Main contents
Archive for the 'POH_news' Category
August 22nd, 2010
-Click on image to see slideshow-
Stacy Villeneuve, Native Studies teacher from St. Pius X Catholic High School in Ottawa, brought Project of Heart to her school this spring, and commemorated the deaths of the young students from two Indian Residential Schools in Manitoba: Assiniboia IRS (Winnipeg) and St.Boniface IRS (St.Boniface).
The St. Pius edition of Project of Heart saw its completion with an IRS survivor coming to Stacy’s classroom to talk to the students, answer questions, and create awareness which, until that day, many students did not have concerning Canada’s role in the cultural genocide of Indigenous people. Villeneuve’s summation of their time with Grandmother? “Amazing time together-truly beautiful.”
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
August 21st, 2010
Colinda Clyne, Head of Special Education at John F. Ross C.V.I. in Guelph, whole-heartedly embraced Project of Heart along with her students in April of this year. “The students loved this project”, she reported. She later presented it at her region’s Professional Learning Community’s conference as part of the “making connections” segment of the event.
John F. Ross C.V. I. has a population of 2,000 students, so the learners were able to commemorate the deaths of children from four Indian Residential Schools in Canada. Chosen were: Mohawk Institute IRS (Brantford) , MacIntosh IRS (Kenora), Shingwauk IRS (Sault Ste. Marie), and Pelican Lake IRS (Sioux Lookout). For more information on reports relating to the deaths of the children at these schools, link to:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/An+awareness+of+missing+children+and+unmarked+graves+desperately…-a0189000701
Project of Heart is grateful for the time, energy, and enthusiasm that the students of John F. Ross C.V. I. put into learning about the Indian Residential Schools and the impact of their continuing legacy. The contributions of these students keep the memories of these children alive. They will not be forgotten.
( Click image above to see slideshow )
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
August 18th, 2010
- Click image for slideshow -
Immaculata Catholic High School in Ottawa found out about the Indian Residential Schools through the efforts of grade 9 Native Studies teacher Loretta DeEugenio. Loretta and her students were fortunate enough to have an Indian Residential School survivor come to their classroom in May, to talk about the impact that the IRS had on him personally, his family, and his community. The lives of the lost children that were commemorated were from Fort Pelly IRS and Beaval IRS, both in Saskatchewan.
Loretta is thankful of the opportunity that was presented to her and her students, to learn something of the Catholic Church’s responsibility for running these schools. The IRS survivor was greeted with a banner, welcoming him to their school, and the students embraced his knowledge and his forthright honesty with the respect that was due.
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
August 16th, 2010
- Preparations for smudging ceremony at All Saints. Click image for slideshow -
On May 26th, All Saints Catholic School in Kanata participated in Project of Heart. It capped off Aboriginal Awareness Week at their school, and provided a unique opportunity for the whole school to learn about Indian Residential Schools and their impact on Aboriginal families and communities from their Indigenous guests. Native Studies teacher Amy Talarico and Art teacher Graham Mastersmith teamed up to help guide their students in learning about this much under-taught aspect of Canadian history, in preparation for presentations by an IRS survivor and a respected Elder.
The school cafeteria provided the place for the students to listen and learn from Chris Herodier, an IRS survivor from James Bay. Chris opened the session by speaking in his native language, and then went on to explain what some of his experiences were. The students were then shown a DVD that explained how Project of Heart worked, and tiles were distributed to all the students. Readers can see the results in the slide-show. They were able to commemorate the lives of those children who died at three residential schools in Saskatchewan: Muscowequan IRS, Marieval IRS, and St. Michael’s IRS, all run by the Catholic church.
Before the close of the event, Omamiwinini (Algonquin) Elder Annie St. George from KitiganZibi smudged the tiles and spoke to the students about the sacredness of relationships, of life, and of the responsibilities we have toward all living beings, human and non-human. Elder Annie was living proof to the students at All Saints, that Indigenous ways of knowing and being were not killed by the Indian Residential Schools.
