This year, we celebrated National Indigenous Peoples Day at Muskoka Heritage Place in Huntsville, Ontario. It was wonderful to be invited back to share Indigenous culture with students, families, and visitors from across the community. The event offered opportunities to learn from First Nations, Métis, and Inuit presenters, showing students that Indigenous cultures are diverse, vibrant, and very much alive today.
Throughout the day, several school groups visited the historic village, with several hundred participating in the celebration. The site was also full of tourists who came to experience the many First Nations, Métis, and Inuit cultural activities taking place throughout the village. The museum provided a special passport to encourage visitors to stop and experience each cultural station. As each person travelled from station to station, they learned about Indigenous cultures and got to experience hands-on activities such as beading, drumming, making dolls, making bannock, playing lacrosse, storytelling, tea sampling, Inuit games, and dance (including Fancy Shawl and Métis Jigging).
Our Youth4Youth Canada team was very busy all day. Akina Ohlman shared First Nations music history, and cultural artifacts before performing and teaching Fancy Shawl Dance. We (Taliah and Sarina Lyons) shared about Métis history, played spoons to traditional fiddle music, performed a couple of dances and then taught each group a few basic jigging steps. Every half hour brought a new wave of enthusiastic participants, eager to learn what we had to share. With each group, there were several thoughtful questions. We loved how eager everyone was to learn and to participate in group activities.
We would like to thank Muskoka Heritage Place and The Town of Huntsville for inviting us back for this event. We loved how the community came together to create meaningful opportunities for students to learn directly from Indigenous people interested in sharing culture and knowledge with others. We hope to return again in the future!
Follow our journey as we continue sharing Indigenous culture with youth across Canada:
