Couple launches book on Cree language's application to education
- Jeanelle Mandes | March 30, 2015
Linda and Keith Goulet launched their first book together called "Teaching Each Other: Nehinuw Concepts and Indigenous Pedagogies” at the First Nations University of Canada in Regina this week.
“I was excited, it was a long time coming,” says Keith about their book launch. “It was a great day for us.”
The Goulet’s have been working on the book for years and they talk about relationships in the book and the three major forms of education in the Cree language. The book is also a combination of theory and practise coming from Indigenous thinking.
The book is described as a product of thinking, interviewing, collecting stories and exploring Cree concepts as it applies to education.
Keith says a lot of people were excited about the Cree concepts and people thought only in terms of regular translation of European concepts and establishing a book on Cree frameworks of analysis which they call it the determination model.
“Both Keith and I are educators and we’ve both we were both teaching Indigenous studies in the North and the South. I taught students to be reflective on their teaching,” says Linda. “We started talking about some of the Cree concepts in education and we found these effective teachers are often without knowing implementing Cree concepts in the way they taught in their classrooms.”
Both authors hope readers take away an understanding after reading this book and how they work with others in education.
“I’ve used the book in a classroom already and the teachers talked about how the book reaffirmed and gave value to what they were trying to do which is often not recognized in the school system,” says Linda. “Although it’s written for educators, the principles in it are how to work together in any situation.”
Keith and Linda work won’t be stopping at this book, they are already talking about doing articles together in the future.
“I really enjoyed the book and working with my wife. We’ve worked together for so many years and having discussions is a good thing. It’s a good feeling,” he says. “One thing we talked about is an extension on the idea the first phases of Indigenous knowledge and now we’re talking Cree knowledge,” says Keith.
The book is already available on Amazon and in university and college libraries. The book is listed at $32 dollars but during the launch, book buyers saved $2 dollars upon purchase.
The University of British Columbia (UBC) Press published their book but no representatives were present for their book launch. Keith says the UBC Press will be present at the next book launch at the Prince Albert FNUniv campus.
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