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
August 4th, 2010
-Click image to see slideshow-
This spring, Lynn Rainboth, a veteran teacher at Devonshire Public School in Ottawa along with her grade 6 class, commemorated the Indigenous students who went to Amos Indian Residential School in Amos, Quebec. This school was chosen because of a unique personal connection – Rainboth herself had taught the Barriere Lake First Nation children at Lac Rapide in the early 1990s, and many of the community members had attended Amos IRS in their youth. The community was “close to her heart” she says, and it became close to hearts of her 10 year olds as well, as can be seem in this article written by Kitchissippi Times correspondant, Salah Sultan.
An IRS survivor visited the school in June to answer questions and to smudge the decorated tiles the children had created. At the completion to the project, children at Devonshire learned about the ongoing Human Rights complaint filed by the First Nations Child and Family Caring Society and the Assembly of First Nations regarding discriminatory funding practices by the Federal Government toward First Nations children in the child welfare system.
Rainboth’s children signed the “I am a Witness” petition and learned, in so doing, that First Nations children are still being hurt even though Indian Residential Schools are with us no more.
To see more on what the project has meant to Lyn Rainboth personally, you can read a heartfelt letter she wrote to Project of Heart, published with her permission below. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
July 27th, 2010
By Nancy Hamer Strahl –Teacher, Port Perry High School, Port Perry, Ontario
This past semester, my Current Aboriginal Issues class was privileged to meet Larry Loyie, author and residential school survivor. His story changed the lives of my students and they felt they wanted to do something for the survivors and for those who never made it back home. Project of Heart gave us an opportunity to do just that. Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
July 12th, 2010
– Click image to see slideshow of other tiles –
They were as young as Grade 4 but as the above collection of sad faces shows, their emotions were engaged at Brantford’s Brier Park public this spring as teacher Julie Lumax incorporated Project of Heart at her school by commemorating the students who lost their lives at northern Ontario’s Fort William Indian Residential School.
What the grade 4 and grade 6 participants learned, in their own words:
” It wasn’t fair that Aboriginal children were forced to go to Residential Schools”
“It wasn’t fair that they had to change their names to English names.”
“It wasn’t fair that the teachers got good food and the children got burnt toast.”
“Not everyone is the same. People are equal and should be treated equally.”
“Respect and celebrate differences.”
“Be part of the solution and stand up for others.”
Some great resources used included As Long As the Rivers Flow and Shin Chi’s Canoe, and Jule reports that “our students were so touched by the stories presented in both these books, particularly Shin Chi’s Canoe. Our discussions revealed such compassion in the students. An Elder living in the community shared some of his culture with the students when the tiles were smudged after decoration.”
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
July 10th, 2010
-Click on image to see slideshow.-
Winnipeg’s Forks district was the scene of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s first national event in June, held in conjunction with historic public hearings into the residential school era. Project of Heart was there as a featured activity, and for four days our interactive display was available to all visitors of the TRC event. Images from the event can be seen here.
A room was set up with tables where participants could decorate tiles, and laptops and headphones were available for people to view DVDs on the residential school era – and to engage in the social justice component of the exercise by signing online petitions and/or sending emails to elected representatives.
As well, a large map of Canada with all the locations of Indian Residential Schools was displayed prominently near the tile decorating station.
Participants were quite moved by the experience of commemorating the lives of the tens of thousands of students who went to school and never came back; many took pictures of the completed tiles as keepsakes.
Some of the best reporting of the event came from Cendrine Marrouat published this excellent review of the event and activities, including images of completed tiles.
As part of the launch of the Project of Heart exhibit, Pei-Ju Wang, a representative of P.O.H., gave the following address:
“It gives me great pleasure to greet you all here tonight, at The Forks. Thank you to the Cree, Metis, and the Anishnabeg, on whose traditional territories we are gathered.
“I also want to give thanks to the commissioners Wilton Littlechild and Marie Sinclair as well as to the TRC creative management team who invited Project of Heart to be a part of this event, and who have worked so tirelessly to insure that this project gets presented a way that that honours the the survivors and their families and pays homage to the countless lives of Indigenous children who did not live to tell their stories.
