public that religious organization harbour prejudices that are at odds with an inclusive society --  but I do expect them to have a meaningful conversation about their core mission, the message they want to send to staff, campers, and parents, and whether or not they want to respect basic Charter rights related to equality, regardless of whether they feel legally obliged to do so.  In my mind that would be the moral thing to do.

As a high school teacher, I have watched as the conversation on inclusion and acceptance of LGBTQ students (and rights) has gone through a dramatic shift over the last 20 years. When I first started teaching, there was no conversation. Then it became an awkward one, with many students (and sometimes educators) being openly homophobic and making life for queer kids a living hell. We have a long way to go, but I am increasingly confident that our schools are becoming safe places for ALL students and that we are starting to model inclusion for the rest of the community. This has not been a steady shift but rather one that occurs in bumps and reactions to events -- two steps forward, one step back. Each time an incident or news item brings the attention around to inclusion, we have had a chance to discuss, react, and open up. For example, in 2011 our newly elected school board faced pressure from students, teachers, and public policy advocates (including the BCTF) to adopt a stand-alone LGBTQ anti-bullying strategy. When the motion to do this came before the school board in 2012, the vote was 6-1 against. When the issue came up again in 2014, it was passed 6-1, with the dissenting voter advocating for a broader revised policy that included all forms of bullying. What changed? The board became convinced that policy is a key component in the shifting societal norms. They also responded to pressure by teachers, students, and the public, many of whom brought stories of homophobic bullying in school. Sometimes change in societal attitudes comes first, sometimes the law changes and people come to accept that change was necessary. Often it is both -- the Charter of Rights itself is probably the best example of this dynamic at work. I hope this news story about Ness Lake Bible Camp is one such incident that spurs reflection on what inclusion really means and whether religious freedoms should protect organizations from discriminatory practices.

So, my message to Ness Lake Bible Camp is this: keep providing awesome programming to campers and services to camp renters -- your work is providing fabulous nature-based formative experiences that kids do not get anywhere else. Keep doing your Christian thing, too -- parents know what they're signing their kids up for and a little exposure to religion is not a bad thing, especially when it is modelled rather than harangued. Keep bringing up the topic of inclusion at all levels of your organization -- it is not okay to skirt the Equality Rights in your employee practices and it is not okay to tell a young women she should not work with kids if she is sympathetic towards the challenges faces by others who are LGBTQ -- love is love. The message you have sent will send a chill through your other staff -- a perception that they can't ask questions of their faith or explore their beliefs publicly without risking their positions at the camp. Don't be afraid of a diverse and inclusive staff -- you would be amazed at the difference it can make for children to see that their role models face the same complex questions that they do, including how to deal with their own sexuality. Rather than shun a young Christian woman who has (as I understand it) expressed love for others who face discrimination based on their sexual orientation, you should be welcoming her and trying to learn from her. This does not compromise your core mission, in fact it would help test it and make it relevant to other youth. It might actually save some lives.

My message to the School District is to do the right thing and insist that the organization behind Ness Lake Bible camp not only ensure that all kids are welcome there (as they have more or less done in their carefully crafted public statements over the last week), but bring their employee code in line with the Charter of Rights if they want to continue receiving bookings from the school district. Let this also be a lesson for future "controversies" -- don't be afraid of a good conversation, avoid the urge to say "let's not talk about this until it comes out in the media." We have seen a dramatic shift in district leadership over the last few months, some of it fueled by a desire to see a shift in management practice and new strategic directions. One of the "old ways" we need to discontinue is the veil of secrecy and tendency to obfuscate around important and controversial decisions, often rooted in a reticence to accept the role the district has in the community. There was been great progress made over the last few years on this front -- keep up the momentum and be open and honest about both mistakes and intentions. This is an exciting year ahead.

In both cases I should not be surprised to see complex, staid, and tradition-rich organizations take their time to move towards radical ends, but I am confident that both organizations are filled with thoughtful folks that will take the opportunity afforded by this (now public) story to make progressive decisions.

