Canada's History

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Students seek to understand the complex legacies arising from the points of view of the Fathers of Confederation by creating a scripted dialogue between two figures of that time. Starting with a discussion on the removal of the statues of John A. Macdonald, students dig into the dominance of the Orange Order in 19th century Canadian politics and interrogate the commonalities in the treatment of Irish migrants and Métis peoples. This assists students to explain what spurred both Irish Fenians and the Métis to strike violently against the dominant political order of the Confederation era. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a teacher in your community, visit CanadasHistory.ca/Awards.

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Tracey Salamondra and Carla Cooke designed a cross-curricular project where students partnered with community members and organizations to create historical narratives for an interpretive trail expansion in a neighbouring community. The project capitalized on the assets of rural communities, strong relationships, and the ability to overcome obstacles that emerged while completing an inquiry project during the pandemic. The students interviewed current and former residents and worked with museum artifacts, digital archives, and local historians as secondary sources. After studying storytelling, narrative writing, and the writing process, students each wrote, edited, and fact-checked three narratives of their choosing. The project allowed students to see history as a living discipline and learn about their communities' st

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. High school teacher Cynthia Bettio designed a semester-long project for her Grade 10 Canadian history course that is modeled after the Snapshots in Time cards, developed by Dr. Lindsay Gibson, Dr. Catharine Duquette and the Critical Thinking Consortium. The project culminated in students designing their own digital Canadian history timeline game with an emphasis on the narratives of marginalized groups over time. Students, with the support of STEM Minds Inc. and using Unity (a gaming language), developed an interactive Canadian history timeline game which will engage users in navigating key events in the history of 2SLGBTQ, women, immigrants, Indigenous groups, disabled people, and people of colour in Canada since 1914. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a teacher in your community

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Melissa Moorhouse’s project, "Ethical Dilemmas — Then and Now," is an inquiry-based student experience within her class’s examination of key aspects of the Second World War. The project encourages meaningful personal development through reflection on transformational ethical questions. Through research, self-reflection, and conversation, students connect an ethical dilemma of the past to a contemporary Canadian issue. Embracing Universal Design for Learning, students can choose a medium of communication that best suits their learning styles and strengths. It combines the inquiry process, critical evaluation, and higher order thinking all with creative transformative outcomes. Rooted in diversity, equity, and inclusivity, it allows students to connect to their own identities and passions. To learn more about the Governo

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Luisa Fracassi developed her project “Immigrant Voices” as an experiential learning opportunity for her high school students. First, students attended two virtual tours and a workshop run by the Canadian Museum of Immigration at Pier 21 in Halifax. The tours explored the immigrant experience by using memoirs, interviews, and other primary sources, while the workshops shared the history of and process behind conducting oral history interviews. Using what they learned from Pier 21, students conducted an oral history interview with an immigrant, transcribed the interview, and created a historical narrative in a magazine-style layout about their interviewee’s experiences. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a teacher in your community, visit CanadasHistory.ca/Awards.

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Robert Jardine’s research-focused book project engages students in the process of writing history. Students co-create research questions and use those questions as frames to consider various periods in Canadian history. Over the course of the semester, students organize, research, locate images, and write chapters for a student-created history textbook that reflects their interpretation of significant events and peoples in Canada’s past. The intended outcome is that the students use a variety of competencies to create their textbook and that they begin to understand the power of past events in shaping their worldviews and the world they live in, as well as roles that individuals, organizations, and institutions wield in the creation of history. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Barbara Ann Giroux’s first grade class embarked on a vibrant learning journey toward reconciliation. It included participation in the First Nations Child & Family Caring Society’s Reconciliation Ambearrister program, as well as an in-class project on the UN Declaration of the Rights of the Child. Upon class request, it evolved to include all interested students in the school, with the purpose of developing an understanding of equity issues facing many Indigenous communities and TRC Calls to Action within the school. The class shared weekly posts about human rights injustices faced by Indigenous peoples in Canada and invited students to offer their opinions to the weekly question, “Do you think all children in Canada have the same human rights?” The Grade 1 students became knowledgeable leaders in the school, while their

