Hello everyone! I hope this is okay for me to post here and I want to very clear that I mean NO offense, if something I ask or say comes off in a negative way. I am genuinely trying to wrap my head around this topic, and after discussing this at length with other teachers I know and my husband, I thought I would see if there was anyone willing to lend an ear to this topic.
I am a music teacher in Newfoundland, teaching at a kindergarten to grade 6 school. I’m about halfway through my career, so I’ve done approximately 15 or so Remembrance Day assemblies. My pop was a Korean War veteran who spoke at all my school assemblies growing up and nothing made me more proud. I cry every year thinking of him.
My school is center city, and has always been more of the most diverse school communities in our province. With the huge amount of new Canadians that have joined our school over the last few years, we are sitting at a pretty much 50/50 split between kids born in Canada and not. There see various reasons for these families coming here, but many/most are fleeing war in their home countries - Ukraine, Syria, Palestine, Democratic Republic of Congo, Jordan, Sudan, and I could acruslly go on and on - we have over 30 countries represented. It is beautiful and special and I am so proud to be their teacher and to know and learn from them.
I am lucky to be able to invite members of our Legion who come with their flags and march in. I love having them at our school and love the friendship I have made with them over the years - most of them are Korean War veterans like my pop (who died from cancer over 20 years ago - I wish I could ask this question to him!).
Okay, my question: I follow the Legions “script”/order. I have students emcee so in their speaking parts so I also have lines that reference the idea that war is not just black and white photos - many of our students have come from war, war is happening right now around our world, etc - I also have the emcees talk a little bit about Indigenous Veterans Day but that’s a slightly different topic for another day.
How do you feel about this sort of inclusion? A focus on war across the world? Potentially a heavier focus on peace? How do you feel about teachers trying to balance saying thank you for keeping Canada safe, when also trying to stay trauma informed and trying to make the kids most directly and recently impacted by war feel validated. So I guess I don’t have one question - I am wondering how to balance the fact this is a Canadian holiday, focusing on the CANADA in Remembrance Day while also acknowledging my specific students who have so much war trauma.
I wish I had a better, more direct question. I hope someone out there knows what I am trying to talk about. Either way, thank you for your time, even just if you’ve read some of this novel!