“I don’t want to go into detail, repeating what you can read on the posters and in the literature on Project of Heart. What I want to do, is tell you the beginning of a story. It begins with naive students and a naive teacher–settlers…those just like me and like my students. We found out that the history we were taught in school and in University, was not a truthful history. We were puzzled. We had thought that this wonderful place that we were so proud to call “home”–Canada–was not always built on the noble characteristics we were told it was. We did some research. We talked to people–Indigenous people and informed settlers–who supported the new and disturbing things we were finding out…that what happened in Canada to thousands of children…was nothing less than genocide.
“We decided to do something about it. We wanted help people–our people– learn the truth. We wanted our friends and neighbours to know how the attitudes that created the past–that created the Indian Residential Schools–continue to be a part of the present. And we did do this and continue to do so. And that is why Project of Heart is here. It is here to remind Canadians that we are living on Indigenous land, that we’re still newcomers, and even though we tried our best to “kill the Indian within the Indian”, Aboriginal cultures were too strong, their connection to the land too great, to entirely succumb to our invasion.
“Project of Heart is about recognizing our “settler” ability to do the right thing. It is about our determination to recognize our dependence on those we continue to relegate to the margins. It is about acting responsibly and taking our civic duty to be responsible to all citizens, not just white people, seriously. It is about transforming our institutions and the communities we live in so that people, our relationships with each other, and the environment we live in, come first. It is about finding the courage to speak truth to power, however and whenever that power manifests itself. It is about doing what is right, so that justice is something that can be lived, not just given lip service. It’s about non-Indigenous Canadians, looking critically at ourselves and our institutions through the eyes of First Peoples, so we might see how we need to start thinking and acting differently.
“A truthful past is something rarely reflected in the story we tell ourselves. Project of Heart tries to help us tell the truth. With this acknowlegement, we can move forward, creating new knowledge, creating new possibilities, and creating a space for Indigenous knowledge to affect us all — to bring hope to us all. The gestures of reconciliation take the form of beautiful tiles, each tile representing the life of an Indigenous child who died as a result of a “social engineering project gone bad”. The tiles are a testament to our commitment to the truth and reconciliation process. Next, the gestures of reconciliation in the form of the social justice actions that will be performed here over the course of the next few days, will attest to our individual willingness to put our words into action. At the end, these works of art will be smudged by an Elder as we witness a ceremony that was once banned in this country.
“May the thousands of children who died so needlessly and so senselessly, not be forgotten. May their spirits watch over us as we learn and pay homage, so long overdue, now. And may the Indigenous children struggling for survival in this land of plenty today, know that we are thinking of them as we, in the words of Cindy Blackstock, a untiring champion for the rights of Indigenous children in Canada, says, ‘Let us resolve to make a difference by putting children first. If reconciliation does not live in the hears of children, it does not exist at all.’”
Migwetch.
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
July 6th, 2010
Above: a sample of the letters written by Notre Dame students as part of the social justice component; click on image for slideshow of completed tiles
A Native Studies teacher from Notre Dame Catholic High School in Ottawa completed Project of Heart with her students in June by commemorating the deaths of the Indigenous children at the Cross lake IRS in Manitoba.
Suzanne Keeptwo sends us this report of her class’s experience with Project of Heart: Read the rest of this entry »
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »
July 3rd, 2010
– Click image to view slideshow –
This past term 32 students from Bishop Smith Catholic School in Pembroke, Ontario commemorated the children who died at Thunderchild IRS and Sturgeon Landing IRS, both in Saskatchewan. The Bishop Smith participants were students of Kathrin Winkler, teacher of Aboriginal Cultures through the Arts.
“It was an amazing gathering to smudge the tiles. I ended up clearing the cafeteria and moving tables around to crate a large circle-kept inviting classes to participate. During the smudging of the tiles and throughout, our guests from Pikwakanagan were received with total respect and interest by the participants who were also able to be smudged,” Kathrin reported. A journalist from the Pembroke Observer covered the smudging ceremony which was held, very appropriately, on Earth Day.
For the social justice action component of Project of Heart, the students discussed the issue of missing and murdered Aboriginal women, then circulated and signed the Amnesty International petition drawing attention to the Stolen Sisters campaign.
Posted in POH_news | No Comments »