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. After participating in an Indigenous-focused interdisciplinary class, students in Jennifer Maxwell’s class created real-world projects that could contribute to reconciliation. Throughout the course, students explored Indigenous contexts and histories, with topics about the legacy of colonial oppression including land claims (and the LANDBACK movement); Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two-Spirit persons; the Sixties and Millennial Scoops; residential schools and day schools; the Indian Act; the Band Council system; and the reserve system. Students then researched and explored the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, specifically around the Calls to Action. Finally, for students to participate in their own act of reconciliation, they chose a topic, an audience, and a product to design to help

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2022 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. In answering the question, "To what extent have diverse voices shaped Canadian identity and culture?", students in Tanya Andersen’s high school history class can give a direct answer, do a deep dive into a topic of interest from the unit, or complete an "Andersen Assignment," which is an assignment that has more structure. For the unit question and the deep dive, students have a choice of medium through which to communicate their thinking. The “Andersen Assignment” requires students to follow the Design Thinking Process to examine the Grade 10 history textbook for gaps in coverage of a Canadian identity. This project allows students to critically examine the textbook and become advocates for change. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a teacher in your community, visit CanadasHistor

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Jackie Cleave is a teacher at Laura Secord School in Winnipeg, Manitoba, where she developed a project about making the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action accessible for younger students. As Jackie notes, the 94 Calls to Action are a set of directions towards reconciliation but they were not intended as a teaching tool. To make the Calls to Action more accessible, a team of educators worked with seventy-five grades 4, 5, and 6 students to reword the calls in child-friendly language. Her students researched history, explored current reality, toured the Canadian Museum for Human Rights, and listened to Indigenous leaders. The students used art, poetry, dictionaries, and thesauruses to identify the problem and rephrase each Call in their own words. The result is a book containing the art, poetry, orig

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. What do we do with statues of people whose views and actions we now recognize as problematic? What role do we play in the telling of Canada’s national story, and what impact can we have on its future? Katie Tressel considered these essential questions while developing her project “Heroes and Villains.” Students are asked to consider how perspectives about historical figures and events can change. They examined how what we choose to remember about our past influences our future, and they took steps towards creating the Canada they want to live in by designing their own monuments celebrating their vision for the country. Overall, students learned that history is not a single story, and that recognizing multiple perspectives creates a richer, more accurate national identity. To learn more about the Governor General's Hist

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. “Missing,” a show performed by Kelly Barnum’s dance students at Nanaimo District Secondary School in Nanaimo, British Columbia, explored the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls crisis. The thirty-minute show focused on the lost lives of six British Columbian women and girls and incorporated powerful images of those lost and the symbolic red dresses. Kelly developed the show with her former student, Sarah Kielly, in collaboration with the Indigenous Education Department and used music by Indigenous, primarily female, artists; monologues describing the lives and loss of the six women; as well as the NDSS Drumming Group performing "Women's Warrior Song.” The goal of “Missing” was to spread awareness to the school community. Unfortunately, due to COVID the students were unable to share their work with a larger a

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. In Randall Keast’s project, The Human Rights Symposium, students must conduct in-depth research into a marginalized group in Canada and the challenges they faced in their pursuit for equality. Once they have conducted their research, students must present their findings in seminar-style groups. This allows for students to not only engage in a conversation about the historical influences that led to marginalization of these groups, but also provides students an opportunity to directly engage with the history and teach their peers what they’ve learned themselves. At the end of the symposium, students are asked to reflect on the process and explore the notion of a just society. To learn more about the Governor General's History Awards or to nominate a teacher in your community, visit CanadasHistory.ca/Awards.

Denise LeBlanc enseigne à l’École du Grand-Pavois à Rimouski au Québec. Son projet finaliste Le cœur d’Auschwitz a été réalisé en collaboration avec École en réseau et le musée de l’Holocauste de Montréal. Les activités pédagogiques réalisées ont favorisé l’enseignement et la sensibilisation des élèves face à l’Holocauste. Le point de vue ciblé a mis en lumière des actions de bienveillance et d’empathie survenues au cours de cette page d’histoire sombre. Un partenariat avec la Fondation Monique Fitz-Back s’est imbriqué dans la démarche éducative. Cet organisme de bienfaisance aide les jeunes à développer la reconnaissance de l’autre et l’empathie afin de favoriser le vivre-ensemble et la poursuite du bien commun. Le projet Le cœur d’Auschwitz a valorisé le respect des droits de la personne et la considération de la diversité culturelle comme l’enrichissement d’une société saine.