Leadership Change

Over the last two weeks I’ve been meeting with a teaching colleague to plan out a one-week intensive SFU summer course for local teachers. The aim of our course is to explore themes in the development of leadership and mentorship capacity among educators. We start with a central question about identity — the self that teaches, the self that leads. A sublime approach to leadership requires that we both embrace and deconstruct who we are as teachers, learners, leaders, or mentors and also that we move beyond our own experiences in order to open our mindsets to new challenges, theories, strategies, and communities of practice. We see leadership much like a backpack — it is filled both with tools of our own design (and the result of our experience) but also the tools we acquire for a specific trek across a specific landscape. We will also emphasize that leadership is differentiated. It is tempting to see (and respond to) a hierarchy in action when we look at an organization like a school district, with certain people selected and even paid to be “leaders.” When we scratch the surface, however, we see multifaceted roles for diverse approaches to leadership, and that some of the most effective forms of leadership have nothing to do with title. Instead, these forms often relate to values and practices involving moral purpose and intention, authenticity and voice, learning-oriented design, interdependence and relationships, and "followership." Nonetheless our recognized leaders, the ones to whom leadership is attached as a job description, bear our special scrutiny and can provide insight as to how power works, and how we can arrive, individually and collectively, at values and practices that are vital to our contexts as educators.

During the same time as my colleague and I are planning this leadership course, we are witnessing that largest change in School District 57 management in at least 15 years, if not ever; an occasion for reflection on educator identity and deconstructing leadership structures if there ever was one. This is the culmination, or perhaps just the latest development, in a dramatic year at the board office. We’ve had a superintendent depart after being on leave, an acting superintendent come and go and come back again, a new superintendent hired from out of province, and similar comings, goings, leaves, resignations, and new hires from other senior staff (i.e. assistant superintendents). Each of these moves is accompanied with a narrative, with dramatic speculation deserved or not, and theories about "why" involving everything from gentrification to palace revolt. Alongside these moves is a significant administrative shuffle between schools, one of largest of its kind in decades. This entire management transition come with some controversy, casualties, and political intrigue (as expected in any organization) but also with the promise of change and renewal. I, for one, am excited about the prospects.

The senior jobs in a school district come with heavy responsibilities. The local (SD57) superintendent and his/her team makes operational and educational decisions with a $130 million annual budget — larger than the City of Prince George, affecting a staff of over 2000 including about 850 teachers, and about 14,000 students in 40 schools. The superintendent also sets the tone for the organization (or is one of many doing so) in terms of foci, labour relations, student achievement, inclusion of all learners, professional ethics, and stakeholder dialogue (notably with parents and the media).

When the current HR dust settles, it looks like we’ll have almost a complete change “at the top” and next year would definitely be the year to expect new directions in the organization. This is new ground — not unlike a clearcut or razed landscape — but also one with new horizons and unpreventable new growth. The stakes are high; in addition to the new management team, the “double down” next year is that we are expected to pilot or implement all of the new curriculum, and make progress towards the “transformation of our education system.” Landscape is apt metaphor — to the clearcut, fresh burn, or blown down patch of forest comes a lush burst of fireweed and other pioneer species -- the stable and mature ecosystem is a long way off and not a guarantee. In the same way, there are many simple yet important short-term measures that can be taken to start anew. Not taken, this landscape will quickly be filled by whatever comes naturally, for better or worse, and the job at arriving at a stable ecosystem (e.g. an inclusive and productive district culture) becomes more difficult. The "seral stage" or period of regeneration will be an unavoidably awkward process with mistakes made and lessons learned. The long-term measures, however, can not be reactionary and will require more consideration and intent.

Perhaps I’m speaking in circles, so to bring this home I suggest that the new management of our district look to these dozen places for insight on what to do next — in addition to their own experience they can fill their backpacks with the following:

