I really appreciated the relaxed format of being able to work independently and at my own rate. The three lecturers all presented the material in an interesting and sincere way. I learned so much from the artwork of Leah Dorion and i felt this was an excellent way to highlight the important messages, to give me something to return to and to help me remember them by. I understand that this is an introductory course and it has done its job well by planting the roots and establishing a foundation for me to continue to build my knowledge from. The personal stories shared by guest speakers were relevant and very heartfelt. I would highly recommend this course.

TAKE THIS COURSE!!! This is a must for everyone living in Canada, the United States and any country with indigenous peoples; especially if your ancestry makes you part of the settlers. I hope there will be a follow-up course, or many follow-up courses (I feel each class could easily be made into a 12 class courses!!) because I feel this is really just scratching the surface, a very good scratching, it's just there is so much to learn. We have so much listening to do. We have to encourage indigenous peoples to be way more present in politics; they are the ones who can show us how to be one with our surroundings. I am very grateful for this course. Thank you!

I have thoroughly enjoyed this, my first, online course. I am profoundly changed because of it! This is information that should have been taught at various grade levels to all Canadian children enrolled in the public school system. As someone who took Canadian Studies at the high school level, I was saddened to realize and admit that I didn't know more!! Knowledge is power!! Once I learned that we were not given the full story of the Indigenous history and experience, I knew it was up to me to search it out for myself!! I enjoyed the lectures, the artwork and the video clips. Grateful for the experience! I will recommend it to everyone!! Thank you! JB

Great learning about part of the history of this land, to learn about the traditions, lifestyles, societies, arts, etc of some indigenous cultures; the different battles that they have faced through colonization; the current injustices; the movements; and the achievements on getting some autonomy, recognition and respect back. Though the fight is not over. But having this exposure to the general population is an important step so they can recognize, understand and empathize with what the indigenous cultures have been through. A most sincere thank you for the research, work, art, stories, experience sharing, and effort that was put to make this amazing course.

I feel that the course was very informative and well put together. As a person who has First Nations people in my family i have quite abit of information but the course gave me actual time lines of events and dates that were relevant to what i was told. It certainly made me uncomfortable at times with the way our government dealt with and still does deal with Indigenous issues.

It didnt "pull any punches" when talking about the difference in the way First Nations and Settlers understood or chose to understand the details of treaties and land claims that still apply today

I think it is an excellent course and am glad to have been able to take part in it.

I am emeritus faculty in Portuguese language and Luso-Brazilian studies. I have some non-specialist background in US Native American studies from high school and my undergraduate course. As an American with some understanding of Native studies, I truly enjoyed this course. It was a broad multi-disciplinary introduction to Indigenous Canada, as promised. For an American like me, too, it was well situated within Canadian studies. That is, I was simultaneously learning about our indigenous neighbors to the north and about the Canadian national context. Native Studies at the University of Alberta is to be commended. I look forward to pursuing this topic further.

This was an amazing course and the journey for myself was enjoyable and thought provoking. I am truly inspired to continue on the native studies earning path. I developed a new perspective to some old knowledge, opinions and experience I have had, both positive and negative. All contributors to the body of work that became this course should have such pride. It should be considered a starting point for our social studies curriculum design in Canada. I especially loved listening to Leah Dorion discuss her art and process of creating the art along side the course content with the faculty members. Great interviews, great flow, just loved this course. Thank you!

This is a very well done course! I was highly engaged & learnt a lot! I very much enjoyed the pace of the course. I also enjoyed the learning styles via video lectures, the lecture wording, how I could save my notes from the lectures & the overall course notes at the end of the week made for a great review before the module quiz. Personally I think that everyone should take this course & it should be made a part of learning through Canada. This should be a course taken by all Canadians & especially part of the immigration entry. Canadians would definitely benefit from taking this course. Merci, Thank you Dr. Tracy Bear & team for creating an amazing course!

I really appreciated learning from Indigenous folks and Canadians. As a U.S. citizen, I've never known much about the history of Canada, despite living along the shores of Lake Superior! I feel like learning some of it from the Indigenous perspective was especially important. I've worked with Native Americans for years and learned much from them. This has expanded on that. I especially loved the live discussions on Sunday afternoons. I felt I was really part of something and hearing from the instructors themselves, just being themselves, was really valuable. Having Dan the token "learner" was great. It was the best experience I've had this pandemic.

