Jared ten Brink, a doctoral student in education at the University of Michigan, is an enrolled member of the Nottawaseppi Huron Band of Potawatomi. He lives a two-and-a-half hour drive from his tribe’s reservation, which makes it difficult for him to help his two young children learn about Native American traditions.
But as a former science teacher and instructional coach, he was looking for a way to convey the teachings of tribal elders to a wider audience through distance learning. However, traditional streaming of his videos has not been very successful.
“How can I actually connect to the land when I’m looking at this flat screen and this little box on Zoom?” he wondered. “How do you get people into that space?”
To better preserve and share the teachings of indigenous cultures, he decided to try the latest high-tech tool: virtual reality.
But when he went to the tribe’s elders with the idea, not everyone was convinced. Some were concerned that wearing VR headsets would distance students from the natural world.
But other tribal leaders thought it was worth a try. So for the past year, Ten Brink has been experimenting with an approach that takes 360-degree cameras into the field and captures key cultural practices.of short vr video only part of the curriculum he is developingalso incorporates practical exercises.
Could virtual reality be the key to teaching Indigenous ways of knowing to a wide range of students?
This week on the EdSurge Podcast, we connected with Ten Brink to dig into that question.
Listen to the episode of apple podcast, cloudy, spotify Listen to podcasts anywhere or use the player on this page. Or read the partial transcript below, edited for clarity.
EdSurge: How did this project come about?
Jared Ten Brink: I didn’t grow up immersed in tribal culture, so I can’t really approach it from a place where I can put the teachings into practice. Furthermore, I’m not an old man. So, in my opinion, it’s not my place. So I didn’t want to be the one teaching in these videos. I wish it was someone else.
So I connected with a personal friend. I connected with various tribal government connections and organizations I knew and asked them about this. And I sat down and said: What do you think about this idea? And what should we teach? What should be the topic for these?
We settled on two topics that are very important to the Anishinaabe (Three Fires Council) of which we are a part: maple sugar and manoomin (wild rice).
Our ancestors were told to look for places where food could grow above water. They then traveled down the St. Lawrence River and found a place where food could be grown on the water. It’s wild rice, manoomin, and the Great Lakes Basin where it grows everywhere. It was all over the place, and our story mirrors Manoomin’s story very well. Manoomin was killed when we were driven from the land. When settlers arrived, they reclaimed the wetlands where the manoomin grew to grow potatoes, and killed the manoomin because they polluted the water system. Therefore, the manoomin is now an endangered species.
Syrups are also very important because they are how we survive the winter. Realistically, this time of year, he starts running out of food as we move into February. And that’s exactly when the gift of syrup comes into play. It wasn’t just used as a syrup. It was thoroughly boiled down to make sugar. And it’s great. Anyone with a maple tree can do it.
That’s one of the things we did with the kids. And it was so exciting to see it. So the kids are sitting here with spoons and they keep stirring, stirring, stirring. And suddenly they said, “Why does the color change?” After stirring for about 5 minutes, it will suddenly turn from syrup to sugar in about 15 seconds. And they’re like, “Oh!” It was so cool to see and the kids thought it was so cool to see.
How will VR emerge?
So to shoot these videos, I went to a tribe member’s sugarbush in northern Michigan, the northern part of the Lower Peninsula. He went out into the forest with his 360 camera and I just followed him. We started walking into the forest. I tapped the first tree. He talked about the process and taught us how to harvest maple syrup.
Some people hearing this idea may think it’s ironic that we’re using very modern VR technology to preserve an ancient culture.
I don’t think it’s ironic that technology helps learning in this field. Indigenous peoples have long used technology in a variety of ways. We believe he is not stuck in one era or the past. That was one of the things I talked about with tribal members, and some tribal members were adamant that this was not appropriate.
Of the people I spoke to, many more agree, and I’m sure there are many others in the world as well. Not all of us agree.
What do you think is the potential of VR beyond this project?
One possibility I’m considering in the future is streaming VR, but this would require far more resources than I have access to.
If you can stream VR, you can set up cameras around the sacred fire and have tribal elders teach you and talk to you on land. That way, you can spend time with your friends in your own space. Light your sacred fire too, put on your headset and connect with that person. One of the stories I heard from many Native Americans was that they missed the smell of fire.
We asked the elders to connect with us via Zoom. But it’s not quite the same. When you’re watching this call, you and I are in this box. You cannot see the entire space around you.
[In VR], I look around and see people dancing around me. You see people watching, you see people talking, but not everyone is doing the same thing. There’s more going on.