1. Strategic Plan. Prepared by an external consultant, and the result of extensive stakeholder feedback, this report contains some fresh ideas and vocabulary about the possibilities for change in our district. The strategic planning itself was held up by years of politics, but the outcome may have worth the wait — but only if it is taken up by senior management. The first couple of pages are boilerplate, similar to what has appeared in District Achievement Contracts of the past. Page 4-7 contain the new stuff, an interesting balance of values and actions. If senior management is looking for a departure from the past, they could start by simply focusing on the six community needs: adaptability, community connectedness, uniqueness, relevance, communication skills, and fairness. All district initiatives (e.g. website, media releases, board room procedures, new programs, policy development, budget talks, etc.) will benefit by being filtered through the lens of these six needs. For some reason the Strategic Plan can’t be found on the SD57 website but it is archived here: http://sd57dpac.ca/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/sd57-strategic-plan-april-26-2016.pdf.
2. Report on Rural Education. We have many rural and remote schools in our district, some just outside Prince George and six others in Mackenzie, McBride, and Valemount. Mainly in 2014 and 2015, some of the rural school staff, as well as their communities and other stakeholders, were consulted about the needs of their schools. A report with great background information and 14 recommendations was created, some of which are practical, others idealistic, and others controversial. One of the latter involves a scheme to increase video conferencing “options” for rural schools —while this is indeed a accepted form of “distributed learning” it has also been decried by the teachers and communities affected as an erosion to teaching and learning conditions in rural schools. There was an attempt this year to force these “options” on schools, but cooler heads and longer memories prevailed — the last attempt at increasing capacity for video conferencing was expensive, seldom used, and unsuccessful. Still, the report contains other viable and practical actions (p. 33-34) — the door is open to experimentation and further collaboration; the stakeholders have stated their commitment to stay involved. For some reason the Report on Rural Education can’t be found on the SD57 website but it is archived here: http://sd57dpac.ca/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/2016.01.18-Report-Ad-Hoc-Committee-on-Rural-Education-FINAL.pdf
3. Aboriginal Education Enhancement Agreement. This has been a long time in development and is still in draft form. Once signed, this agreement will guide program development for Aboriginal learners and help address gaps of equity and achievement. At issue appears to be the amount and kind of consultation with local First Nations communities. Surveying other completed AEEAs from around the province, no two are alike although they all share common themes. Most of them have broad support and signatures from local First Nations community leaders. The coming year is the year to get this right and finalize the agreement. Finding an actual copy of the draft AEEA proves difficult. I will post a link if I can find one.
4. Archived District Plans. Each year the school district, through it’s superintendent and approved by the board, releases a variety of reports and growth plans. Among them are literacy plans, rural school plans, Aboriginal education plans, achievement reports, and facility plans. Each one tells a story, and each one conceals as much as they reveal. Nonetheless, the represent issues and foci that were important at the time, and taken together form a useful data Now that the Ministry of Education has changed its reporting requirements (e.g. see http://www.sd57.bc.ca/Documents/Ministry%20of%20Education%20-%20Enhancing%20Student%20Learning.pdf), many of these documents will no longer be written. The various collections of past reports are sometimes hard to find on the district website, or have been removed, but some of them are archived at https://www.sd57.bc.ca/Programs/Reports/Pages/default.aspx.  Probably one of the most interesting (to me at least) was the 2010 DSC Report (District Sustainability). This omnibus report suggested all kinds of cuts and school closures, some of which were eventually approved. The process leading up to the DSC and the process of deciding what to do with it were laden with problems, too many to get into in this space. Suffice to say that there are powerful lessons to be learned from how that all went down.
5. District Achievement Contracts.  Chief among the old documents is the "DAC." The former superintendent referred to these as “compliance documents, written for a general audience but intended for the Ministry of Education; not meant to withstand statistical analysis, but indicative of trends and efforts to improve performance.” Why do these have value for new managers of our school district? They contain powerful, if arguable, statements by former senior admin about our district, including their priorities and a summary of the important work that goes on in the district. It is their attempt to pay attention to what is going on. The most recent of the DACs available on the SD website can be found at https://www.sd57.bc.ca/Programs/Reports/Documents/2013-14%20Reports/2014.07.15%20District%20Achievement%20Contract%202014.pdf.
6. Long Range Facility Plan. The 2015 long-term facility plan is perhaps the most relevant and consequential of past reports. This lays out some possibilities for school reconfiguration in the future, but no actual commitment to close schools and so on. The other data in the report is useful: school capacities, enrolment figures and such -- information that in the past was hard to find without a freedom-of-information request or demand from the elected board. Given the acrimonious nature of the 2010 sustainability process, and the legacy of school closures in SD57 (24 out of 64 school closed since 2001), this document will certainly be put to the test if the topic of school closures or reconfiguration comes up again. In particular, the fate of the secondary French Immersion program will be fun one to watch -- does it stay at the crowded Duchess Park or does it move to the roomy PGSS? The LRFP is archived at https://www.sd57.bc.ca/Programs/Reports/Documents/2014-15%20Reports/2015.05.26%20Long%20Range%20Facility%20Plan.pdf.
