I knew a little bit about this last year, but now we went way more in depth and it
was a little bit heartbreaking to learn about this.
So this is Cooper Island Residential School and they got here in a canoe.
And this is a dock, and these are bits of road.
So people could see how far they have to go to actually put them in a residential school.
Critical literacy is inviting children to look beyond themselves and it's about taking up topics of power,
inequality and social justice.
You can start anywhere.
Take a text that is meaningful, it's about an important topic or issue,
and begin with the students and asking them "what do you see here?"
You can even do a picture walk to start to say what do you notice in the picture?
All over the school we're focused on connecting the kids world to the world so we want
to help them see themselves as agents in the bigger story.
A metaphor that we use is text as either mirrors or windows.
They get a sense of belonging when they can see themselves in a text.
Text as windows on the other hand are looking out into a world that's different than themselves.
We chose storytelling as one of the
learning branches when we were planning a unit around residential schools.
It was important because in all of the learning that we do it starts with the
students personal story, their funds of knowledge, and so starting from that foundation
and then making the connections to the stories that were shared by people who survived
residential schools was kind of a natural fit.
They began with telling stories that had to be true stories from their own families,
then we explored stories that were true,
and from the families of people who were affected by Canada's legacy, and who are still being affected.
And so now because of that mirrored experience, the children can see their story as ongoing
and they can see the story of residential schools as ongoing.
They can imagine how those stories will intersect.
The oil has spilled from the pipeline, the
oil is now leaking into the pond so they are now gonna get affected by it.
Some people did more things about treaties, I focused on the Kinder Morgan pipeline 'cause
didn't even know what that was at the time.
Last year we did a lot of textbook reading and stuff like that but it's so much better when you pick which
group you want to be in, pick what you want to use to learn with.
I'm not very good out of the textbook but I'm really good on technology.
Through critical literacy approach there are multiple texts. Media, there's television, there's visual images.
I decided to make a board game on thing I learned.
You play it together with lots of people so then if you share a piece of learning that
maybe it's not in the board game then people will learn it too and you can
also learn new things.
We ask questions like who's represented? Who is missing? Whose voice is being silenced?
Who's being privileged?
And in this way children get to look at a book not just one way.
What I love to see in my students is the confidence that comes out.
When they practice agency, when they practice seeing themselves as part of an ongoing story.
I feel that, instead of speaking or writing,
it's better for me when I have art. I want to think a lot about what's behind the meaning
of the picture and then to think about the residential schools.
They were starting to go: "Oh! My grandma also came from England" or "We
also do that on Father's Day!" and the connections started to get built really strongly.
That was kinda where I started to implement critical literacy,
was looking at themselves and really involving the families in that part of the journey as well,
as such a wealth of knowledge for the students themselves but also for me to understand
where my students were coming from and and who they came from.
I think if they're not feeling safe and comfortable in their environment they're not gonna take off their shoes
and put somebody else's shoes on.
So right now Ashley is doing a fantastic project around inquiry with kindness.
She'll talk about what does it mean to be a kind neighbour.
Also look at the areas around in our community or what does it mean to be kind to,
you know, your fellow classmates, or to your teacher.
Even on the other end of the spectrum too, not just what does it mean to be kind,
but why might someone be a bully?
I used to think if I was friends with a bully I would be a bully.
I learned you can be anyone's friend in the world.
You're asking questions and they found out why bullies are mean. Because they have pain in their hearts.
If some person died and they want to protect themselves.
A big change that I've seen in a student is probably Neo.
He never hesitates to go to a child that looks sad to ask them how they're feeling.
He'll voluntarily make kindness rocks just to go give to that one specific child sometimes which is,
well, you know. It warms my heart for sure.
We talked a lot about what makes a good neighbour and why being a neighbour of a school would be good or bad
and looked at those pros and cons.
The kids really wanted to just say thank you. Like hey we know it's tough
sometimes to be a neighbour of a school, we know we're really noisy.
We also recognize that kindness doesn't just have to do with people. They thought: "Hey
if I give a plant, gonna make somebody smile but maybe
that'll help out our environment and see animals and insects in our environment as well.
Our youngest children often teach us the most because the questions they raise and the perspectives they see
really bring forth their funds of knowledge in ways that take us out our adult school oriented ways of being,
and instead into place conscious, local, and diverse ways of knowing that come and
are found right in our children.
So I think through all of this the biggest thing I've seen is their walls come down.
They are no longer inside their box, there is no box. They are accepting of others, they're convinced
that their kindness is going to go around the world and I think that they're right.
It's really neat to see them feel so empowered about thes actions that they're doing.