microcredential

Indigenous Birthworker— Pregnancy Micro-credential course

The Indigenous Birthworker—Pregnancy Micro-credential course emphasizes Indigenous traditions on pregnancy and birthworker roles. It covers Indigenous philosophies, birthing plan creation, and comprehensive support for parents and families. The course addresses pregnancy challenges and includes Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) language training for effective communication.

Your Career Path

OSHKI-WENJACK’s Indigenous Birthworker—Pregnancy Micro-Credential Course offers flexible online learning, enabling participants to stay in their community while pursuing certification. The curriculum delves into the crucial role of Indigenous Birthworkers, covering topics like pregnancy philosophies, prenatal support, and mental health. Anishinaabemowin (Ojibwe) language training is integrated to enhance communication within Indigenous communities.

Curriculum

You will walk through a variety of units, each with different lesson styles, resources, and places to upload your assignments and certification expectations. This Indigenous Birthworker course will prepare learners at the community level with the knowledge and skills to provide culturally appropriate education and support to Indigenous persons and families during pregnancy.

Unit 1: Introduction to Indigenous Birthworker
Unit 2: The Reproductive System
Unit 3: Pregnancy Nutrition & Exercise
Unit 4: Complications During Pregnancy
Unit 5: Pregnancy & Mental Health
Unit 6: Ojibway Language for Pregnancy

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Program Information

Program Length: 45 hours of online self-paced content
Start Date: Continuous Intake, start anytime^*
Tuition Fees: $600 • Textbooks Fee: $65 approx. (order separately)

*start dates are subject to change

Other Indigenous Birthworker Micro-Credential Courses at Oshki-Wenjack:

Indigenous Birthworker (Doula)—Labour
Indigenous Birthworker (Doula)—Postpartum
Indigenous Lactation Support

Required Texts

Required texts for the Indigenous Birthworker—Pregnancy Course are:

Tait Neufeld, H., & Cidro, J. (Eds.). (2017). Indigenous experiences of pregnancy and birth. Demeter Press. ISBN 978-1-77258-135-5

Simkin, P., & Rohs, K. (2018). The birth partner: A complete guide to childbirth for dads, partners, doulas, and other labor companions (5th ed.). Harvard Common Press. ISBN 978-1558329102

The required text for this course are used by all three Birthworker micro-credential courses (Pregnancy, Labour, and Postpartum). We recommend purchasing both texts prior to beginning your first (Pregnancy) course to give yourself time to familiarize yourself with both texts as you move through your course work, even if we do not engage directly with both of the texts in each of the three courses.

In this course, you will notice gender neutrality language and inclusive language are often used, but at other times discussion around birth and pregnancy remains gendered. As many of our teachings and readings utilize gendered terms, there are areas we use them as well for ease of reading. Whenever possible, we commit to using gender neutral and inclusive language throughout the Birthworker courses. Using gender inclusive language means using umbrella terms when talking to everyone and the terms specific people identify with when speaking to them individually.

As we move through our course, we will devote some time to learning Ojibwe terms, phrases, and questions. The intent of this course is not for you to become a fluent Ojibwe speaker, rather, it is to help you learn useful and relevant phrases and terms to better support future clients. Some units will have a small language section embedded within that unit, while others may not. Additionally, each of our Birthworker courses will have a unit devoted entirely to Ojibwe language components.