As a young girl, I was always eager to show my knowledge. There were multiple occasions where I told my mother that I already knew how to do things that I definitely had no clue how to do. My poor mom had to explain to me that I really didn’t know how to swim on multiple occasions, but my response was always the same: “I saw those people do it, so I know what I’m doing!”. Keep in mind, I was about three years old at this time, Sorry mom! Like you may have expected, I actually didn’t know how to swim. My mom told me I needed to go to, and complete, swimming lessons before I could actually say I was able to swim. So, I did, and this experience started to spark my interests in gaining new skills. From then on, I’ve always been one who enjoys having an array of knowledge and abilities. I guess you could say that’s why I choose interdisciplinary studies. There was a point, however, where I took this leaning for granted. During my teenage years, I felt as though I didn’t fit into the social norms of my high school. While popularity didn’t really matter to me, I struggled with being uninterested in the traditional way that academics were taught. My interests stemmed more from hands on learning such as arts and sports. This was where I felt the least amount of pressure and the most happiness, maybe because no matter what we did, I always felt like I learned something new or got better at something I already knew. While my peers were busy reading textbooks and doing homework, I was constantly working on an art project, or commuting to practices. After high school I luckily had the chance to escape my small town and create a new life for myself in North Vancouver. This is where my interest in learning really started to come back. I felt like I was free to choose the topics I wanted to learn about, and with term projects I could really focus on specific things within the niche of the subject. I was also able to find value in learning because I had a responsibility to keep my grades up due to being on Capilano’s women’s volleyball team. Throughout these last two to three years, I feel like I have grown into a new person through the learning I have been able to experience. As I look at some of our readings on Indigenous ways of learning, I realized that their way of teaching and learning has been what I needed all along. The first thing that comes to my mind is that kids need to learn this at a younger age than I did. Whenever I found value or curiosity in something, I was more interested in putting time and effort into becoming better within that subject. As of right now, my main goal in life is to work with children because I want to teach them that there is more to life and knowledge than just reading and regurgitating. I want to show them that there’s value in hands on experiences, imagination, and storytelling. It feels like kids are being taught at such a young age that knowledge is based on the ability to read a textbook and do well on a test, however, I feel like there’s so much more meaning and learning to be found if we spike curiosity and allow kids to find their own knowledge within a subject. Overall, I want to help kinds find joy in learning so that they are intrigued by new subjects rather than scared of them. My educational journey has been more about finding a need to help kids find value through their learning and teach them that learning in a non-traditional way is more than okay, if not better!