First Nations artwork, person writing in book.

Indigenous Mentorship – Activities and resources

Find activities and other useful resources to help plan a strong mentoring experience.

Your mentorship team may use our activities (see below) or work with your teacher lead and students to design your own program. Here are some things to keep in mind when planning activities.

IDEAS FOR MENTORING ACTIVITIES

Community

promote youth leadership development experiences in the community
engage in community volunteerism together
offer opportunities for exposure to unfamiliar cultural and artistic events

Life skills

offer opportunities to improve social skills such as communication
provide training in areas such as how to manage money
help improve problem-solving skills and critical thinking

Academic

improve self-assessment of academic skills and areas of need for further education
help students learn about university, college, apprenticeship options and scholarship opportunities
offer workshops on post-secondary scholarship and bursaries application.
identify work readiness skills

Career

help students learn about career opportunities within and beyond business and accounting; for example, students might want to visit a physiotherapy clinic, a computer lab or an auto-body shop
encourage students to continue educational, personal and professional development
increase student awareness of career resources, networking opportunities and professional associations
teach students how to access reliable information sources

Workplace

develop student understanding of your workplace and profession by discussing workplace rules, policies and procedures, work ethic issues, organizational culture, unwritten rules and social aspects
explain your employer’s goals and discuss how each person contributes to the achievement of these goals, including by explaining your job responsibilities
help students to see connections between classroom learning and the workplace
encourage students to ask questions and follow their interests
model behaviours that lead to workplace success, including respectful communication and cooperation with colleagues

Additional activities

Mentoring activities are determined by the CPA mentorship team, the school team and students, working together. The following tools and ideas can help your team get started.

Speed intros is an ice breaker tool in which individual mentors and students spend 10-15 minutes getting to know each other before time is called and they move on to engage with the next person. (for programs with six or more students) [coming soon]
Who am I? is a worksheet mentors and students can fill out separately and then discuss to learn more about each other and themselves.
Getting to know the student is a worksheet containing 13 questions for students to fill out on their own so you can learn more about their likes, dislikes, strengths, challenges and career interests.
Questions for students to ask mentors about working contains of a list of questions students can use to ask mentors about their work life and choice of career or profession. It may also help students gain confidence in asking other adults about their career choices.
Student goals helps students set goals and objectives for the things they want to do or discover over the next several years in the areas of creativity, education, relationships, fitness, health and work. This worksheet sets the stage for keeping a record of accomplishments that you can work on together with students over time.
50 plus possible activities provides a comprehensive list of activities to do together.
Project-based learning explains the benefits of defining a project to address a specific challenge, problem or dilemma and provides examples of successful projects that can provide an experience as robust as an internship.
The game of life is a game where each student must choose on which path to start: college or career. The game has been updated with new careers chosen by kids.
Managing your money is a booklet containing tools and tips to help you meet your goals. Please email us for copies.

RESOURCES FOR MENTORS

Mentorship skills

CPA Canada Mentorship Program for Indigenous Students Handbook – get full information on everything you need to know to be a mentor.
CPA Canada Mentorship Program for Indigenous Students leave-behind brochure
Toolkit for Mentors – Your mentor toolkit contains tools to help you set up your program quickly and efficiently, with sample agendas and checklists to help with administrative detail.
Toolkit for Schools – Your school toolkit contains the tools necessary to support administrative programming.
20 Ways to Say, “You’re Great!” – positive reinforcement is a powerful motivator for encouraging others to feel good about their accomplishments and inspire them to continue making progress.
Mentor – Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring
Alberta Mentoring Partnership – Teen Mentoring Toolkit
Mentor Canada – The Mentoring Effect: Indigenous Youth
University of Alberta – The magic of mentorship: How an after-school program is building brighter futures for Indigenous Youth

Questions? Please email us.

Indigenous cultures +

Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada – TRC Findings Report – Get access to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada’s summary reports.

Indigenous Corporate Training – Your Guide to Indigenous Relations – Get access to training and free resources to help you work effectively with Indigenous Peoples through Indigenous Corporate Training Inc.

Introduction to Indigenous People’s Cultures Course – This introductory course provides you with insight into the history of First Nations, Métis and Inuit Peoples. Gain insight, knowledge and skills to better understand the perspectives of Indigenous students as they navigate through the CPA profession and education in accounting and finance.

APTN National News – New Minecraft world to teach students about Anishinaabe culture – This online article provides information on the new partnership between Microsoft Canada, Minecraft: Education Edition, and the Louis Riel School Division (LRSD) in Winnipeg, Manitoba, as they use the game Minecraft to teach students about Manitoba Anishinaabe culture. (Available in English only.)

Royal Ontario Museum – Indigenous Voices – Designed for K-12 students and teachers, each webinar episode features Indigenous ROM educators and guest speakers as they highlight distinct ancestral objects, share stories, and offer arts-based activities that celebrate living Indigenous cultures. (Available in English only.)

Beside Magazine – New Narratives: Nuna – Juliana Léveillé-Trudel writes about what one can learn from Inuttitut, a language shaped by humility, poetry and the land.

