Teacher in Manitoba Interlake school division protecting Anishinabemowin language from 'dying out'

Young students at this school in Manitoba’s Interlake are about to get a crash course in Indigenous language. Hi everyone. What are we here to learn about today? Amazing. Sang this with Yeah, now we can start. I’ve been speaking in most of my life. I heard it through my my grandparents, my mother spoke it to me when I was young. That’s all I spoke was on the Schnabel moon. But growing up, I kind of kind of went away from me, and not many of my peers were speaking it. So I kind of, like, wanted to bring it, like, into my family. What just happened? I said I won’t. You got bingo. Bingo. What was the, what was the winning word? Bingo nanan. What does nanan mean? Five. What do you think your your parents, your grandparents would think that you’re getting to learn this language in the school? Happy. Why happy? Because they want me to know this when I turn older. How do you say to 9 #5 nanan nanan? 50% of our students identify either as First Nation or may T So by doing this, it brings a connection to their past language, their past culture, their heritage. And when you look at Ashern and the location where it is geographically, we’re surrounded by those people of that culture in our communities. This is where we’ve immigrated to. So we’re learning about our heritage, where we move to next number in the schnabe moon is Beijik. My favorite part about this is we’re learning it well. We’re having fun. So you’re learning and you’re helping to pass it on. How do you feel about that, getting to do that in the school with your friends? I feel happy about it. I feel proud. You feel happy and proud. Why? Because I because it shouldn’t be forgotten. And what do you think about learning a language like this? Do you like it? Yeah, a lot. What do you like about it? I like how usually in English, it’s like like in this language, like there’s a lot of in the words, but it’s not SSH, it’s actually ZH. It’s pretty interesting working here. Giving the opportunity to work in this school system is like so rewarding for me to teach it, you know, because it’s dying out. But to bring it back and keep it going is is something that, you know, that’s amazing with the truth and reconciliation is really good that it’s being had knowledge to like throughout Turtle Island. What we see here with a language program that focuses on an indigenous local language is that ability for all of our students to be able to understand that way of looking at the world, understanding the world and coming together and communicating. And so there’s an incredible power to that. And we also see a push across the province right now for looking at the importance of Indigenous ways of knowing and being. And so I think that’s another another key piece to this program. We just have to cover your four corners. All right. Next one is Nishan Sway.