Omission by Design: The Need for an Overhaul of the Ontario Social Studies and History Curriculum
Glynn Sharpe

Abstract
The intention of Ontario’s Social Studies and History curriculum is to promote a better understanding of Canada’s past. Ideally, students are encouraged to reflect upon, synthesize and critically examine periods in its development as a nation that are often problematic. The prescribed, provincially approved curriculum fails to meet this expectation by omitting the Residential School experience thousands of Aboriginal children were forced to endure. The social, cultural, physical and sexual abuse inflicted upon a generation of Native children is omitted entirely from the text teachers are instructed to share with Ontario’s students. The author argues that Junior, Intermediate and Senior students are developmentally prepared to both receive and grapple with this dark era of Canadian history. Omitting the Residential School experience from Ontario’s Social Studies and History curriculum prevents students from understanding this atrocity and what measures must be undertaken in order for such an occurrence to not be replicated within Canada and abroad.

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