7. Recommendations from the Ad Hoc committee on Technology and Learning. This group met in 2014 and 2015 to discuss long standing technology issues in our school district. Their findings and recommendations have yet to be publicly released, or if they have, can't be found (seeing a pattern here?). In an era of mobile technology, web-based computing, and continuous digital innovation and disruption, the school district is still locked in a technology model from the last century: single platform, restrictive hardware policies, and ongoing issues with wireless networks and access by staff to basic functions such as printing from BYOD devices — a model that is encouraged but not supported. There are some serious and specific unresolved technology issues in our district, going all the way back to centralizing of district technology services almost 20 years ago. Thankfully, the world of educational technology has evolved enough that many of these issues really aren’t that relevant anymore. What remains, though,  are ongoing needs and basic questions about access, function, equity, and assessment (reflection/action on what is working and what is not). The newly formed Technology and Learning District Committee has its work cut out for them.
8. The School Board Trustees. This group is responsible for much of the management change this year -- that is one of their official roles -- and are the gatekeepers to the various reports and decisions that have set direction in our district past, present, and future. They have not made all of the decisions or written all the reports, but they have made their mark on them. In the past this mark was most often a rubber stamp, but we’ve seen this role evolve to become more activist, progressive, and engaged. Similarly, the board does not manage the school district (that is for senior administration) but they do have a give-and-take role that can and should involve intervention, co-governance, and advocacy within and beyond the management of school and district programs. A key connection between the board and the rest of the district is in the budget process. The “Extended Committee” approach has succeeded in gaining a more inclusive perspective on the needs of the district (or needs of the students), but is not as successful in translating these intentions into changes in direction. A step is missing — the board needs to have a consistent means of taking stakeholder input from the budget process or other yearly feedback opportunities and creating priorities that are actually reflected in the budget.
9. Employee Stakeholders.  PGDTA (teachers) PGPVPA (admin), CUPE (maintenance), CUPE (support staff) and others. All of these groups were consulted on the criteria for hiring the new superintendent, and this feedback could again be used to see the kinds of values and issues that are important to each stakeholder group. When one or more of these groups speaks up in an official capacity (e.g. at a public board meeting or by letter), management needs to pay attention. If they are at the point of raising an issue publicly, this action has not been taken lightly — there is thought, experience, debate, research, and numerous voices behind their concerns. There are a variety of examples from the last few years to illustrate this point — instances where the board and senior management have been cautioned about the impacts of a particular decision — the initiation of the Northern Learning Centre comes to mind. When management has listened, these kinds of decisions have been modified and the outcome improved. When management has not listened, these decisions have usually resulted in unnecessary failure and “we told you so” moments. 
10. Community Stakeholders.  DPAC (parents), University of Northern BC, Northern Health, City of PG, Regional Districts. These groups, too, were consulted about what the needs of our district and they should be involved in what happens next. For example, the past chair of the DPAC (Sarah Holland) has amassed a very useful collection of research into our school district over the years, some from the SD itself and some from outside agencies. It is telling that in the past, community groups wanting to know more about their schools could face stonewalling by the SD and had to complete freedom-of-information requests to learn what they needed. The flow of information has improved since then, but there is room to improve.
11. Individual staff. Our district contains scores of teacher and administrators that are “students of the organizational history;” that have insight into problems and solutions. Find them, invite them, ask them questions, listen to them, discern what can be learned from them. Getting them to be involved in district-wide solutions will be tricky. Some are already involved — they are practicing leadership in its many forms and in their own way. Others have gone into hiding and need to be coaxed out by an inclusive, welcoming climate as free as possible from politics and penalties for speaking up. One great source of insight from individual staff is the collection of Learning Team and Innovation grants conducted by teacher groups over the last few years. While the grant results are difficult to find publicly, the District Principal of Learning Innovations and the District Learning Commons VP are very familiar with the range and depth of these inquiry projects.
12. The literature. I love it when educational leaders justify a new policy or practice by saying “the literature says…” or "what we see in the literature..." While these phrases are often used as a cover, it does speak to the need for educators to look to theory to help solve problems. New curriculum aside, there is lot of really good stuff being written and practiced about educational reform in BC and beyond right now. We need look no further than the many respected and accomplished educators in our own district and province to help guide us into the literature. Dedicated folks from post-secondary are also ready to help. Experience translates as often to baggage as it does to insight, to the the tools needed to make change. Our leaders need to lighten their backbacks of as much baggage as possible and make room for new equipment. Experience needs to inform our identity as educators, but not predetermine every outcome. Notably, the experience of others is one of the most valuable sources of theory. See #1-9 above!