Jean-Pierre Bélanger enseigne au Collège Clarétain à Victoriaville au Québec. Le projet finaliste qu’il a créé pour ses élèves et qui est intitulé Le discours politique, dans la peau des personnages offre aux élèves une occasion de reproduire en classe un discours historique. L'objectif est pour eux de s'approprier notre histoire en redonnant vie aux mots qui ont marqué l'histoire du Canada, en les remettant dans leur contexte et en examinant leur impact sur la société de l'époque. En plus de mettre en valeur leurs talents oratoires, ce projet laisse place à l’originalité des élèves et permet d’actualiser la pensée historique à travers des événements d’une autre époque ou d’un passé très rapproché.

Maintenant plus que jamais, les pédagogues sont ouverts aux conversations sur l'égalité et le racisme systémique. Judette Dumel, enseignante à l’École intermédiaire publique Louis-Riel, a été inspirée par ce thème et a développé son projet finaliste. Concrètement, elle a encouragé ses élèves à explorer des histoires du passé et à fouiller des sujets d'actualités afin qu’ils comprennent ce que vivent les communautés noires du Canada et de l'Amérique du Nord. À travers leurs découvertes, ils ont pu à leur tour devenir transmetteurs de connaissances pour leurs pairs et pour les élèves d'autres classes.

Ce projet créé par Kevin Péloquin, enseignant au Collège Saint-Hilaire à Mont-Saint-Hilaire au Québec, est finaliste pour le Prix d’histoire du Gouverneur général pour l’excellence en enseignement. Le projet intitulé Cours-voyage sur des sites historiques engage activement les élèves à jouer le rôle d’interprètes de l’histoire tout au long de l’année scolaire. À partir de l’étude des fonctions et usages d’un site historique ou d’un artéfact de la Grèce ancienne, les élèves plongent au cœur d’une véritable enquête historienne afin de recoller les pièces de leur casse-tête historique. La présentation du fruit de cette enquête ouvre la voie à la discussion sur les usages publics des lieux historiques sur tout le territoire canadien.

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. Student members of the Westwood Historical Society at Westwood Collegiate, along with teacher Kelly Hiebert, have made a documentary film about student voice and social justice regarding the issues of hate and anti-Semitism in Canada today. The project was inspired by a Holocaust Tour where Kelly and the students in the historical society visited Warsaw Ghetto, POLIN (Museum of Polish Jews), Auschwitz-Birkenau, and Lidice Village just outside of Prague, Czechia. The film includes student-led interviews with eight local Winnipeg Holocaust survivors and Angie Orosz-Richt, who was born in the extermination camp of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Angie has dedicated her life to continuing her mother’s story of bravery, courage, hope, and love to protect her daughter in unimaginable circumstances. Students have also interviewed speciali

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. For over ten years, teacher Mark Perry has led students of various grades (1, 5, 11, and 12) in four different schools in the Kennebecasis Valley, New Brunswick, in a commemorative project called "The Kennebecasis Valley Remembers." The students have uncovered thousands of primary documents and have video-interviewed over sixty Second World War veterans to write five books, of which three have been published, and to produce several documentary films. These products detail historical accounts and the biographies of over 180 people from New Brunswick and the greater Wabanaki Territory. This work has been used by university students and University of New Brunswick historians as they have conducted their own research on the stories of New Brunswick. The present focus is on the development of biographies of veterans of the W

This interview is part of a special series of the Teaching Canada's History podcast where we spoke with the finalists for the 2021 Governor General's History Award for Excellence in Teaching. The Keeping Tobacco Sacred project, started by Michel Blades at the Ranch Learning Centre in Lamont, Alberta, is a reconnection to land, culture, language, and identity for youth growing up in government care. Inspired by the Truth and Reconciliation Commission’s 94 Calls to Action, this project is ultimately a grassroots answer to the assimilation of Indigenous people that resulted from the Residential School System and the legacy of their children. The process of learning to grow, cure, and prepare tobacco from seed to offering provides students with a daily connection to caring for oneself as well as the life of another. Additionally, in acknowledging the length of time it takes to grow medicines, it reinforces the importance of positively connecting the mind, body, and spirit to protocols, language, teachings, cerem