Educational Resources

Source: Walking Together : Education for Reconciliation – Alberta Teachers’ Association

Summary: How were the Métis people in Alberta impacted by the Indian residential school system?

The first church-run mission schools established in western Canada beginning in the 1860s were open to First Nations and Métis children. As a result, many Métis students in the communities of Fort Chipewyan, St Albert and Lesser Slave Lake did attend school. In 1879 the Government of Canada, as part of its strategy of First Nations assimilation into the Euro-Canadian culture, entered into a partnership with the Christian churches to establish government-funded, church-run residential schools for Indigenous children. While the federal government acknowledged its responsibility for educating First Nations children, its overall policy was that the provinces were responsible for Métis children.

Source: Canadian Journal of Education / Revue canadienne de l’éducation 41:3 (2018)

Summary: Co-designed with over 200 First Nations, Métis, and Inuit educators and community members across Ontario, the survey investigated how students are learning to think about colonialism and its relationship to Indigenous peoples and Canadian society. Statistical analysis of 2,899 student responses reveals that first-year university students who graduated from Ontario high schools are substantially unaware of Indigenous presence and vitality. The majority of students do not understand the fundamental laws structuring conditions of life for First Nations, Métis, and Inuit people or the contributions Indigenous peoples make to all aspects of Canadian society. Although they know slightly more about what is happening with regard to Indigenous peoples today, students have little sense of the historical circumstances and forces that shape current events… However, when students have opportunities to engage with Indigenous perspectives and topics, it can make a difference to what students know and think. These results indicate that curricular reform is key to eradicating mass ignorance but cannot occur in isolation. Teacher education programs must play a central role in enacting the promise of new curricular emphases.