I encourage our new district management to explore these dozen “places” as they form a vision for next year, or at least accommodate themselves to the various visions at play in a complex organization. To add to the district-wide “year of change” I’ll be sharing what we put together for this SFU leadership course in terms of literature and learnings. Here’s one little gem — an example of what happens when leadership is distributed. Thanks to my colleague Trina Chivilo for sharing this with me: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pYKH2uSax8U.

Making the case for storytelling

Some recent thoughts and discussions have made it clear to me that something is missing from the new BC Social Studies curriculum. Up until now I was not sure if it was something personal and connected missing from the curricular competencies, a mechanism by which Aboriginal perspectives could enter more fully into the classroom conversation, or an practical extension of the core competencies into the learning standards. Turns out it is at the centre of all three. For those uninitiated into the vast realm of education jargon, I will explain these ideas bit using Social Studies as a context.

Curricular competencies are the skills and strategies that students develop in order to approach problems of history, place (geography), and other topics that come up in Social Studies. They include research skills and inquiry abilities. The competencies include variations of six historical thinking concepts that are well explained at The Historical Thinking Project and also at The Critical Thinking Consortium. These "Big 6" are sometimes described as establishing significance, working with evidence, continuity and change, cause and consequence, taking perspectives, and ethical dimensions. I believe there are two important things missing from these competencies -- language that extends historical thinking into the area of geographic thinking, and the skill/space/support for students to make authentic and meaningful connections to their learning, the Social Studies content, and the other skills they are developing. Regardless of the fine-tuning, the competencies represent an academic approach to the study of Social Studies, capable of being post-colonial and culturally sensitive, but nonetheless a modern (if not fully modernist*) incarnation of the positivist tradition in education. The curricular competencies, starting with inquiry and working with a variety of critical thinking concepts, get students to the edge of answering "so what" questions in Social Studies. *Update: an expert on both the new curriculum and Big 6-derived competencies has pointed out that the Historical Thinking Concepts have been profoundly affected by a turn towards post-modernism (presumably among the academics who developed them for use in education). This in itself is a interesting discussion but I'll leave it at that for now.

The new curriculum emphasizes the opportunity to include more Aboriginal perspectives and knowledge, in some ways a challenge to the positivist tradition and in other ways a means to embed alternate views and powerful stories alongside the empirical approach and a Eurocentric narrative. In parts of the curriculum these opportunities are made clear, and in others it is not. What is missing is some mechanism whereby this emphasis can be layered and interactive with the competencies -- and does more just establish a quota for Aboriginal content. There are many ways in which indigenous perspectives can become more responsive with the Social Studies class. I feel as if I am only starting down this path and have much to learn (see Q6/A6 on this post about Social Studies 9). A good starting point for teachers in the same position is the First Peoples Principles of Learning. If you want a interesting thought experiment, read these principles and then read the curricular competencies for a new BC Social Studies course. What's the connection? For me, it is as if the FPPoL represents the reasons why developing the competencies is important work and to end they should lead. Each Social Studies course could be subtitled with Principle 2, 3, 6, 7, or 8, e.g. "Learning is embedded in memory, history, and story."

In providing a framework for the new curriculum and "personalized" learning, the Ministry of Education and teacher teams developed the Core Competencies. "[A]long with literacy and numeracy foundations and essential content and concepts," these aver-arching standards "are at the centre of the redesign of curriculum and assessment. Core competencies are sets of intellectual, personal, and social and emotional proficiencies that all students need to develop in order to engage in deep learning and life-long learning" (https://curriculum.gov.bc.ca/competencies). One of the three core competencies is Communication. There is obvious importance in all course and grades to the various ways in which students interpret prompts, engage in activities, express their understanding, show their learning, and collaborate with others. Where "Communication" could be more practical is at the level of curricular competencies, the discipline-specific skills and strategies that guide exploration of content in each course. What is an actual ability that can be employed alongside interpretation of bias, perspective-taking, and establishing chains of causality in Social Studies?

