Collaborative Online Indigenous Intercultural Learning (CO[I]IL)

We know that for solv­ing com­plex prob­lems, diverse groups per­form bet­ter than homoge­nous ones. We also know that with diver­si­ty comes a greater pos­si­bil­i­ty of mis­un­der­stand­ings. Pro­vid­ing stu­dents with expe­ri­ence work­ing across diver­si­ty in a sup­port­ive and safe envi­ron­ment is an essen­tial part of a col­lege edu­ca­tion.

In this sec­tion, we explore a Col­lab­o­ra­tive Online [I]ndigenous Inter­cul­tur­al Learn­ing (CO[I]IL) Path­way that sup­ports instruc­tors in cre­at­ing col­lab­o­ra­tive projects that inter­weave Indige­nous and inter­cul­tur­al per­spec­tives.

What is CO[I]IL? (Accordian 1)

Col­lab­o­ra­tive Online Indige­nous Inter­cul­tur­al Learn­ing or CO[I]IL is an Indige­nous-focused vir­tu­al exchange where­by two or more fac­ul­ty based in dif­fer­ent coun­tries and insti­tu­tions col­lab­o­rate to devel­op a series of syn­chro­nous and asyn­chro­nous activ­i­ties for their stu­dents. Stu­dents com­plete the activ­i­ties in inter­na­tion­al teams using dig­i­tal col­lab­o­ra­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tion tools.

CO[I]IL uses tech­nol­o­gy and the Inter­net to bring diverse fac­ul­ty and stu­dents together—across bor­ders of
time, space, lan­guage, cul­ture, and discipline—to engage in peer-to-peer inter­cul­tur­al dia­logue and
mean­ing­ful projects that sup­port devel­op­ing inter­cul­tur­al flu­en­cy and an under­stand­ing of dif­fer­ent cul­tur­al con­texts.

What is the Difference Between Traditional COIL and Collaborative Online Indigenous Intercultural Projects? (Accordian 2)

While tra­di­tion­al Col­lab­o­ra­tive Online Inter­cul­tur­al (or Inter­na­tion­al) Learn­ing projects focus on pro­vid­ing stu­dents and instruc­tors with in-class inter­na­tion­al and inter­cul­tur­al expe­ri­ences, CO[I]IL goes one step fur­ther by devel­op­ing Indige­nous-focused local com­mu­ni­ty-based projects, inter­weav­ing both local and glob­al per­spec­tives.

Traditional COIL projects have four key dimensions
  • Teach­ers and stu­dents col­lab­o­rate with­in and across class­rooms
  • Online tech­nol­o­gy and inter­ac­tion are essen­tial com­po­nents
  • Inter­na­tion­al and inter­cul­tur­al learn­ing is cen­tral
  • The project is inte­grat­ed into exist­ing cred­it-bear­ing cours­es

CO[I]IL braids togeth­er Indige­nous and inter­cul­tur­al ways of being and know­ing with­in an inter­na­tion­al Indige­nous-focused project, and is found­ed on the fol­low­ing guid­ing prin­ci­ples:

  • A non-Indige­nous instruc­tor and an Indige­nous instruc­tor come togeth­er in a part­ner­ship of col­lab­o­ra­tion and reci­procity
  • The project reflects and inte­grates Indige­nous ped­a­gog­i­cal approach­es (see Facil­i­tat­ing online learn­ing with the 5R’s: Embed­ding Indige­nous Ped­a­gogy into the Online Space, based on Kirk­ness & Barnhardt’s (1991) 4R’s of Indige­nous ped­a­gogy as a start­ing point, and also seeks out local resources where avail­able)
  • The project pri­or­i­tizes the needs of Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties local to each insti­tu­tion, ensur­ing that final class projects ben­e­fit these com­mu­ni­ties
  • Both fac­ul­ty and stu­dents engage with Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties local to each part­ner insti­tu­tion, focus­ing on the needs of the local com­mu­ni­ty

Introducing the CO[I]IL Pathway (Accordian 3)

The CO[I]IL Path­way guides instruc­tors through every step of the CO[I]IL expe­ri­ence, allow­ing teach­ers to enter the process at the point most appro­pri­ate for them, encour­ag­ing an iter­a­tive and ongo­ing cycle of learn­ing, engage­ment, and reflec­tion.

This Path­way inter­weaves Indige­nous ped­a­go­gies, inter­cul­tur­al per­spec­tives, and land-based approach­es with aca­d­e­m­ic expec­ta­tions and can be adapt­ed to the pri­or­i­ties of any community/context with­in which the Path­way is uti­lized.