Was very impressed with the 6 paintings. Demonstrated the power of art in expressing multiple ideas simultaneously. The interviews with Bill-Ray Belocoury & Tracy Bear made we wish I could hear more from them. I wish the quizzes had focused on the big ideas not minute points, e.g., I knew PNIAI founded by 7 but Janvier included Bill Reid (a hero of mine) and that would be 8. I debated on saying 7 or 8 , picked 8 & was wrong although to had totallly understood that section. Pleased I took the time to do the course - confirmed previous knowledge, introduced some new ideas and encourages me to continue my journey of learning about Canada's Indigenous Peoples.

Thank you very very much for creating this program and giving everyone an opportunity to learn and grow in knowledge and history. I have learned and experienced so much in these few short weeks. I have also cried and been very angry. I am now, I feel, educated and enlightened to issues I was blind to, or as a youth, had no care to learn.

Knowing that my ancestors on my mother's side settled in Quebec in the 1640's, I would like to know that they were not part of any problem but shared the land and were decent and respectful people but of course I will never know and can only hope that they were kind and helpful settlers.

Again, thank you.

Elisabeth Green

An excellent course that gave me a much improved understanding of an Indigenous perspective. The material was well presented and I loved the art by Leah Dorion that accompanied many of the lessons and her gentle presentation. Some of the quiz questions were a little too tricky as they required an interpretation of the material presented and in some cases more than one answer might have been interpreted as correct by a student - but most were straightforward. There were a couple of things presented that I disagreed with but I took the position that this is an introductory course meant to present an Indigenous perspective so I did not take issue with them.

I was referred to this course through a friend. I thought at the very least, I might gain some additional knowledge regarding questions and uncertainty about the history and culture of Indigenous peoples.

The instructors were relatable and personable while sharing their knowledge. I was so encaptured, I found myself speeding through the course so that I could learn more.

I´m going to take it again and with my notes, really take the time to research resources that were discussed.

Thank you Coursera, for making this course available. It is of my opinion that this course should be mandatory in every public and private Canadian school. This is our history.

Good evening,

I have learned so much taking this course. I was going to mention that this course was originally written in 2015. I wonder if there could be an amendment to the TRC regarding additional recommendations being addressed since 2015 and also the admission of that the MMIW numbers are even greater than known when this course was written. As an aside, when I was 10 years old I had the amazing good fortune to attend expo 67 and I clearly remember the "Indian" pavillion and being very confused. I began to ask questions that only a very inquisitive 10 year old can ask and no one could answer them or wanted to answer them. I now know why!!

This is an excellent course. I highly recommend it. As someone who grew up on Treaty six territory, I never learned the history of the indigenous peoples who were here before my family came to Canada. I appreciate that the course creators do not present the indigenous peoples of Canada as a single homogenous group, but rather use examples from different cultures to illustrate larger points. This course changed me and gave me a perspective of indigenous history and culture I have never had before. I really believe that this, or a course like this, should be mandatory for all Canadians. And it should certainly be mandatory for anyone seeking public office.

As an immigrant Canadian, there's not a lot of avenues to immerse in the rich culture and traditions of the indigenous people. The narrative, both corporate and scholastic is dictated by a distinctly Euro centric flavour.

A course like this helps understand the complexity of integration, the heavily underplayed pain and suffering, and the oppurtunities to participate in social movements to both bring indegenous issues to the light and to lay out a chart for a more conscientious future as a Canadian.

Thank you for bringing this course to an online platform, to the curators of the content, the artisits involved, and the three knowledgeable presenters.

Joe G

I have learned so much more about Indigenous peoples. This course was indeed thought provoking, sometimes I felt in awe of the culture, anger and sadness at the continuous treatment from settlers throughout the years as well as what is still happening in modern times. I had dreaded the module on Residential schools but it had to be faced and acknowledged. Truly grateful to the Faculty of Native Studies for their work in putting this course together and I sincerely hope many more will take this course. So enjoyed Leah's paintings - tied into the modules beautifully! Thank you to all who were involved in this necessary education about First Nations.