I believe that all three of these "problems" -- incomplete curricular competencies, inclusion of Aboriginal perspectives, and the need to explicitly apply core competencies -- centers around storytelling. This is skill, a competency, an arena for discovery, and a way of beginning difficult conversations, that has always been indispensable in the Social Studies classroom. I'd like to see storytelling included more prominently in the new curriculum. Read a few of the student stories on this blog post to see my own bias on the importance of storytelling. Maybe one day there will be a Storytelling 12 that leverages interdisciplinary learning from K-12 and allows students to tell their stories. I think it would be a fitting way to finish high school and honour their diverse paths towards success. For now, Storytelling will be an unofficial curricular competency and will be the main strategy with which teaching and learning in my Social Studies class get the heart of the three problems I have described above. For the visual learners out there, I have summarized and represented these thoughts in a graphic below.

Journey of the Hathlo

Where to begin? My friend Adrian Barnes, author of Nod ([update:] and Satan à la Mode!) had some sound advice for procrastinating writers (like me) who find elaborate excuses not to write; who, when faced with the greatest story ideas, bury themselves in tangential projects. He said the thing to do if you want to write a novel is to stop waiting for the conditions to be perfect and just start writing. I have no idea how far this will go, but I think I have waited long enough and need to start putting some of my story ideas down on (virtual) paper if only to show an attempt. Amongst the hundreds of story ideas that have occurred to me (as they do anyone with an imagination) I have hatched four big schemes for novels with the potential for more than a nodding interest by myself and an imagined audience. None of them has ever proceeded past an elaborate concept phase, excepting perhaps the "Journey of the Hathlo" as evidenced by a box in my basement filled with notebooks, sketches, jottings, and maps. One of the other ideas for a novel has a narrative that jumps between the near-present logging camps and fishing boats and late 18th Century British Columbia (sea otter trade, Nootka Crisis). A third idea was about a near-future society where the ability to scan thoughts through technology (mind-reading) becomes commonplace and, of course, disastrous for the fundamental unwritten rules of society and the construction of the self. The fourth idea was about differing cultural portrayals (and purposes) of the afterlife from a geographer's perspective. So there it is, an unrealized quadruple threat: fantasy, historical fiction, sci-fi, and non-fiction.

Stories, like plans, are nearly perfect before they are written -- flaws and failure have not been demonstrated, plot and character holes are only temporary abstractions, and the possibilities are endless. They can be pitched in short form without having conclusions in place, and can change direction at the whim of the storyteller. However, the longer one waits, the longer one risks that death will precede publication, or, more practically, that the basic story idea, premise, names, context, title will be used by another. While originality is not always the greatest concern of an author, it is an important part of my procrastination cycle. One of my story ideas involves the journey and saga of a people across ice age landscapes to reach a new home. Should I be staking a claim to the internet address hathlo.com? It is troubling to consider (especially in light of Adrian's advice), that I have probably spent more time thinking about domain registry than I have actually writing this story that has been swirling around me for over twenty years. I have also spent more time pouring over maps, studying glacial landscapes (in particular, sea level change and post-glacial ecology), and drawing my own maps than I have in writing, at least in a form that can be shared with others.

The origin of this story goes back a long way for me, perhaps in broad terms to my close reading of the works of Tolkien as a youngster, but more specifically to a period in the early 1990s when I began to think about what a mythology for British Columbia might look like, or more accurately what it would sound like. A number of events and thought experiments coalesced during that time, some of which had been building (as they do in all stories) from a rootmass of older self-moderated tales and memories. The machinery of the story as I see it today took on form as a result of three peculiar events -- a vision, a dream, and the lingering impressions of a daytrip. There were other events that fed this story, but these three stand out to me as significant.

1. The Vision
As I recall it now, I drove up alone in the failing light of a fall night in 1992 to a friend's rural property south of Chilliwack in the Ryder Lake area. After letting myself in the gate and parking my truck, I walked across the property past the fields and forest with my sleeping bag and a pillow to a one-room cabin tucked on a wooded knoll, a place I helped build. To the south lay the Chilliwack River Valley, known by a low rumble coming up from far below as I approach the knoll. The sound of a youthful river is like a rushing wind or rolling thunder, but comes mainly from rocks dragging, shifting and tumbling along the river bed. Rising beyond the Chilliwack River are the first mountains of the Skagit Range, the Canadian part of the Cascades. Somewhere up on the flanks of Church Mountain, I saw a light, perhaps from a dirt bike or 4x4, a spark against the canopy of dark forest and night sky. Maybe this was some late-evening adventurer looking for the way down or some dirt road campers looking to settle in for the night.  In my mind's eye, the lights multiplied, and came from many fires or torches. The river's rumble became the low notes of a great song, and the fires began to move downslope. It was a clan of warriors and families of warriors, the Hathlo, descending the mountain with joy and terror. They had awoken from some great sleep and were roaring towards the coast, as if they had waited a thousand years to begin their song and complete some quest. In my jottings and drafts this later became a great thawing set toward the end of the last Ice Age, and behind the singing warriors came a great flood of meltwater that would destroy much of the forest along with their enemies.

