November brings cooler days and changes on the land. Some animals prepare for winter, leaves fall, and frost may arrive. What are the children noticing in your community?
Create your own moon graphic here!
Bundle up and head outside together. Visit a familiar place and see what has changed since your last visit.
Look for Indigenous languages on signs around your community, from welcome signs to schools and community buildings.
Invite Elders, Knowledge Keepers, language holders or learners to share place names and their meanings. These names can carry teachings about harvesting, the land and community life. Noice the words on signs together. What do children recognize? What would they like to learn? Who could join your walk and share language along the way?
Special Days in November:
National Inuit Day November 7.
Celebrate Inuit voices, cultures and contributions. Explore Inuit-created books, recipes and resources with children and families. How are Inuit children and families reflected in your program? What Inuit-created resources could you add?
- Nunavummiut Recipes
- Inuit Resource Booklets
- Inuit felt boards, syllabics cards, puzzles and more
- Language resources, videos, images
Indigenous Veterans Day November 8
Invite families to share if they have someone to honour. Are there Indigenous veterans in your community whose stories could be shared? Share information about local Remembrance Day ceremonies so families can choose if they’d like to take part.
Louis Riel Day November 16
Honour Louis Riel’s leadership and his work to defend Métis rights. Explore Métis stories, languages and history together.
“We celebrate Louis Riel as it was important Indigenous people had someone to stand up to keep our Indigenous languages and to keep our right to be out on the land with the animals to hunt and keep our traditional lively hood… He gave up his life to stand up for these rights so it is important to celebrate him!” – Phil Gladue, MNBC Senator and AHSABC Elders Council
“Keep our Métis history alive… to look forward to the future with pride in who we are as proud Métis peoples.” – Elder Helene, Wilson MNBC Elder
How does your program celebrate Louis Riel Day?
Programming Planning Ideas:
Let the land, local teachings and November’s special days guide your planning.
Explore these questions as a team.
What is changing on the land? Which foods are available? How are animals preparing for winter? Which teachings could Elders and families share? How will you mark this month’s special days?
Explore cultural programming idea sheets developed by teams in B.C. and the Northwest Territories.
- Monthly Program Set Up – Bears
- Monthly Program Set up- Elk
- Monthly Program Set up- Moose
Science explorations
Which animals hibernate? Where do they rest, and how do they prepare?
What happens to water when it gets cold? Explore ice and snowflakes.
What changes when the ground freezes?
Why do some trees lose their leaves?
Art Centre:
Offer paper, chalk, paint, tissue paper and cardboard– alongside fallen twigs, shells and pinecones. Invite children to choose what to create. Add photos of homes from the Nations represented in your program, and label materials with guidance from language speakers.
Craft:
Make seasonal decorations to hang in your centre or take home.
Invite children to arrange, paint or decorate gathered materials in their own way.
Use hardening clay or plaster of paris to make trees, snowflakes, mukluks, moccasins or any shape children imagine.
A little white paint can turn a pinecone into a snowy tree.
Add craft materials and see what woodland creatures children make.
Sensory play:
Add ice cubes and Arctic animal toys to the water table for an iceberg sensory experience. Watch the ice melt together.
Freeze large toys in ice, then offer warm water and spoons so children can explore melting.
Offer individual tabletop sensory bins for quiet play, with arctic toys, scoops and materials suited to the children’s ages and abilities– cotton balls, clear glass marbles, fake snow, foam snowflakes, tweezers, spoons.
Health Promotion
Warm up with oatmeal, soups, stews and breads. Add local berries to muffins or fruit loaves and serve harvested fish with whole grains or wild rice. Invite children to share their favourite foods.
Stone Soup Cooking Activity:
Read Stone Soup together, then make a soup children can contribute to. Invite families to bring vegetables and have some on hand so everyone can participate. Children can wash and prepare ingredients with support, and the cook can finish the soup for a shared meal.
Innovative Idea: Little Moccasins and Little Mukluks in Williams Lake read Stone Soup and then take the children out to choose a rock. They boil the rock, so it was sanitized.
Name the ingredients in the languages of your community. For inspiration, try Talking Little Feet in Grand Forks’ version, made with Indigenous foods.
Invite families to a canning workshop to prepare foods for upcoming winter solstice feast. Explore preserves and harvested foods, guided by local knowledge and safe food preparation practices. If your community has an abundance of fish eggs, host a fish egg curing workshop! Families harvesting moose can try this recipe from Keda Yaze Kime in Dease Lake.
Recipe of the Month: Breaded Boneless Goose from Nunavut
Breaded Boneless Goose from Nunavut. Explore this recipe and others shared in this Nunavut Cookbook. Download
Wellness link of the month: Seasonal Wellness.
Traditional foods and wellness link of the month: New Canning Guide Offers Info on a Favourite Food Preservation Method
Playful Additions:
Building Block & Construction
Add fallen twigs, driftwood and animal toys to the block area. Add kayaks, dog sleds, snowmobiles or Red River carts where they connect with children’s lives and learning. Nearby windows offer a view of rain, snow and changing weather.
Math
Bring math language into everyday play: compare heavy and light, full and empty, near and far. Count out loud with fingers: plates, boots, ingredients or friends together, using the languages of the community. Use “1,2,3” before beginning a shared action. Math becomes part of children’s real work, relationships, play, and connection to the natural world. If Instead of a Person lesson plan.
