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SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE - Hundreds of teachers were at Sir John Franklin high school last week for a two-day professional development workshop on aboriginal education and the effect the residential school system has had on the communities and individuals in the North.

Jessica Ehnes, who works at K'alemi Dene School in Ndilo, listens to acclaimed broadcaster Paul Andrew as he tells his story on the impact of residential schools on communities and students. - Ben Morgan/NNSL photo

The workshop's organizer Shannon Payne is the aboriginal education coordinator for Yk1.

"This is to give teachers a historical perspective at why we have the issues that we face today, from the perspective of aboriginals," she explained.

Payne said the residential school system has had lasting intergenerational-effects.

"I mean it's basically a cultural genocide," said Payne.

Children were forcibly removed from their families and taken to the institutions.

"They were told to be ashamed of their parents, their culture and their language and they were forbidden to practice their culture or speak their language," said Payne.

"In school systems in the south," she said, "you don't tend to hear about the aboriginal school system and if you do it isn't from the aboriginal perspective, so there is not that same empathy or the extent to how it destroyed a people."

Payne said she wanted to let teachers hear first hand the effects the school system had the people of the North and to help them understand why aboriginal education is so important. She said the intention of the Yk1 workshop was to give teachers concrete strategies for working with aboriginal students and aboriginal communities.

The event brought in a specific group of elders who spoke passionately about their experience. Teachers at the workshop gathered into groups and heard stories told by the elders. They also watched a documentary called The Fallen Feather, which focused on the residential school system and the history of what happened.

She said talking about the residential school system is not about pointing fingers but rather about understanding.

Reanna Erasmus, who was representing her aboriginal heritage, presented at the workshop.

She didn't go to a residential school but she understands the systemic problems that resulted from them. Her mother went to a residential school at the age of two.

"When she had me she didn't understand how to express the love and nurturing that I needed because she never experienced it in the schools," said Erasmus.

"I don't blame my mother because I know what she went through but when I had children I made sure I went to lots of parenting classes so that I learned all the things I never learned from my mother when I was a child."

She said the schools have had a long-lasting impact on people in the North. The workshop, she added, was well received.

"I had teachers approach me afterward who told me they had no idea about the history here. I think they were grateful."

Erasmus called the workshop a "first step" and said forums like this should be continued and discussed in communities across the North and the entire country. "People need to know this, it's important," she said.

Payne said it's not a matter of fixing a problem. "It's a matter of recognizing that there are challenges and that if we can at least be aware of why there are problems then we can be a bit more compassionate as teachers and educators," she explained, "and it's really just about being human and building relationships with people."