Blog Post 3

Throughout my school years, we always learned about First Nations, specifically the way they were impacted when the Europeans came to Canada, and then we learned about Residential schools. It was a little bit, but not a lot, and I always felt like more should be incorporated into the curriculum and the schools in general. Now that I am older I see different stories and information on social media and in the news. I have realized the importance of Truth and Reconciliation and the different calls to action. Even so, it was amazing for me to see how much the school I’m at does to honour Indigenous knowledge in the school and the classrooms. Throughout the building, there are truth and reconciliation posters, ‘Every Child Matters’ flags and banners, and the teachers even incorporate Indigenous culture into the classrooms. I was in a pre-kindergarten class this week and although there is no curriculum and they are just being prepared for the next year, the teacher already started incorporating Indigenous knowledge into the classroom. She read the kids this book, and I can’t remember what it was called, but it was counting in Cree. The book was 10 pages and each page had a number in Cree and then it said how to pronounce it and what number it was in English and then there was an image of Indigenous people doing specific cultural things. In one picture they were making moccasins, in another one they were hunting. There was a picture of some women wearing traditional clothing with a sash and a baby. It was so amazing to see the teacher read this book with the Cree numbers as well as briefly explain each picture and what was special about the picture to these little kids. Even though they probably won’t remember the words or all the pictures it is wonderful that it is being introduced to them when they are so young. As a child, I was not exposed to that information so early on in my life and it’s disappointing because it is such a beautiful culture, and it is important that we are all educated on such a huge part of our country’s history and a huge population of our country.