Shin-chi's Canoe
by Nicola Campbell & Kim LaFave
Description:
Publisher description (Groundwood Books):
This moving sequel to the award-winning Shi-shi-etko tells the story of two children's experience at residential school. Shi-shi-etko is about to return for her second year, but this time her six-year-old brother, Shin-chi, is going, too.
As they begin their journey in the back of a cattle truck, Shi-shi-etko tells her brother all the things he must remember: the trees, the mountains, the rivers and the salmon. Shin-chi knows he won't see his family again until the sockeye salmon return in the summertime. When they arrive at school, Shi-shi-etko gives him a tiny cedar canoe, a gift from their father.
The children's time is filled with going to mass, school for half the day, and work the other half. The girls cook, clean and sew, while the boys work in the fields, in the woodshop and at the forge. Shin-chi is forever hungry and lonely, but, finally, the salmon swim up the river and the children return home for a joyful family reunion.
Author and Illustrator biographies (http://nicolacampbellauthor.blogspot.com/ and Strong Nations):
Author Nicola Campbell is Nłe7kepmx, Syilx and Métis and is named after her home, BC’s Nicola Valley. She has a BFA and a MFA in creative writing and is currently working towards a doctoral degree focusing on contemporary Indigenous Storytelling at UBC Okanagan in Kelowna, BC. She is the author of four childrens books. A Day with Yayah (2017), published by Tradewind Books. Grandpa’s Girls, was a finalist for the 2012 Christie Harris Illustrated Children’s Literature Prize. Shin-chi’s Canoe received the 2009 TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award and is on the 2009 USBBY Outstanding International Books List. Shin-chi’s Canoe is the sequel to Shi-shi-etko and was a finalist for the 2009 Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award and a 2008 Governor Generals award for illustration. Shi-shi-etko was a finalist for the 2006 Ruth Schwartz Children’s Book Award, the 2006 TD Canadian Children’s Literature Award and the 2006 Marilyn Baillie Picture Book Award. It was the co-winner of the 2006 Anskohk Aboriginal Children’s Book of the Year Award.
Kim LaFave has won the Governor General's Award, the Ruth Schwartz Children's Book Award and the Amelia Frances Howard-Gibbon Award for his illustrations in Amos’s Sweater by Janet Lunn. He illustrated Shin-chi's Canoe by Nicola I. Campbell, which was a finalist for the Governor General's Award. He lives in Roberts Creek, B.C.
Resource format: Picturebook
Age recommendation: Grade 1 - 7
Keywords: residential schools, separation, histories, kinship, family, Elders, oral tradition, resilience, hope, identity, colonization, hope, courage, braids, hair cut, cattle truck, fishing, canoe, paddling, parents, grandparents, laws, siblings, village, cultural genocide, Indigenous languages, ethnocentrism, mountain, stream, resistance, sleep alone, separation, cedar, mass, pray, cooking, cleaning, laundry, sewing, farming, carpentry, blacksmithing, porridge, starvation, hungry, snow, winter, eagle, steal food, sockeye salmon, reunification
Year of publication: 2008
Publisher information: Groundwood Books
Teaching and Learning Ideas
Our team collaborated with new teachers, alumni of the Werklund School of Education’s Bachelor of Education program, to create teaching and learning plans for texts in this website. With audiences ranging from Pre-Kindergarten to Post-Secondary, lesson plans across this resource address a wide range of school subject areas, inclusive approaches, and Indigenous education topics, such as the revitalization of Indigenous languages. As this website was designed with Undergraduate Programs in Education instructors, as well as teachers in mind, connections to UPE courses have been flagged on each lesson plan. These lessons are intended as a starting place for educators, to help you envision ways in which you might bring Indigenous literatures, as well as ways of knowing, being, and doing, into your teaching contexts. Please adapt, use, and share these lessons in ways that are generative for your teaching practice. We offer our sincere thanks to the dozens of new teachers who gifted us with these creative ideas!
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