St. Teresa students learn traditional Indigenous games

Indigenous drumming, arts, games and pemmican making were part of a day of fun and learning at St. Teresa of Calcutta School today, as the Holy Spirit School Division’s FNMI and (I)SWAG teams were on hand to run events and activities for the entire school. 

“We’ve been looking at celebrating cultural diversity this year. As a division, it has been a focus. We started out wanting to expose students to different elements of different cultures. We were looking at the arts, music, food and all the celebratory pieces of culture,” says Principal Patti Pilsner.

Knowing how culture enhances mental health, Pilsner adds, has been the school’s priority. “We placed this one after Pink Shirt Day and we started with our First Nations community.” 

“We are a multicultural community and looking to celebrate the diversity of all the different cultures the students bring to the school.” 

Every month, Pilsner says, the school would like to highlight a different culture, celebrate each other’s differences and teach the students to understand each other’s culture better. 

Approximately 350 students took part in the day’s festivities in the different activity areas. “It’s a nice hands-on experience,” says Pilsner. 

Billy Woitte, who is the school’s Indigenous student wellness access guide, says traditional games were brought into the school to teach math, hunting and fine motor skills. “We are becoming more of a multicultural city, and we reside on Blackfoot Territory. I think it’s very important all our students know about other cultures and ways of doing things.”  

A few of the traditional games included hoop on a stick, which teaches students hand and eye coordination. Another opportunity was for the students to use their math skills with a game of chance with deer antlers. Other games taught students dexterity and how to hunt, run and shoot an arrow at a target.

“I hope students take away another way to help their mental health and wellness with these easy games that can be brought from the land. You can make all these games out in nature,” says Pilsner, and it gives students a better understanding of where they live.