By Shelley Gonneville, Manager of Child and Family Initiatives and
Danielle Deneau, Community Wellness Coordinator
Staff members of the MNO Healing and Wellness Branch who
participated in Life Skills Training held in Toronto on Feb. 22-23, 2011.
On February 22-25, 2011, The Métis Nation of Ontario (MNO) Healing and Wellness Branch organized front-line training in Toronto for 43 of its staff members. Over three days, facilitators Tracy Bald, Community Wellness Coordinator and Shelly Whitney, Long Term Care Coordinator, guided the group through Life Skills sessions. Tracy and Shelly had previously taken on the task of becoming Life Skills trainers and brought these skills back to the Branch with a high standard of professionalism.
Life Skills Training involved teaching participants to take common workshop topics, 
Two Healing and Wellness Branch staff members, Jennatul Mawa
(far left) and October Fostey (far right) with participants in the
Anger Management Workshop in Windsor. such as budgeting, .and incorporate methods and activities that would make it fun as well as real for people within their communities. Over time, standard presentation models don’t always resonate with most people.
Hands-on, interactive activities and story sharing, on-the-other-hand, gives audiences the opportunity to better understand the topic, because in the end, they can relate it directly to their every day lives, making it more likely they will make the changes needed to live healthier lifestyles.
The MNO Healing and Wellness Staff in the Windsor office wasted no time applying what they had learned in Toronto to one of their training sessions. On the afternoon of March 8, they provided an anger management workshop in their community that incorporated some of the interactive ideas they had learned in Toronto. Participants talked about what anger looks like and how to react to it. It was the first time staff tried a more interactive workshop from the Life Skills Training in Toronto and it was a success! With lots of good laughs, but also the serious side, and with the help of a guest speaker from the John Howard Society, the participants learned about different types of anger, using anger in a positive way, when anger becomes a problem, the ABC’s of anger and much more.
The Healing and Wellness staff in Windsor would like to thank everyone who participated, including the guest speaker and all staff for a wonderful afternoon.