I am inspired and excited by an opinion piece written by Stó:lō educator Dr. Jo-ann Archibald, the new Order of Canada recipient, who imagines the brightest future for her field.

She shared her dreams for Indigenous Education in Canada, which included: 

• Having hope, and the highest expectations

• More Indigenous teachers!

• Including more Indigenous ways of knowing in the curriculum

• Non-Indigenous students benefiting, too

• More emphasis on education as a life-long journey

• Stronger connections between education systems, community 

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I share with Dr. Archibald's in her dreams and have visions of a bi-cultural curriculum in our early learning frameworks. The two main early learning frameworks I use are standing separate today in Canada. Ontario's pedagogy for the early years framework, As Learning Happens, reflects some Indigenous Maori principles, which allows some space for our Indigenous Canadian ways of knowing. However, they are very much still sitting on the sidelines. Indigenous pedagogy still has a ways to go embedded as a core curriculum in the early years. 

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The second Indigenous Early Learning and Child care framework published in late 2018 by the federal government partnership with Indigenous communities is a standalone document. Separate but encouraged to be incorporated across Canada in the early years.