September 11, 2021

Introduction

The Alberta Curriculum has come under scrutiny as being White-centric and portraying an inappropriate perspective of the Indigenous, Inuit and Metis peoples in Canada. The United Church is a stakeholder in this topic because we have played a role in the mistreatment of the Indigenous people.The Church has a responsibility to the Indigenous people, as outlined in TRC 48, 49, 59 – 64. Thus, we have a responsibility to comment on the suitability of the Curriculum for how it portrays our Indigenous people. 

I have reviewed the Curriculum in the context of TRC Calls to Action, and will illustrate how the curriculum does, or does not, live up to these Calls. The outline of this essay is:

1. Define the content that must be included in the curriculum, as described by relevant TRC Calls to Action.
2. Review the social Studies curriculum for each grade, and assess how it addresses the required content as spelled out by TRC. 

TRC Calls to Action

Specific Calls to Action that are relevant to education are:

62. We call upon the federal, provincial, and territorial governments, in consultation and collaboration with Survivors, Aboriginal peoples, and educators, to: 

1. Make age-appropriate curriculum on residential schools, Treaties, and Aboriginal peoples’ historical and contemporary contributions to Canada a mandatory education requirement for Kindergarten to Grade Twelve students. 
2. Provide the necessary funding to post-secondary institutions to educate teachers on how to integrate Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods into classrooms. 
3. Provide the necessary funding to Aboriginal schools to utilize Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods in classrooms. 
4. Establish senior-level positions in government at the assistant deputy minister level or higher dedicated to Aboriginal content in education. 

63. We call upon the Council of Ministers of Education, Canada to maintain an annual commitment to Aboriginal education issues, including:

i. Developing and implementing Kindergarten to Grade Twelve curriculum and learning resources on Aboriginal peoples in Canadian history, and the history and legacy of residential schools. 

ii. Sharing information and best practices on teaching curriculum related to residential schools and Aboriginal history. 

iii. Building student capacity for intercultural understanding, empathy, and mutual respect. 

iv. Identifying teacher-training needs relating to the above. 

64. We call upon all levels of government that provide public funds to denominational schools to require such schools to provide an education on comparative religious studies, which must include a segment on Aboriginal spiritual beliefs and practices developed in collaboration with Aboriginal Elders.

The TRC requires the following concepts in the Alberta Curriculum.

1. The content must be:
   1. age-appropriate
   2. present Residential Schools and the legacy, Treaties, contemporary contributions of Aboriginal peoples to society. 
   3. present Indigenous knowledge and teaching methods.
2. Foster intercultural understanding, empathy and respect.
3. Provide comparative religious studies that includes Aboriginal spiritual beliefs and practices (for denominational schools).

Kindergarten

The Kindergarten Social Studies curriculum focusses on being an individual, belonging to a family, and belonging to a community. While there are no specific references to Indigenous culture, there are opportunities to engage the students with examples from Indigenous culture.

• Listening to stories could be an opportunity to read stories from our Indigenous peoples. For Alberta, local stories from the Blackfoot or Cree peoples are relevant because the students can visit the items discussed in the stories. One example is a Napi story about the Okotoks big rock. Relevant local stories should exist in all parts of Alberta.
• Discussing love, friendship and care as a basic need is an important point when it comes to Residential Schools and what was taken away from the Indigenous students. This is a good seed to plant and revisit in later grades.

The Kindergarten curriculum introduces maps, and reading maps. This skill is leveraged for Grade 1 to illustrate the traditional territory for our Indigenous people. However, Kindergarten students cannot read, and may not comprehend what a map is telling them. This portion of the curriculum is not age appropriate, and grade 1 or 2 may be more appropriate.

The Kindergarten curriculum (in the context of Indigenous culture) is:

• age appropriate,
• Fosters a a sense of intercultural understanding and respect,

The family can be revisited in later grades, which ties in the legacy of Residential Schools.

Grade 1

The Grade 1 Social Studies curriculum appears to be more advanced than the students ability or pre-requisites from Kindergarten. This issue at hand, however, is the application to the requirements of the TRC.

The Guiding Question about the Indigenous people in Alberta poses an excellent introduction to Indigenous culture. However, the concepts of Hunter, Gatherer and Farmer, and the related ideas of a traditional range may be difficult to grasp where the students pre-requisites from Kindergarten covered Understanding Family Stories.

Understanding the visual representation of a timeline is appropriate for students that are just learning to read. However, there is no prerequisite for introducing numbers as a measure of generational time. This concept is not age appropriate, and may be better suited for Grade 2.

Introducing the students to the spirituality of the Indigenous peoples is appropriate at this age. I think Grade 1 students are capable of appreciating some aspect of indigenous spirituality. However, this is a complex topic and must be revisited in later grades.

The reference to Clovis weapons is inappropriate in any context, and should be changed to Clovis tools. Clovis points (spear or arrow heads) were designed to hunt game, not for waging war. The use of the word weapon suggests a community that is focussed on violence and is inappropriate for our Indigenous people.

Explaining cultures through stories or artifacts or petroglyphs is excelling for Grade 1. But comparing the stories from many different cultures (Mesopotamia, Egypt, China) may end up as a useless collection of trivial facts rather than a constructing a foundation for future learning. A smaller focus, such as only looking at the stories from the Indigenous people, may provide a better foundation for learning.

Introducing the origin of writing is not relevant or useful for students that are just learning to write. While this concept covers the language of our Indigenous people, the material is not age appropriate for Grade 1.

Exploring different styles of leadership, and the importance of relationship building (the the use of gifts with the Indigenous culture, and highlighting that customs are different from European customs) is appropriate, but I have concerns that Grade 1 students can grasp these concepts in a meaningful manner.

