What were the conditions like for native american children at indian schools? were coerced to attend the schools and brutally punished for running away?

Indian schools on a whole were terrible for Native American culture. Most natives were coerced into sending their children. They were told that they children would learn the white man's ways and language and be able to better function in the white man's world. However, the schools were designed to destroy Native American culture. Children were stripped of their native clothes, forbidden to speak anything other than English, given "Christian" names. They were told to forget their prior lives as they had no future with it. If they wanted to achieve anything they had to lose it all and assimilate completely into white culture. 

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