A comprehensive book about Orange Shirt Day will be available in late August.
Designed as a textbook for middle school-aged students, Secretary-Treasurer of the Orange Shirt Society, Joan Sorley, said in addition to the history of Orange Shirt Day, it covers a variety of topics related to it as well.
Sorley explained how the book came together.
“We started last July in our little office, the publisher came up from Victoria and there were sticky notes all over the boardroom table. That’s how we started this book with an outline composed of sticky notes and then we ended up with this beautiful, gorgeous book less than a year later”.
The Orange Shirt Day book covers the history of residential schools in Canada, the Society’s movement in Williams Lake, and how Orange Shirt Day has exploded across the country.
Sorley said when the book does come out on August 18th there will also be a study guide issued with it that’s meant for teachers or for somebody who is trying to facilitate reconciliation sessions.
“There are chapter questions at the end, there’s a chapter about reconciliation and different things that it means to different people. Every chapter has review questions, reflection questions and most chapters have some extra research questions and activity assignments”.
Sorely said they hope that schools will take advantage of it and order it for their schools, maybe not a textbook for every student, that’s probably a bit much to expect but certainly, we would hope that they’re available in the schools for sure.
Both Executive Director and Founder of the Orange Shirt Society, Phyllis Webstad, and Sorely are both excited about how the Orange Shirt Day book turned out.
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