2. The Dream
This strange night occurred in late Spring, 1994, while camping in the Kootenays. I was tenting along on the edge of lake at a Forest Service Rec Site (was it Mabel Lake?), most of the way through a solitary road trip, and on that particular night I was having a hard time getting to sleep. I suppose I was at a turning point on the journey, no longer rapt by the lakes and streams, the forest and mountains, the towns and sites of interest.  On my mind was the letting go of the school year, my last in at the University of BC, and coming to terms with the Summer work ahead and the decisions I would have to make about the Fall. Should I aim for more work with the forest consultant firm, or was it time to put in that application to teacher training? That night, when I finally left for the Land of Nod, I had a dream that haunts me to this day. The scene, emerging slowly and inconsistently as they sometimes do in dreams, was set mostly around a campfire in a dense wood, near to a stream but very dark save the the bright flames in the pit and the stars above. There were a few people around the fire, sometimes they were friends but at parts of the dream they became strangers; for some moments I noticed that I was alone. There was music. It came from our voices, and from a guitar someone produced, and from echoes in the forest that returned our song in the form of new instruments. At some point we realized the music was not coming from us anymore but from another guest at the fire, an enormous Sasquatch. The music had the complexity of a symphony, and a story unfolded about the last 100,000 years of the Pacific Northwest, each part about a different time and location. I've come to understand this to mean that each movement dwelt on an Age of the late Pleistocene and Holocene Epochs, moving progressively south along the coastal regions of Alaska, BC, and Washington State. If there were words for the music, I'm not sure they were audible; perhaps the Sasquatch spoke to us directly beyond the song, but there was definitely a narrative woven through the entire piece. Sasquatch strummed away at his guitar and hummed or did something like singing, and we came to understand the untold tale of the land as witnessed by a vanished people and a collective of Sasquatches, of whom this one was likely the last. As so often happens in my dreams, the details turned towards each other, a proliferation of resemblances, and were known as much by what I didn't remember as what I did. When I woke, or rather when I was aware that what I was experiencing belonged more to my conscious reality than something deeper beneath, a great sadness came over me. I wept from the beauty of the song, and also the realization that the deeper themes, story, and meaning of the song was slipping away from me and could only be experienced once. Over the years I have built up the story of the Hathlo around the bare fragments of that song that remain. More importantly, at times when I am present and connected to, I feel that I am singing that song still,  adding some small part to the ongoing whole, making some small impression on the Holocene. If this all sounds too serious, just google image search sasquatch playing guitar and things will actually seem quite silly.

3. The Daytrip
This memory of a quick trip up Knight Inlet and back has stuck in my head for years. It was less about advancing the stories in my head and more about the physical and emotional tones that would influence my understanding of setting. The sights, sounds, and smells of this day did more to affect my ongoing vision of a story taking place than the thousands of other experiences I have had in the wilderness. I need some time to put this day in perspective, and will come back to this on a later date. I think the story of that day might be a nice way to remember some of the time I spent doing forestry work, even if it was a one-off along the BC Coast compared to the years I spent in the interior of BC and Northern Alberta as an ecosystem geographer.

So, there it is, either a commitment to get some of my stories down in print, or perhaps an elaborate scheme for further procrastination. Jotting the ideas here for my unknown audience (I'm not sure I really blog for anyone but myself, anyways) feels pretty good, though. It reminds me that stories can be be beautiful (and yes, perfect) even when incomplete and unrecorded.  Storytelling is something we do, something that fashions our individual and collective identity, even when the process is internal. If I remember my Daniel Dennett correctly, consciousness itself can be understood as a narrative centre of gravity; the stories we tell ourselves about our own experience that eventually wear "identity paths" in our brains.

