A circle for parents, extended family, grandparents and other caring adults who are the answer to the young people in their lives’ needs.
About this event
Children thrive when they are in ‘right relationship’ within their natural village of connection. We invite parents, extended family, grandparents and other caring adults to participate in this circle designed to give adults the confidence to begin to see themselves as the answer (as opposed to having all of the answers) to their children’s needs.
For more information or for free tickets, please click here.
Gathering Our Medicine brings together Western science and Indigenous ways of knowing to transform our understanding of human development.
About this event
Developmental Science aligns with traditional Indigenous teachings that humans are social, emotional and spiritual beings who thrive in relationship to each other, the land and all of creation. Intersecting with understandings from developmental psychology, attachment theory and affective neuroscience, Gathering Our Medicine offers a framework for transforming the way we perceive and respond to human development with a specific focus on helping to centre the community and kinship within cultural ways of knowing and being.
For more information or for free tickets, please click here.
About the Facilitators:
Denise Findlay is a bi-cultural person of Indigenous Coast Salish and settler ancestry, proudly belonging to the Skwxwú7mesh Úxwumixw (Squamish Nation), who has dedicated the last 20 years to travelling across Canada working exclusively in Indigenous communities facilitating processes focused on collective healing and de-centering child and youth mental health experts in order to restore dignity to the role of the natural kinship circle. Denise is responsible for leading the development and implementation of an innovative Provincial program called Gathering Our Medicine, in collaboration with community-based Advisory and Working Groups. Denise has the gift of the oral tradition. She is uniquely able to capture people’s attention, reaching into their hearts, transcending cultural, class, educational, and gender barriers. Denise holds a Master of Education, is on Faculty with The Neufeld Institute and is currently undertaking her PhD at Simon Fraser University with a research focus on intersecting knowledge from attachment theory and Indigenous wisdom traditions and how cultural place-based knowledge naturally supports healing, recovery and development across the lifespan for Indigenous families and communities.
Marla Klyne Kolomaya is a certified counselor and parent consultant offering services for families struggling with making sense of often perplexing behaviours commonly seen in children and adolescents. Marla specializes in providing consulting and professional development for parents, educators and helping professionals who are yearning to make sense of the kids in their care. After spending several years as a counselor within the education system Marla made the decision to transition into private practice while completing an internship with Dr. Gordon Neufeld – a foremost authority on child development and a leading interpreter of the developmental paradigm. Marla now serves on the faculty of the Neufeld Institute and has returned to her roots, supporting families within community through the Gathering Our Medicine model, and it is a most natural fit. Marla approaches her consulting and teaching work rooted in the understanding that every child and adolescent has a unique capacity to flourish and reach their full potential when the conditions for this unfolding are provided for and supported. Marla proudly descends from both French and English Metis ancestry and lives in the beautiful northern Interlake of Manitoba on a small cattle ranch. Her most treasured roles are partner to her husband Scott, Auntie to her nieces, nephews, and godchildren, as well as daughter, sister and friend.