This artifact is about my first art class on Winter Counts with my Grade One students. Winter Counts were used by the Nakota people of North America to record important events that occurred from the first snowfall of one year to the next year's snowfall. Instead of written language, pictographs and oral traditions were used as documentation in Winter Counts and students viewed, discussed, and created their own pictographs of people, events, and other significant objects in their personal lives.  The storybook "My Heart Fills with Happiness" by Monique Gray Smith was also read together to help generate ideas for students. 

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I chose to include this artifact because I wanted students to develop knowledge, understanding and appreciation about the First Nations people and emphasize oral and visual methods of communication, expression and record keeping. Students had an opportunity to learn specifically about various pictographs and what they represented in traditional Winter Counts. Students were also able to expand on the learning by making personal connections to the methodology and creation of pictographs for a classroom Winter Count which was displayed on the hallways bulletin board for other students and staff to see. 

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From this artifact I learned the importance of delivering an effective lesson. Although the final product was a success, I felt as though the process of learning, connecting, and creating was not as organized or impactful as I had hoped. I had initially wanted to deliver the historical significance orally (to reflect oral traditions of First Nations cultures), but for Grade Ones (with some students that would need differentiation like an ELL student and a deaf student, a long oral lesson was not an effective way to deliver this lesson. I also learned the importance of closure and how taking time at the end of the lesson to check and solidify understanding would have been an important step in student learning. 

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The ways in which I grew or changed as a teacher as a result of this artifact are that as a teacher, I have a responsibility to provide opportunities to students to learn and apply foundational knowledge about FNMI communities and that I need to ensure that the way that I am delivering the lesson is effective for the class that I am teaching. I would change the design for this activity to help students to think more critically about important people, events, and objects in their lives and inviting FNMI individuals from the community to ensure accuracy and relevancy for students would offer more engagement and connection to their learning. For future lessons, I could get in touch with the Alexis Nakota Sioux Nation so that the context could be established  in Canada and specifically within Alberta as well.