Thank you for your question.
It's one of those “it depends” answers on how one carries out those conversations. I will say that I think it's important to have those conversations with small children as much as it is to have them with older people. Obviously, my story was about my daughter in grade 3. I know we have been talking about this in my family for some time. This is why I think education is important, but it's also important to educate the educators and to help those participating in education, whether it's teachers, librarians or other people in other areas—parents even—understand that even though these topics are hard, and it is hard to talk about....
I will say that when children are taught in school, as I think mine have been, that Canada is the best and Canada has all these wonderful things and you say, well, yes, but there are these parts of Canada that require work.... So it's allowing people to learn how to have hard conversations and not to not have them because they're uncomfortable or because you don't feel equipped to have them. I do think that is particularly important in thinking about ways that.... As Mr. Big Snake said, coming out to the territory, to the land, and seeing those places is also vitally important for having an understanding of what happened.
Again, it depends, but I think the biggest part is not not having them. That for me is one of the biggest things I would say. Having a national day does speak to the importance, to say, no, we can't not have these conversations.