“Cen­tral to the Path­way and impor­tant at each step, is the focus on the local, on rela­tion­ship build­ing, and reci­procity.”

This col­lab­o­ra­tive Path­way is evolv­ing through dia­logue with stake­hold­ers and com­mu­ni­ties across five BC part­ner insti­tu­tions, along with inter­na­tion­al part­ner insti­tu­tions.

Draw­ing on exist­ing exper­tise with­in the net­work ensures inter­cul­tur­al com­pe­ten­cies and agreed-upon Indige­nous ped­a­gog­i­cal approach­es are pri­or­i­tized, in cul­tur­al­ly appro­pri­ate ways across con­texts, to ensure local com­mu­ni­ties remain at the cen­ter. Inher­ent with­in Indige­nous ways of know­ing and inte­gral to the Path­way are the Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment Goals (SDGs). Con­sid­er­ing the SDGs in CO[I]IL project devel­op­ment enhances our abil­i­ty to con­nect with Indige­nous pri­or­i­ties and goals on a local and glob­al lev­el.

At the heart of this CO[I]IL Path­way lies the com­mit­ment to rec­on­cil­i­a­tion, decol­o­niza­tion, and Indi­g­e­niza­tion, with the voic­es of Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties lead­ing the con­ver­sa­tions.

 

The Path­way takes fac­ul­ty through the fol­low­ing steps:

  • Posi­tion­ing: Walk­ing in a Good Way
  • Inter­weav­ing: Braid­ing the Indige­nous and the Inter­cul­tur­al
  • Com­mu­ni­ty Build­ing: Co-cre­at­ing Projects
  • Con­nect­ing through Kin­ship: Engag­ing in CO[I]IL
  • Reflect­ing and Reci­procity: Mov­ing For­ward in Reflec­tive Cir­cles

Positioning: Walking in a Good Way (Sub-Accordian 3a)

This requires rig­or­ous and ongo­ing self-reflec­tion, vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty, and a will­ing­ness to shift and grow through mis­take-mak­ing and expe­ri­en­tial learn­ing. Walk­ing in a good way means:

  • under­stand­ing our own sto­ry and con­nec­tion to the land
  • hon­or­ing the local: pri­or­i­tiz­ing the land we walk on
  • reflect­ing on your heart and spir­it

Interweaving: Braiding the Indigenous and the Intercultural (Sub-Accordian 3b)

Inter­weav­ing refers to how Indige­nous per­spec­tives and ways of teach­ing are inter­wo­ven with inter­cul­tur­al per­spec­tives and ways of teach­ing, with­in a CO[I]IL project. This process includes:

  • explor­ing what it means to be Indige­nous-focused
  • devel­op­ing inter­cul­tur­al flu­en­cy
  • braid­ing dif­fer­ent ways of know­ing and being: inter­weav­ing the Indige­nous and the inter­cul­tur­al

Community Building: Co-creating Projects (Sub-Accordian 3c)

This means ensur­ing land-based learn­ing remains at the cen­ter of the Indige­nous-focused online project. It means acknowl­edg­ing and hon­or­ing the lands local to those par­tic­i­pat­ing in the project (at home and over­seas) and seek­ing guid­ance from local knowl­edge keep­ers and oth­ers, to ensure we make appro­pri­ate and respect­ful con­nec­tions with local Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties as we co-cre­ate projects that focus on what is impor­tant to the peo­ple on whose lands we walk. It includes:

  • work­ing well with local Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties to iden­ti­fy a project
  • choos­ing an inter­na­tion­al part­ner
  • get­ting prac­ti­cal — under­stand­ing CO[I]IL logis­tics

Connecting through Kinship: Engaging in CO[I]IL (Sub-Accordian 3d)

Stu­dents and instruc­tors across class­rooms work to fos­ter com­mu­ni­ty and con­nec­tion before stu­dents begin on their joint explo­ration. This begins by:

  • com­ing togeth­er through ‘Sto­ries of who I am’
  • engag­ing in local com­mu­ni­ty-based projects
  • learn­ing from each oth­er

Reflecting and Reciprocity: Moving Forward in Reflective Circles (Sub-Accordian 3e)

This step rec­og­nizes the ongo­ing and iter­a­tive nature of CO[I]IL and is an oppor­tu­ni­ty to demon­strate an ongo­ing com­mit­ment to devel­op­ing Indige­nous-and inter­cul­tur­al-focused ped­a­go­gies and prac­tices. It involves:

  • reflect­ing on the path we took
  • reflect­ing on our new sto­ry
  • giv­ing back and mov­ing for­ward: con­tem­plat­ing the next steps in our CO[I]IL jour­ney

Getting Ready for CO[I]IL (Accordian 4)

CO[I]IL braids togeth­er Indige­nous and inter­cul­tur­al ways of being and know­ing with­in an inter­na­tion­al Indige­nous-focused project.

