Invaluable tool for teaching the Great Peace

Page 21

The Great Peace--The Gathering of Good Minds CD-ROM is a unique and absorbing multimedia vehicle programmed to take you deep into Haudenosaunee (Six Nations Iroquois) territory. Aboriginal people designed it to teach authentic Iroquois values, culture and history from the time of pre-European contact up to the present. The central theme and foundation of this interactive learning tool is The Great Law of Peace, the philosophy upon which the Iroquois confederacy was built.

The easy to navigate CD-ROM is designed for classroom use from Grade 3 up to the post-secondary level, according to Jeff Burnham, an Oneida and president of Working World Training Centre Inc. of Brantford, Ont., which holds the copyright.

Published in 1999 and now in its second edition, Burnham said about 3,000 copies have been sold so far. There are two versions: the "personal version" that sells for $199 Canadian, and the instructional one with a 250-page resource guide for educators that costs $370.

A large creative staff collaborated on the project's art, music and video portions. Elders, scholars, educators and a team of computer programmers and animation experts invested approximately 20,000 hours to complete the 3000-plus screen CD-ROM. The content and richly emotive artwork was created or compiled by project director, artist and writer Raymond R. Skye of the Tuscarora Nation. Sheila Staats, a Mohawk historian, was principally responsible for the accompanying teacher's resource guide.

The history of the Haudenosaunee people is presented on multiple academic levels in a user-friendly, non-linear format, which means learners can skip to the sections that interest them most. The CD-ROM is entertaining as well as educational, and will draw viewers in with the authentic stories and sound clips of Aboriginal languages by Aboriginal speakers. Opportunities for interactive activities abound, such as an Iroquois Extreme Canoe Challenge, in which students can navigate their on-screen canoes through dangerous waters.

Women, traditionally influential in Haudenosaunee community life but frequently silenced in the last century as a result of assimilation into non-Native culture, are elevated to their appropriate status here. That Haudenosaunee men and women hold equal place is reinforced by the philosophical teachings encountered in the section about Sky Woman's descent from the Sky World, for example.

The main menu screen gives users five places to start; it is suggested you start your journey with Creation, then move counter-clockwise to Dark and Troubled Times, Birth of the Great Peace, the Great Peace Interactive Journey, and finally the Peace section.

Teachers will want the full package of CD-ROM and resource guide, which they will find it indispensable. That is because the manual is written by a teacher with extensive knowledge of a teacher's requirements and her own culture. Not only does the resource guide explain the historical and cultural background to the legends in The Great Peace CD-ROM, it contains teaching units with suggested lessons and exercises and an indispensable glossary. The post-secondary level contains a significant bibliography that facilitates further research. Teachers will appreciate the Values section, too, as a springboard to further study.

Another useful feature is that the CD-ROM has been programmed to provide internet links to other First Nation web sites.

Pauleen Mitsuk, an education resource person with the St. Boniface school board in Manitoba, purchased 20 copies of The Great Peace - The Gathering of Good Minds for area schools.

"I really liked the visuals, said Mitsuk about the CD-ROM. "The first thing about it that I liked was the title, because as an educator that's what I'm always working towards.

"The creation story is very similar to many First Nations creation stories, so it relates to other ones. So, if we show it in the classroom, it's familiar to children no matter what Aboriginal culture theyre coming from, usually."

The package should be a valued resource for non-Native students in history or social studies classes as well. Perhaps it should even be mandatory, as it would do a lot to dispel the inaccurate portrayal or the leaving out of Aboriginal peoples that have been the mainstay of Canadian classroom materials until now.

More information and reviews of The Great Peace - The Gathering of Good Minds CD-ROM package are at www.greatpeace.org.