The Conference Board of Canada – Bright Future – Rt. Honourable Paul Martin on Indigenous opportunities – Listen to the Right Honourable Paul Martin as he speaks about the importance of entrepreneurship to Indigenous people.

Public Policy Forum – Policy Speaking – What is Reconciliation About? – Senator Murray Sinclair shares wisdom on the Nova Scotia lobster fishing dispute and how current events fit into the trending societal discussion about racism and systemic racism.

The Boys of Nunavut – A program helping at-risk Indigenous youth in Northern Canada. (Video available in English only.)

Statistics Canada – Indigenous Statistics Portal – The portal is part of Statistics Canada's Indigenous Statistical Capacity Development Initiative and provides a central location on the agency's website where users can find links to data products about First Nations people, Métis and Inuit. The Indigenous Statistics Portal provides data on Indigenous communities, children and families, health and well-being, education, work and many other topics, in one convenient location. Users can also quickly find information on recently released products and view data from the 2016 Census.

Prosper Canada and AFOA Canada – The Shared Path: First Nations Financial Wellness – This report defines financial wellness in the context of First Nations Peoples and communities, reviews why it matters, provides a conceptual framework to help clarify the determinants of financial wellness, and identifies barriers, needs, best practices and principles for building the financial wellness of Indigenous individuals, families, and communities together. (Available in English only).

Treaty of Niagara – Information on the 1764 Treaty of Niagara and the role of the Wampum Belt.

CTV News – Village older than pyramids discovered by student – discover how a 14,000-year-old village was unearthed on a B.C. island by a UVic student. (Available in English only).

Pacific Northwest History and Cultures: Why Do the Foods We Eat Matter? – This online lesson provides perspectives from First Nations community members, images, objects, and other sources to help students and teachers understand the important connections between foods and cultures for Indigenous Peoples of the Pacific Northwest. Discover how First Nations of the Pacific Northwest take action to protect and sustain salmon, water, and homelands.

Whose Land – Explore territories by city, land, treaties and agreements or communities with these fluid maps developed to create dialogue around reconciliation.

Hinterland Who's Who — this series of iconic public service announcements about Canadian wildlife releases a vignette on ravens in six Indigenous languages.

Honouring Indigenous Peoples – HIP Annual Report 2018 (Available in English only).

C.D. Howe Institute - Research: Pursuing Reconciliation: The Case for an Off-Reserve Urban Agenda. (Available in English only)

Native Land – a website run by Victor Temranto of Mapster, a Vancouver-based tech start-up that creates interactive maps and mapping applications. Working with Indigenous communities and researching treaties, the website provides a map that shows the traditional territories of Indigenous Peoples around the world. It is intended as a resource to help people understand the history of the land and prepare meaningful territorial acknowledgments.

Canadian Indigenous Culture Training – Truth and Reconciliation Edition

Statistics Canada – Aboriginal Peoples Survey (APS)

Statistics Canada – Labour Market Experiences of Inuit

Statistics Canada – Labour Market Experiences of Métis

Statistics Canada – Employment of First Nations men and women living off reserve – This paper uses the 2017 Aboriginal Peoples Survey to assess the employment characteristics of First Nations men and women, including occupation, industry and full-time/part-time employment. A number of other outcomes, influenced by these characteristics, are further explored, such as job satisfaction, skills, health, presence of disability, and measures of economic well-being such as food security.

Statistics Canada – Employment characteristics of Métis women and men aged 25 to 54 in Canada – This paper uses the 2017 Aboriginal Peoples Survey to assess the employment characteristics of Métis men and women. A number of other outcomes, influenced by these characteristics, are further explored, such as employment rates, employment income, education, occupation and employment types, economic instability, and self-reported mental health.

Statistics Canada – Inuit participation in the wage and land-based economies in Inuit Nunangat – For Inuit, the term 'livelihood' encompasses work in the wage economy and in the labour that connects them with the land, their culture and their community. The results from the 2017 Aboriginal Peoples Survey presented in this paper highlight how important it is to include land-based economy in any examination of the labour market. Furthermore, these findings suggest the need for policies and programs aimed at improving Inuit employment and related economic outcomes.

The Importance of Understanding Accounting and Finance (video available in English only) – CPA Canada Mentorship Program for Indigenous High School Students’ Advisory Committee member Terry Goodtrack, CEO of AFOA Canada, on the importance of Accounting and finance to the future prosperity of Indigenous Peoples and how AFOA and CPA are working together.

Project of Heart – an inquiry based, hands-on, artistic journey of seeking truth about the history of Aboriginal people in Canada

AFOA Canada – Dollars and Sense – AFOA Canada has developed three financial literacy modules for Indigenous students: (1) The Secondary School Module for students in grades 11 or 12; (2) The Middle School Module for students in grades 7 and 8; and (3) The Elementary School Module for students in grades 3 and 4.

Educationally-Based, Culturally-Sensitive, Theory-Driven Mentorship Intervention with At-Risk Native American Youth in South-Dakota: A narrative Review (Available in English only)

Not My Territory: Perspectives From Urban Indigenous People Across Canada (Available in English only)

Martin Family Initiative - Indigenous Knowledge and Mathematics Community of Practice - A series of videos using Indigenous knowledge and practice to develop mathematics skills. (Videos available in English only.)