Generations

Here's a photo from a student Social Studies project showing five generations in one family, the youngest in the photo being the student's mother. It is remarkable to think about the potential of intergenerational wisdom; in fact this idea is what formed the foundation for two kinds of student Heritage projects at my school. Not just wisdom but also humour, purpose, shame, awe, controversy, destiny, grief, and inspiration.

I've worked with our school's teacher-librarian over the years to encourage our students to interview their elders, and to think about how their generation might see things differently than the one(s) that came before. Not everything works along generational lines, but it is a practical way for students to conceptualize the last 150 years.  One of the things my teacher-librarian and I chat about is what to call the next cohort of students in our school -- the generation that follows the so-called Millennials.

Here's a list of the generations previous:

• Generation Y / The Millennials / The Echo Generation -- c.1982 - c.2006
• Generation X -- c.1965 - c.1984
• Baby Boomers -- 1946 - c.1964
• The Silent Generation / Lucky Few -- c.1925 - c.1945 
• The Greatest Generation / G.I. Generation -- c.1901 - c.1924
• The Lost Generation -- c.1883 - c.1900

Here's what we came up with so far for the next generation -- c.2005 - ?:

• Generation Z
• The Quantum Gen
• Hyperconnected Gen / Networked Gen
• Meme Gen
• Post-Carbon / Green Gen

Characteristics: Those born after the creation of popular online social networks, after global acceptance of climate change (and the gloom therein) but also after global shift in growth rate from exponential back to linear. Most of the world's poorer nations of the world have transitioned from early expanding, underdeveloped status to become newly industrialized with declining birth rates. China overtakes Japan and Germany to rival the United States in economic status. Globalization and pervasive, hyperconnected mobile technology dominate all aspects of life. Advances in science have given us insight into the cosmos as well as the basic building blocks of life and matter.

Why the name choices?

Gen Z - for Zombie of course - a revived symbol of deathlessness to go along with Vampires, Werewolves and such. These timeless denizens underwent a revival since the publication of Twilight in 2005, but do we really want that event to mark the beginning of a generation?  In 2005, Aubrey de Grey predicted, in a TED talk, that the generation that will live forever has already been born. While he didn't have Zombies in mind, the idea fits -- the focus is on the next 100 years and not the last.  In education it is around 2005 when educational marketers and pundits start pushing the "21st century" learner, teacher, education system and so on.  Better late than never.  The students of the new century are supposed to be less concerned about fixed states of learning (including subject areas) and more about creativity, collaboration, and critical thinking.

Quantum Gen - a quantum is essentially the smallest entity that comprises some larger whole, it is a reduction of complex systems down to the basic parts.  This is a fitting metaphor for the way in which modern sciences (including social sciences) have growing confidence that we can actually understand ideas that were previously immutable, particularly as it relates to the brain, genome research, biotechnology, and different kinds of physics. This is the generation that will see transhuman experimentation (cyborgs), mind control, and perhaps interstellar travel. Read Asimov's Foundation series for the blueprint.

Networked Gen / Hyperconnected - Speaking of 2005, this is also the year that Youtube is created.  A year later it's Twitter.  During these years, Facebook turns from a college online yearbook to a wide-open social network.  These three form the unholy Trinity of Social Media that would shape the existing generations and create new conditions for the one that follows.  Sorry, Myspace.

Meme Gen - This is also the generation that saw the rise of memes, both as a philosophical/psychological/linguistic term about cultural transmission, and of course the popularized meme which is about mimicry, deconstructing (or debasing) cultural detritus, and use of familiar images, catchphrases, and media in order to be witty on the internet.

Post-Carbon / Green Gen - The Earth is witnessing affects of environmental crises, notably as a result of climate, but also the possibility that exponential population growth is turning back to linear.  Nations are finally taking carbon emissions seriously after mixed results of the Kyoto Protocal.  Bali and Copenhagen Summits set new goals, and governments have shown a new willingness to put controls on carbon and seek energy alternatives.  Alas, much wishful thinking here and Greed could stand in for Green often as not.

Please feel free to critique these or suggest some new ones.

Sept 2015 update: just read an interesting article about the extent to which Americans identify with their generational labels:  http://www.people-press.org/2015/09/03/most-millennials-resist-the-millennial-label/