Resource Library
Find compelling classroom resources, learn new teaching methods, meet standards, and make a difference in the lives of your students.
We are grateful to The Hammer Family Foundation for supporting the development of our on-demand learning and teaching resources.
![A group of high school students sit at desks in conversation.](/sites/default/files/styles/scale_480/public/2023-10/AdobeStock_254378868.jpg?itok=f6YAphey)
Introducing Our US History Curriculum Collection
Draw from this flexible curriculum collection as you plan any middle or high school US history course. Featuring units, C3-style inquiries, and case studies, the collection will help you explore themes of democracy and freedom with your students throughout the year.
Apologies
Learn about the public apologies issued by several churches in the years following critical reports and testimony from residential school survivors.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
The Government’s “Statement of Reconciliation”
Learn about the 1980s response of the Canadian government to the long-lasting effects of residential schools on indigenous communities.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Prime Minister Harper's Apology
As part of the Indian Residential Schools Settlement Agreement, a Truth and Reconciliation Commission was established. Before its work got under way, Prime Minister Stephen Harper issued a public apology on June 11, 2008, on behalf of the Canadian government. The apology is part of the process arranged by the government and the First Nations as parties to the agreement, part of an overall attempt to address the government’s role in the history of the Indian Residential Schools.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Truth and Reconciliation
Since the beginning of its work in 2010, the commission has been collecting information about what was done to survivors in the residential schools and has worked to make this information public. From this process, the survivors receive public, communal acknowledgement and support for years of injustice and suffering.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
The Charge of Genocide
In the 1990s, residential schools scholars and many indigenous leaders began to argue that the efforts of the Canadian government to assimilate the Indigenous Peoples in the residential schools embodied the principle of cultural genocide: assimilation was intended to destroy the Indigenous Peoples as culturally distinct group.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Prime Minister Harper’s Apology
The apology is part of the process arranged by the government and the First Nations as parties to the agreement, part of an overall attempt to address the government’s role in the history of the Indian Residential Schools.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Métis
The term Métis describes descendants of both Europeans and First Nations people (the Canadian government did not formally recognize the term until the Constitution Act of 1982).
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
The Invention of the “Indian”
One of the first acts of the European colonization of the Americas was an act of naming or, more accurately, misnaming.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Colonization
When the European powers set their sights on North America, some three hundred years after the so-called discovery of the continent (which for them was the “New World”), it became a location for French and British settlements.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
Colonial Power Struggle
War and political changes also contributed to the destruction of indigenous ways, livelihoods, and physical existence.
![Graphic from cover of "Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and the Indian Residential Schools."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/SL_graphic5.png?h=bc3345c8&itok=_uc8CaVR)
The Lone Ranger
This image portrays the fictional Native American character, Tonto, in the 1930s radio show and 1970s television adaption, "The Lone Ranger."
![1950s film still from The Lone Ranger.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/LoneRanger_FH24271.jpg?h=c17ae58b&itok=H4AKnQtV)
Stolen Lives: The Charge of Genocide and the Residential Schools
Various scholars, indigenous and non-indigenous, discuss the charge of genocide regarding the Residential School system in Canada and its effects. This video is a part of the resource Stolen Lives: The Indigenous Peoples of Canada and The Indian Residential Schools.
![](/sites/default/files/brightcove/videos/images/posters/image_1808.jpg)