The Blackfoot language has experienced a substantial decrease in speakers since the 1960s and is classified as "severely endangered" by the UNESCO Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger. In Canada, this loss has been attributed largely to residential schools, where Indigenous students were often punished severely for speaking their first languages. Widespread language loss can also be attributed to the Sixties Scoop, through which thousands of Indigenous children were taken from their families, often without parental consent, and relocated by the government into non-Indigenous families. As a result of these losses, the Blackfoot community has launched numerous language revitalization efforts, include the Piikani Traditional Knowledge Services and many more.