Middle-aged white woman, beginning to learn - I can't comment on the content. The lectures and notes were easy to follow, broken into small segments for focused learning, and spaced out in an easy-to-accomplish timeline. The course introduced me to a wide variety of new information, gave me lots of links to original sources to continue learning, and (in some cases) made me feel uncomfortable about the historic and continuing problems of colonialism, without feeling too threatening to my (dammit) white fragility.

I appreciate very much that this course is available to me, and hope to find more from the same faculty, and/or on the same general subject.

I completely enjoyed the entire course and found each module well planned and the presenters provided a clear and concise delivery of the content. The early Canadian history from early settlers to the modern times has provided me with a new perspective on Canada s indigenous peoples.

Professor Tracy Bear was especially knowlegable and her calm and thoughtful approach to the course content was refreshing and highly appreciated. Every Canadian member of Parliament and the Senate should be required to take and pass this course , as they will be enlightened to the History, trials and tribulations , and future aspirations of Canada's Indigenous peoples..

4.5/5. The course delivered more than my expectations. I have been stretched by information and perspectives that have increased my understanding of Canadian history in association with the First Peoples. If I had Aladdin's lamp, one rub would have every non-Indigenous Canadian, and those to come, to have the knowledge, viewpoints, history, heart and emotions ingrained in them from the teachings of this course.

The exception to full marks is the embarrassing amount of grammatical mistakes (spelling, incomplete sentences). I acknowledge "forgiveness" had been asked for in this regard, but, c'mon, it's a university course! Raise the bar and all's well.

This course, although just touched on many topics, was very well researched and compiled into deep history of Indigenous peoples. I wish this was part of elemntary school. I love learning about true history. This has given me a new perspective on being Canadian. Although I am of the MicMac, I am embarassed to be Canadian. Thank you for the educational course and history. I will use this to be a better person and a better part of my community now. I must add, most of this information was not available when I was growing up. I lived among the Mohawk, Metis and coming from MicMac, I still had no idea that most of this happened. Thank you so much :-)

I learned a ton about our Canadian history I had no idea existed. Things I learned in this course about our indigenous Canadians history, that I had no knowledge. Of course, I do recall much of the news stories, growing up regarding the treaties, the blockades, but we never heard much about what the cause or concern from the indigenous perspective. This course was enlightening and I am so grateful for the opportunity to have taken it. Thank you for the all the fantastic material. I have a much better understanding of the horrors of the residential schools, the detriment and harm caused by colonization and the importance of understanding and empathy.

Although I am a Mohawk woman, I haven't been taught the right history to its full extent. This course has helped me in many ways, to guide my mind and to help me help my community in the best ways that I can. Having this knowledge has brought on many discussions and conversations about the colonization and what it means to be a modern day Onkwehonwe. We are still here, there are some of us that do practice our traditions, and many of us who still have the knowledge and language of our ancestors. As Onkwehonwe, we must act accordingly to our original ways and teach those who do not know, and fulfill the responsibilities that the Creator has given us.

I think this FREE course is amazing! It should be required learning for all Canadian adults, since most of us did not hear most of this in school. I hope more of this perspective and information gets into schools soon. The best tool against racism is understanding, but also, I just found so much to delight in and agree with in the perspectives on nature, the world, and humanity in this course. The instruction and format are excellent, creative, and interesting -- no, better than interesting. Fascinating. This course fascinated me as no other has done in decades. Thank you to UofA and the excellent instructors from the Indigenous Studies Department.

I learned so much about the history of Indigenous people in Canada and their ongoing contributions and resilience in the face of an incredibly long, powerful attempt to colonize, assimilate, and dismiss Indigenous voices and culture. I am able to comprehend far more about current headlines (Wetsuwe'ten pipeline resistance; Mi'kmaq Fishery/Moderate LIvelihood in Nova Scotia; my favourite artist Alex Janvier) than I had been. I appreciate the blending of past and present, history and future, and am inspired to work toward reconciliation wherever and whenever I can as a settler Canadian living on the traditional territory of the Anishnaabe in Quebec.