Immersion goals being met

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Nothing succeeds like success, especially when it seems to snowball in every direction, and success has opened the floodgates of interest across Alberta and Saskatchewan in the cutting-edge work being done in the Cree Immersion Program at Onion Lake First Nation.

It all started, according to Brian MacDonald, soon after Saskatchewan Sage published an article in the January 1997 edition on the pioneering efforts of the Cree Curriculum Development Program at Chief Taylor School, a program based on a very special dream. . . to breath new life and vitality into the linguistic heritage and culture of the Plains Cree.

As head of a brand new program with many barriers to overcome, Brian MacDonald most definitely had his work cut out for him, carving out a whole new territory in the education of his people.

In a world saturated with the English language via television, movies, books and advertisements, it was his mission to help keep his Native language alive, well and growing. . . a language that holds many secrets to understanding the rich and vital culture of the people who had inhabited this land for close to 40,000 years.

Faced with the problem of how to keep traditional values, customs and beliefs alive while preparing children to function well in two very different languages and cultures, was something that had to be tackled from the ground up, starting in nursery school.

What started out as a bold experiment several years ago has become a high profile model of success that is attracting a lot of attention from reserves and schools across the Prairies.

The Cree Immersion Program was designed specifically for children from Cree-speaking families because, as MacDonald explained, "If the teachers can talk to them in Cree and the parents and grandparents can reinforce it at home, then the language can become a real, living part of their lives."

One of the biggest challenges faced was a critical lack of teaching materials such as books, language tapes and a dictionary.

The last few years has seen a big turn-around, with the Sakeweskam Learning Centre becoming a well-known leader in the production of state-of-the-art Cree Immersion material.

"Everybody's coming down to see us, wanting to find out about our program and resources, from the education directors of Hobbema (Alta.) to Darren Okimiysim of the Saskatchewan Indian Federated College Cree Language Department, and the response has been excellent." said MacDonald.

"And we've gone from having almost no material to having enough to burn into a Cree Immersion CD, a high tech way to transfer words, graphics and songs to other First Nations who are just getting started."

The best part about the new compact disc is that it's a very adaptable program, easy to interface with other languages and dialects within the language family, and one that takes a big load off the Cree curriculum staff, who have worked around the clock for two years to produce and teach the material.

And with two years of experience under their belts, the curriculum team has become real a expert at producing school books, which now take about two weeks to put together.

The SIFC has developed a standardized writing system and, once a month, local Elders come in to share their knowledge and advise on pronunciation and new word creation.

The program has been under close scrutiny by the SIFC in terms of program evaluation and feedback.

"This helps to give us the scope on how things are going, what we foresee in the future development and how we can improve our delivery in all areas," explained the director.

"We're ironing out the bugs to become more effective so that when our kindergarten students are 10 years old, they will be fluent in their Native tongue."

There will be special recognition for parents at this year's graduation, a token of appreciation for helping to reinforce the language at home. As the staff explained, parents really need to be online and committed to the program.