Learning Story – Treaty Agreements
The Week of January 24, 2023
What Happened?
Lila Erasmus spent the day with us today. She taught us that the Land changes when we are here “The Bushkids are coming, the Bushkids are coming!” The Land is so happy. She put tobacco in the fire to help us start the day off in a good way. She taught us that we aren’t alone, we are with our ancestors. They are here to take care of us. When we put tobacco in the fire, we can ask our ancestors for help and they will find ways to direct us.
The Bushkids explored many plants that Lila brought. The plants are medicine. We hope to pick some of these plants with Lila in the spring. Lila taught us how to infuse labrador tea with almond oil.
It was very cold today and the Bushkids took really good care of themselves. The Bushkids even stacked all of the wood today! We cooked bannock and two ducks!
Why is this important?
We have so much to be grateful for this week – to Lila for sharing her knowledge with us. We noticed that she is a strong example of the Dene Law “Share what you have.” She shared so much with us today. We are also grateful to Donovan for teaching us how to clean and prepare the ducks with so much patience and humour. We are grateful to our new Bushkids staff Charlie Cameron-Sills who brings gentleness, fun and a huge willingness to help.
We are so grateful to the Bushkids for helping stack the wood with no complaints and a beautiful way of making the bush work fun. Thank you to Adam Mercredi, Kyrah Mercredi and Cailey Mercredi for bringing the wood all the way to our site from the parking lot on the weekend. We are so proud of the Bushkids for taking good care of themselves in the cold.
What does this mean for next time?
We will welcome Lila Erasmus back to learn how to use spruce gum in a salve. The Bushkids wanted to make more bannock but with cookie cutters this time! We will explore the lake again – this time putting a hole in the ice with an auger for fishing! The lake is a favourite place to play lately!