Bridges Instead of Borders: Fostering Student Resilience Through Integrated, Play-Based Watershed Curriculum

• In Event: Indigenous Teachers and Learners: At the Intersection of Preparation, Curriculum, and Course Mandate

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to conceptually reframe how we come to explore and understand the role of watersheds in our lived experiences and in our history provides the opportunity to reimagine STEM education in our schools as well, broadening access for our learners, allowing for the Indigenization of curriculum, and supporting restorative work with our students by focusing on a multi-disciplinary and place-based approach, in which watersheds serve as bridges, not borders, to students’ understanding of the world around them and their place within it. We draw conceptually from a place-based curriculum model developed from the North Dakota Essential Understandings to better understand the role of Indigenous-centered curriculum and leadership.

Authors

• Julie Robinson, University of North Dakota

• Joshua Hunter, University of North Dakota

• Hollie Mackey, North Dakota State University