Infant & toddler ideas
AHSABC Advisor Lora McDonough shares an idea from Uxwin Mimne AHS, Nanaimo. A wooden toy smokehouse with salmon stuffies the children could prepare and “smoke.” Books and photos of smokehouses extended the play.
Salmon teachings can include life cycle sensory bins.
Even edible sensory bins!
Lofty ideas
Create a cozy gathering space with blankets, furs, seasonal stories and a felt fire. For parent involvement, invite families to gather fallen pinecones and branches with their children to add to the space. Hang white canopies to look like snow, adding twinkle lights and snowflakes!
Conayt Loft Photo
Dramatic Play Area:
Create a cozy cabin or a hunting shelter that reflects the Nations represented in your program. Ask families what belongs in the space.
Add a pretend fire or smokehouse, cooking utensils, play foods and warm clothing such as moccasins, mukluks and mittens. Empty tea and cocoa containers invite kitchen play. Include labelled photos of locally used teas (e.g. Labrador tea, rosehips) with guidance from Elders and Knowledge Keepers.
Deer hunting blind 1
Innovative Idea – Katlodeeche AHS in NWT was inspired to make this version of a traditional Dene hunting shelter.
Reading Area:
Choose a quiet corner and add soft blankets and cushions for reading and resting. Include books by Inuit authors about family life, the Arctic and its animals.
Innovative Idea – Tansi AHS in Chetwynd has an affirmation station in its reading area.
Outdoor Ideas:
Set up a warm clothing sharing bin whether families can donate and choose what they need.
Follow the weather in your community: splash in puddles, explore fallen leaves or bring out the sleds. Invite families and Elders to join outdoor play in places everyone can access.
Notice frost, ice and other changes from a safe place on land. Invite Elders and language holders or learners to share seasonal words and welcome families to learn alongside the children.
Gather outsider for warm tea, cocoa and stories with Elders.
Keep moving with familiar games such as red light, green light. Ask language speakers about words children can practice as they play.
Support Inclusive outdoor play, engaging children of all abilities outdoors.
Circle Time
Invite Elders, Knowledge Keepers and families to share teachings about local trees. Follow their guidance about which stories and knowledge to share.
Explore spruce boughs, pine needles or cedar through touch and scent, where appropriate. Add photos, books and items such as cedar hats, pine needle baskets or birchbark canoes, with teachings about their origins and uses.
Books to explore:
Stand Like a Cedar – Indigenous & First Nations Kids Books – Strong Nations
Do Trees Have Mothers? (2022) – Indigenous & First Nations Kids Books – Strong Nations
Some AHS programs use recordable language buttons so children can hear and practice words shared by Elders and Knowledge Keepers. Ask permission before recording or sharing voices.
“We bought these buttons that you can record voices – our centre recorded an Elders voice saying “hand” in Halq’eméylem. The children love it and are repeating the words all day long!” – Stephanie Lawson, Coordinator at Little Pebbles Smameletawtxw, Chilliwack.
Elder Involvement:
Invite Elders and Knowledge Keepers to cook with children, sharing recipes, food knowledge and stories as they go. Ask about local foods rich in Vitamin C.
Gather favourite cold-weather recipes into a booklet for families, with contributors’ permission. You can also explore the AHSABC recipe collection!
Innovative Idea: At Hohuduleh Bayoh in Vanderhoof, Elder Maureen Thomas (Saikuz) shared how to make soapberry icecream with children and Elders. demonstrate to children and Elders how to make Soap Berry Ice-cream.
Family Involvement Ideas:
Innovative Ideas: Uxwin Minme AHS Nanaimo has a parent pantry stocked with seasonal favorites that parents can access daily.
Invite Elders and Knowledge Keepers to share teachings about medicines used in their Nations. Follow their guidance and your program’s practices when planning activities with children and families. November is the perfect month to simmer cedar and spruce on the stove and burn sage and sweetgrass for air purification.
Nature from home: 6 traditional medicines you can make at home | Great Lakes Guide
Ancestral Knowledge and Northwest Native Plants
Nishiiyuu Department Launches Traditional Medicine Cards
Health Picks from B.C. doctors
If Elders or Knowledge Keepers wish to share medicines with families, include their guidance about use and storage.
Offer a family workshop led by Elders or Knowledge Keepers who wish to share medicine teachings.
Bring families together to make gifts and crafts. Invite a community health nurse to a family meeting to answer seasonal health questions.
Traditional parenting
Invite Elders, Knowledge Keepers or Indigenous practitioners to share medicine knowledge, relationships and storage practices specific to their Nations. Follow their guidance about making items such as a medicine pouch, cedar bundle or basket.
Innovative Idea: Conayt AHS in Merritt invited Knowledge Keeper Crysta Johnson, (Llenllenéy’ten, Métis) to give a hands-on information session on Indigenous medicines for parents.
Outreach / Activity kits:
Celebrate your program’s cook, and the foods children love. Indigenous foods are the star of every community – at events, feasts, homes and in programs!
Innovative idea: Aboriginal Mother Centre AHS in Vancouver sent home a sweet recipe page in appreciation of Elder Shirley Mason (Heiltsuk).