Being Indige­nous-Focused (Accor­dian 4a)

Being Indige­nous-focused means weav­ing togeth­er var­i­ous threads to cre­ate a tapes­try of under­stand­ing. This begins with ensur­ing we are ‘Walk­ing in a good way,’ which requires rig­or­ous and ongo­ing self-reflec­tion. It means know­ing where we are, where we come from, the sto­ries that have shaped us, and how we walk ‘in’ and ‘on’ the world. It means being aware of our inher­ent con­nec­tions to oth­er beings and the unavoid­able and sig­nif­i­cant impact we have on all beings around us. In her book,  Wayi Wah! Indige­nous Ped­a­go­gies — An Act for Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion and Anti-Racist Edu­ca­tion, Chrona (2022) shares:

“[o]ne impor­tant aspect of Indige­nous Knowl­edge Sys­tems is that they respond to, and hon­our con­text. Who I am, where I write from, and the land I am now on informs what I share with you. Knowl­edge and under­stand­ing are entrenched in rela­tion­ship and con­nect­ed to peo­ple and place (p.1).”

Reflect­ing on who we are as holis­tic beings shaped by sto­ry is an ongo­ing and iter­a­tive process that goes hand-in-hand with under­stand­ing what it means to be Indige­nous-focused. We also need to have an under­stand­ing of Decol­o­niza­tion, Rec­on­cil­i­a­tion & Indi­g­e­niza­tion.  As instruc­tors, it is not our role and respon­si­bil­i­ty to become the experts and dis­sem­i­nate knowl­edge of cul­ture, intan­gi­ble cul­tur­al her­itage, world­view, or cus­toms of oth­ers. It is our role and respon­si­bil­i­ty to draw on the knowl­edge of our stu­dents, to facil­i­tate their learn­ing and dis­cov­ery of one anoth­er.

 Inter­cul­tur­al Flu­en­cy (Accor­dian 4b)

Although there is no one agreed-upon descrip­tion of inter­cul­tur­al flu­en­cy (some­times called ‘inter­cul­tur­al com­pe­tence’), a com­mon­ly accept­ed def­i­n­i­tion comes from Dear­dorff (2008):

“effec­tive and appro­pri­ate behav­ior in inter­cul­tur­al sit­u­a­tions ”

Deardorff’s (2009) Inter­cul­tur­al Com­pe­tence Mod­el iden­ti­fies atti­tudes, knowl­edge, skills, and inter­nal and exter­nal out­comes as the five key ele­ments of inter­cul­tur­al com­pe­tence, high­light­ing that it is a process, not an ‘end prod­uct’ that can one day be ful­ly achieved.

Across dif­fer­ent def­i­n­i­tions avail­able, most researchers agree that inter­cul­tur­al flu­en­cy includes the abil­i­ty to:

  1. under­stand  and respect oth­er world­views and cul­tures
  2. active­ly lis­ten and engage with diverse oth­ers
  3. a will­ing­ness to tol­er­ate ambi­gu­i­ty
  4. devel­op cul­tur­al self-aware­ness and a capac­i­ty for self-assess­ment
  5. devel­op an open­ness toward inter­cul­tur­al learn­ing and empa­thy for peo­ple from oth­er cul­tures
  6. adapt to vary­ing inter­cul­tur­al com­mu­ni­ca­tion styles
Learning intercultural fluency is important for all students

Help­ing stu­dents to devel­op their inter­cul­tur­al flu­en­cy is impor­tant, regard­less of whether they plan to trav­el, work abroad, or leave their com­mu­ni­ties. Every day we com­mu­ni­cate with oth­er humans, whether face-to-face or online, through email or con­ver­sa­tion. And while we have our ‘human-ness’ in com­mon, we are all unique in terms of our cul­tur­al iden­ti­ties, life expe­ri­ences, and how we engage with the world around us. Under­stand­ing oth­ers may not under­stand and view the world the way we do, is a crit­i­cal life skill for all stu­dents.