Exploring community and how each person contributes is good for Grade 1, and the Indigenous communities are a good way to develop this. Looking at bartering and trade may be too complex for Grade 1: the proposed curriculum develops these concepts in Grade 2.

While the proposed Grade 1 curriculum covers the necessary concepts from TRC, the material seems too advanced for typical Grade 1 students. Including comparisons form other cultures, at this point, may be very confusing. It may be better to focus on one culture (Indigenous) and use that as the model for exploring community and relationships and leadership.

Grade 2

The proposed Grade 2 curriculum does not mention our Indigenous people. The curriculum touches on the Abrahamic faiths, which addresses intercultural understanding, empathy and respect, and also addresses comparative religious studies. This presents an excellent opportunity to contrast these concepts with traditions from the Indigenous people. Since the curriculum includes the comparative aspect, it is necessary to include the traditions from the Indigenous people.

Some of the stories that accompany the Abrahamic traditions (Exodus, colonizing the land across the Jordan River) would provide interesting examples of colonialism when we look at the stories from the perspective of the original inhabitants of the land.

The proposed Grade 2 curriculum does not fulfil the requirements of TRC because it does not incorporate information from Indigenous cultures.

Grade 3

The proposed Grade 3 curriculum opens with the history of North America beginning with European colonization (about 500 years ago), and covers topics up to about 1815. This opens the door for lots of juicy connections and discussion, since North America was colonized by Indigenous people about 10 – 20,000 years ago.

The curriculum explores the early relationship between Indigenous and Europeans. Discussions address how the Indigenous people helped the Europeans extract resources (fish, fur) and to survive. Indigenous customs for food preservation and medicine are explored. This grade also explores conflict that arose. For example, the hostility between the Iroquois and New France are explored from both sides. Differing perspectives of how people value land and how people view government (Indigenous vs European perspectives) are discussed.

I think the proposed Grade 3 curriculum does fulfill the requirements of TRC. I applaud the inclusion of Indigenous customs for food preservation and medicine. 

Grade 4

The proposed Grade 4 Social Studies curriculum explores the economic development of Canada, particularly Western Canada. The discussion is mostly from the European perspective, and the Indigenous perspective is scarcely mentioned. The discrimination of non-whites (Chinese, Indian) are mentioned, but the mistreatment of Indigenous people is not included. The role of the Indigenous people during this part of history is scarcely mentioned. One exception is Louis Riel, where the rebellion is discussed from both the European and Indigenous perspective. 

The discussion on Treaties is hollow, and little more than the statement that “We live on Treaty 7 Land”. There is no full discussion of what the treaties entail, what was promised, what was taken away, and who drafted the treaties. An important part of the treaties were the promise of education for the Indigenous people, and this lead to the Residential Schools. While Residential Schools is a topic for Grade 5, it should be mentioned in grade 4 to provide a transition. The discussion is more akin to lip service to mention this portion of history. 

The proposed Grade 4 Social Studies curriculum does not cover enough detail for the Treaties, nor does it mention the creation of the Residential Schools.

Grade 5

The majority of the Indigenous-related material focusses on the Residential Schools. This seems to be hammered into the students in two weeks. The material seems to be a checklist of information rather than a set of tools for future learning.

I will say that the discussion on the Iroquois Confederacy is timely, but a discussion on the Blackfoot Confederacy in Alberta would be more relevant. The impact of the Iroquois or Blackfoot Confederacies on the American democracy is not relevant to people in Alberta, and should be replaced with the impact our the Canadian democracy or society.

The discussion on the traditional Indigenous names for landmarks should take place in Grade 4, where we discuss the explorers and the Anglicized names they gave to landmarks. This would provide a more fulsome discussion of colonialism.

The Grade 5 curriculum does not cover the Residential Schools and their legacy in sufficient depth. The proposed curriculum reads as an insincere checklist of topics that must be covered. There appears to be more fulsome discussion with the American situation than with our Indigenous population. There are plenty of opportunities to relate this to information that was covered previously, such as the importance of family (covered in Kindergarten).

Grade 6

The proposed Grade 6 curriculum includes a lot of content from US history. There is more detail in the treatment of the Indigenous people in the US compared to the amount of detail about their treatment in in Canada.

A discussion of the faiths addresses the issues of comparative religious studies: this includes Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Sikhism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Confucianism and Taoism. The Indigenous relationship with the land has been ignored, and that violates the TRC. There are just as many people in the world that adhere to an indigenous faith as those who adhere to Buddhism.

The American residential schools are described in this grade. This is not relevant to the people in Alberta. It seems there is more discussion on the American residential schools than the Residential Schools in Canada.

Showing the displacement of our Indigenous people on maps is very instructive. The curriculum should stick to the Canadian experience, not the American experience. Maps can show large scale influx of people, and the small displacements caused by communities being flooded out by hydroelectric dams.

The proposed Grade 6 curriculum does not provide content relevant for our indigenous people. 

Summary

The proposed curriculum does include content to educate students about the history of our Indigenous populate. However, the content appears to “check off content boxes” rather than engaging students in fulsome discussion. Four important issues stand out:

1. Neglecting to include the Indigenous faith in the Grade 6 curriculum for the discussion of world faiths.
2. The complex issue of spirituality is not revisited apart from the introduction in Grade 1.
3. There is no discussion about contemporary contributions from our Indigenous population.
4. Insufficient discussion of Indigenous situation in Canada, where there appears to be a detailed discussion about the United States. 

There are several points in the curriculum that open the door for learning opportunities, such as using maps to illustrate the areas that our Indigenous people have been forced out of due to hydroelectric dams, or the importance of family (raised in Kindergarten) and how Residential Schools removed this value. However, the proposed curriculum does not address the requirements that are identified by TRC. This curriculum should be rejected by the people of Alberta.

References