OCDSB News Release - December 8, 2011
2011 Governor General’s History Award for Excellence in Teaching
Awarded to Elizabeth Wyn Wood Alternate High School Teacher Sylvia Smith
Teacher Helps Heal the Past through "Project of the Heart"
December 12 – 10:00 a.m.
Rideau Hall - 1 Sussex Drive, Ottawa
December 8, 2011 Ottawa, – We must never forget, so we will never repeat is a message history teachers deliver in public school classrooms on a daily basis. Elizabeth Wyn Wood Alternate High School Teacher, Sylvia Smith wanted her students to truly understand the harrowing Indian Residential School Era. So she created an innovative learning module that is now being used in classrooms across Canada.
Thousands of small wooden tiles were used to honour the memory of a child who died in a residential school. Ms. Smith and her students worked with Elders and Indian Residential School survivors from First Nations, Métis, and Inuit communities, to ensure accuracy, to ensure respect, and to make history real.
Sylvia is one of the seven teacher recipients for the 2011Governor General’s History Award for Excellence in Teaching. On December 12, 2011, His Excellency the Right Honourable David Johnston, Governor General of Canada, will award these teachers, along with eleven other outstanding Canadians. They will be recognized for their accomplishments and contributions, to broadening the awareness in and understanding of our history and heritage.
Elizabeth Wyn Wood Alternate High School Vice-principal Monica Leonhardt, says, "Sylvia’s passion for history, her love of teaching, and her commitment to creating an innovative and interactive environment in her classroom is well known, and well respected by her students and her peers."
The Governor General’s History Awards bring together students, teachers, historians, museums and community organizations, writers and media producers to celebrate as well as learn from each other. The day prior to the award ceremonies, recipients will participate in a public history forum at the Library and Archives. This year’s forum, "Speaking of History: How History is Explored Beyond the Classroom" is open to the public to attend onsite or online by registering at CanadasHistory.ca/HistoryForum2011.
TD Bank Group is the presenting sponsor of the Governor General’s History Awards. The teacher recipients will be awarded $2,500 and a gold medal. Their respective schools will receive a cash gift of $1,000. In addition, teachers are provided with a trip to participate in the EF Educational Tours’ National Student Remembrance Tour for the 95th Anniversary of Vimy Ridge in April, 2012.
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For further information please contact: Vice-principal, Monica Leonhardt or Teacher, Sylvia Smith at 613-225-1322 or Sharlene Hunter, OCDSB Communications and Information Services at 596-8264.