Intercultural Perspectives on Classroom Dynamics

While it’s impor­tant to avoid over­gen­er­al­iz­ing, explor­ing poten­tial dif­fer­ences in how stu­dents have been accul­tur­at­ed in edu­ca­tion­al con­texts with­in and out­side of Cana­da helps instruc­tors and also stu­dents to bet­ter under­stand the per­spec­tives and behav­iors of oth­ers. A use­ful start­ing point is Hofstede’s Coun­try com­par­i­son tool, demon­strat­ed in the 3‑minute video below, which pro­vides oppor­tu­ni­ties for dis­cus­sion of broad­er cul­tur­al trends across dif­fer­ent coun­tries.

Hofstede’s arti­cle ref­er­enced in the video, Cul­tur­al dif­fer­ences in teach­ing and learn­ing (Hof­st­ede, 1986), while sev­er­al years old, remains a use­ful start­ing point.

Intercultural fluency and teaching

Our per­son­al expe­ri­ences of learn­ing influ­ence how we, in turn, teach — whether we repro­duce how we were taught, or we do some­thing dif­fer­ent because we didn’t enjoy our own expe­ri­ences of edu­ca­tion. Whichev­er choice we make, the con­text in which we live influ­ences these choic­es.

 

 

As instruc­tors, we con­tin­u­al­ly reflect on ‘how’ we teach, and the meth­ods and activ­i­ties we use. We think about ‘what’ we teach our stu­dents. We ask our­selves, what they need to learn.

“How often do we think about the ‘why’ of what we do?”

Understanding the values and beliefs that underpin the pedagogical decisions we make

Tak­ing time to reflect on our cul­tur­al val­ues and beliefs as they relate to teach­ing, sup­ports us in cre­at­ing learn­ing spaces that val­ue the cul­tur­al diver­si­ty in our class­rooms, by:

  1. help­ing us iden­ti­fy the specifics of how we see the role of an instruc­tor (sage on the stage, guide on the side, etc.)
  2. high­light­ing our (often) sub­con­scious beliefs about the role of stu­dents
  3. iden­ti­fy­ing our expec­ta­tions of stu­dent behav­ior in the class­room
  4. high­light our teach­ing biases/preferences that may inad­ver­tent­ly dis­ad­van­tage some stu­dents

 

Creating Projects (Accordian 5)

When cre­at­ing a project, we need to con­sid­er:

  • How to work appro­pri­ate­ly and respect­ful­ly with local Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties to iden­ti­fy a project
  • How to choose an inter­na­tion­al part­ner
  • The prac­ti­cal impli­ca­tions of CO[I]IL projects

You can down­load more infor­ma­tion by click­ing on a sum­ma­ry of this page via a PDF: Cre­at­ing Projects, or con­tin­ue to read on.

How to Work Well with Local Indigenous Communities to Identify a Project (Accordian 5a)

A guid­ing prin­ci­ple of the CO[I]IL Path­way is for projects to be co-cre­at­ed with at least one Indige­nous instruc­tor who lives in and/or works very close­ly with the local Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty. For exam­ple, a non-Indige­nous NIC instruc­tor would choose to do a project with an Indige­nous instruc­tor at a part­ner insti­tu­tion. An Indige­nous NIC instruc­tor could decide to do a project with either a non-Indige­nous or an Indige­nous instruc­tor at a part­ner insti­tu­tion. Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ties must remain at the heart of the project. ALL instruc­tors would con­nect with the Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty (ies) con­nect­ed to their insti­tu­tion.

What ‘con­nec­tion’ entails will vary accord­ing to:

It’s impor­tant we do our research, and find out what we can about our local Indige­nous com­mu­ni­ty (ies) and their needs and inter­ests. Find­ing out as much as we can from read­i­ly avail­able sources (e.g., the Inter­net, local orga­ni­za­tions, our insti­tu­tion­al resources and con­nec­tions, etc.) ensures that when we do reach out per­son­al­ly, we are doing so respect­ful­ly and appro­pri­ate­ly.

Choosing an International Partner

There are sev­er­al fac­tors to con­sid­er when iden­ti­fy­ing which inter­na­tion­al part­ners might be a good fit for you and your class, includ­ing:

  • do you already have over­seas con­nec­tions / estab­lished rela­tion­ships that would be suit­able for your project? Have you researched a cur­rent list of insti­tu­tion­al part­ners?
  • do you speak any lan­guages in addi­tion to Eng­lish (again, not nec­es­sary), that could help when com­mu­ni­cat­ing with a pos­si­ble project part­ner?
  • how flex­i­ble (e.g. in terms of lan­guage, time zones, etc.) are you in how you con­nect with your part­ner insti­tu­tion?
  • how com­fort­able are you in nav­i­gat­ing cul­tur­al dif­fer­ences in a class­room con­text?
  • would you be inter­est­ed in con­nect­ing with a class from a dif­fer­ent dis­ci­pline?

