Residential Schools In Canada

Residential schools were a very terrible time in Canada’s history, negatively affecting over 150, 000 young Indigenous people between the ages of 4-16 (Green 2012). At the time the government believed that if they taught the natives their ways, native traditions would diminish as time crept by. Many Indigenous children in this period of time would never have normal lives (Residential school essay 2012). Residential schools are religious government funded schools, in which the main purpose of them is to assimilate, educate, and integrate (Miller, 2012). Assimilation was very prominent in Residential schools. Indian agents would take Indigenous people's children away from them and take them to these schools against their will. Ripping generations of close families apart one by one. Next at school, young native children would be put into classes to be taught English. As well as being forced into a new religion without any choice in the matter. Furthermore, they would be punished if they were to practice their religion or speak their native …show more content…
Very few survivors have said that education was good and the schools were a good experience, though the majority has claimed it to be a very awful time. Residential schools taught male and females separately and taught them different skills. One thing both sexes shared in common was learning English a new religion. While females were mainly taught domestic skills, males mainly were taught how to do manual labour such as farming, carpentry, and tinsmithing. On the other hand, education at Residential schools were not always fantastic, since the Government refused to hire real teachers instead people of the church like nuns and priests taught them. Nuns and Priests would not have had the proper education to teach “real students”. Though education was important the way Indigenous people at Residential schools were treated is unforgivable and