September 30th was the first annual Day for Truth and Reconciliation. Each year around this time, we learn about residential schools in class. It is a hard subject but an important one. At LPS they read The Orange Shirt Story, which introduces some of the things that happened at residential schools and explains why we wear orange. In LIS, we start to learn more. One of the things they do is watch videos where Indigenous people share their experiences. This year, a grade four class read a passage about residential schools and answered questions about it. Many classes also made orange shirts out of paper. Last year, in my grade seven class, we read a book called No Time To Say Goodbye. It is a fictional story based on the experiences of Tsartlip First Nation people. It shows how bad the experiences of these children really were. At LSS this year each class made a poster and on the 29th, two classes went around the school drumming and sharing songs taught to them by the Stz’uminus First Nation. Older generations were never taught these things. The impacts of residential schools weren’t part of the school curriculum until 2015; only 6 years ago. In school now, we are doing our part to learn about what happened. To show that we care and that we want to listen.
Kyla Hiebert, grade 8 LSS student
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