Get­ting clear on your respons­es to the above ques­tions will help you nar­row down, how best to iden­ti­fy poten­tial inter­na­tion­al project part­ners for your CO[I]IL project.

CO[I]Il Logistics – Getting Practical

When plan­ning a CO[I]IL project, it’s impor­tant to con­sid­er var­i­ous logis­tics. These will influ­ence what can eas­i­ly be achieved, when, and how. Think­ing about the fol­low­ing before start­ing project design is a good idea.

Language

In inter­na­tion­al col­lab­o­ra­tions, not all par­tic­i­pants (instruc­tors and stu­dents) will like­ly have Eng­lish as their first lan­guage. It’s impor­tant to con­sid­er what the main lan­guage of com­mu­ni­ca­tion will be dur­ing project plan­ning and imple­men­ta­tion if trans­la­tion will be need­ed, and how you plan to help stu­dents nav­i­gate any lan­guage dif­fer­ences.

Time zones

In addi­tion to class sched­ules, whether or not stu­dents (and instruc­tors) can meet ‘live online’ dur­ing class time will also depend on whether or not project part­ners share the same or sim­i­lar time zones (e.g., only a few hours dif­fer­ence).

Technology

Insti­tu­tions, instruc­tors, and stu­dents may use dif­fer­ent edu­ca­tion­al plat­forms and tech­no­log­i­cal tools. We also need to con­sid­er our own and our stu­dents’ famil­iar­i­ty and com­fort lev­el with tech­nol­o­gy, as well as that of our project part­ner and stu­dents. While we may not know who is using what at the ini­tial project plan­ning stage, reflect­ing on what tools we’d like to use and being open to learn­ing new ones, is an impor­tant part of plan­ning a CO[I]IL.

Collaborative Tools

While the list of pos­si­ble tools is end­less, it’s okay to choose one or two that will work best for us, bear­ing in mind:

  • avail­abil­i­ty and expe­ri­ence using the tool
  • acces­si­ble and inclu­sion
  • pri­va­cy con­cerns (ide­al­ly stu­dents should not have to pro­vide any per­son­al iden­ti­fy­ing infor­ma­tion to use a tool and if they do, they need to be aware of this and have alter­na­tives if they aren’t com­fort­able pro­vid­ing their infor­ma­tion
Learning Outcomes

While we can’t assume oth­er insti­tu­tions require cours­es to have learn­ing out­comes (LOs), think­ing about how our pro­posed CO[I]IL will help stu­dents meet one or more learn­ing out­comes is worth con­sid­er­ing at the plan­ning stage, espe­cial­ly if you’re look­ing for project ideas that con­nect com­mu­ni­ty needs and the course into which you plan to incor­po­rate your CO[I]IL project.

Assessment

Assess­ment require­ments, cri­te­ria, and prac­tices may vary across part­ner insti­tu­tions. It will be impor­tant to have a con­ver­sa­tion about assess­ment right at the begin­ning, espe­cial­ly where a CO[I]IL project is includ­ed in a course that has exter­nal­ly man­dat­ed eval­u­a­tion cri­te­ria.

Project Implementation

Every project will be unique. That said, there are two impor­tant ele­ments that every CO[I]IL project will include.

Connecting through kinship: engaging in the project

This step of the CO[I]IL is what peo­ple some­times see as the main part of the project, although in fact, it is a step on a much larg­er and longer jour­ney.

A project can last one class, one week or sev­er­al weeks across a term. It involves stu­dents across insti­tu­tions work­ing togeth­er in diverse groups to explore a giv­en top­ic or prob­lem. The tra­di­tion­al COIL ‘ice-break­er’ is replaced with ‘Sto­ries of who I am,’ fos­ter­ing com­mu­ni­ty and con­nec­tion before stu­dents embark on their joint explo­ration.

Reflecting and reciprocity — moving forward in reflective circles

A key aspect of a CO[I]IL is reflec­tion, not only for stu­dents but also for instruc­tors. Reflec­tion is impor­tant at every stage along the Path­way, and most espe­cial­ly at the end, before embark­ing on a new project.