First Nation American Indian classroom Resources found on the Educational CyberPlayGround.
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Music, Dance, Language, Cree, Navajo, Cherokee, Literacy, Black First Nation People, Virgin Island, Hawaii Resources
Thanksgiving
November is National American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month.
Draw on our varied resources to celebrate and learn about the culture and history of the Native peoples of America.
Learn about history and culture.
ALASKA
Honorary Alaskans ~ Ken Waldman
Inquisitive, you ponder maps,
pronounce simpler place names --Kake,
Wrangell, Sitka, Tok, Nome,
Barrow, Homer -- then the twistier --
Yakutat, Unalakelett, Tuntuntuliak,
Kotzebue, Kwigrilingok, Iliamna.
Inquisitive, you take journerys
which ight include a night's sleep
on the deck of the Taku or Malaspina,
a misty hike up Mr. Ripinski, a paddle
into a shining Kachemak Bay cove, a sunlit
1 A.M. stroll the length of downtown Ester.
Inquisitive, you'll hear a local
refer to Ketchikan as Tijuana, Alaska;
you'll learn Anchorage is Los Anchorage
(a mere half hour from what's truly Alaska);
you'll imagine you'd not just survive winter
in Talkeetna or Haines -- you'd thrive.
Inquisitive, you return north a minute
or two daily, plan next year's trip,
then the one after, and take leave a moment --
even if its over therre in an office, or right here onstage''
and then take leave a moment more.
History of Alaska
The history of Alaska, as part of the United States, began in 1867, but settlement of the region dates back to the paleolithic period (around 12,000 BCE). The earliest inhabitants were asiatic groups who crossed the Bering Land Bridge into what is now western Alaska. Many, if not most, of the pre-Columbian peoples of the Americas crossed the land bridge before migrating south. At the time of European contact by the Russian explorers, the area was populated by the Inuit and a variety of other Indigenous groups.
The name "Alaska" is most likely derived from the Aleut word Alyaeska, meaning greater land as opposed to the Aleut word Aleutia, meaning lesser land. To the Aleuts, this distinction was a linguistic variation distinguishing the mainland from an island.
Most of Alaska's documented history dates from European settlement, starting with Vitus Bering, a Danish navigator in the service of the Russian Navy aboard the St. Peter. However, Aleksei Chirikov, commanding the St. Paul, made landfall first at the present-day site of Sitka on July 15, 1741. The Russian-American Company soon began hunting the otters and helping to colonize much of coastal Alaska, but the colony was never profitable, due mainly to high shipping costs.
William H. Seward, the U.S. Secretary of State, engineered the Alaskan purchase in 1867 for $7.2 million. The nearby Yukon Territory in Canada and Alaska itself were the site of a gold rush in the 1890s, and they remained a significant source of mining even after gold reserves diminished. On July 7, 1958 President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Alaska Statehood Act into law which paved the way for Alaska's admission into the Union as the 49th State on January 3, 1959.
The "Good Friday Earthquake" of March 27, 1964, registering 9.2 on the Richter scale, killed 131 people and leveled several villages. Oil revenues helped reestablish the population and infrastructure of the State after deposits were discovered in 1968, and after the Trans-Alaskan Pipeline was completed in 1977. In 1989, the Exxon Valdez hit a reef in the Prince William Sound, spilling between 11 and 35 million US gallons (42,000 and 130,000 m³) of crude oil over 1,100 miles (1,600 km) of coastline. Today, more than half of Alaskan land is owned by the Federal Government. The fates of the large reserves of wild frontier in the State are under debate, as is the highly political conflict over oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. [source]
Stories are Property
All stories are considered property in the Tlingit cultural system, such that sharing a story without the proper permission of its owners is a breach of Tlingit law. However, the stories of the Tlingit people as a whole, the creation myths, and other seemingly universal records are usually considered to be property of the entire tribe, and thus may be shared without particular restriction. It is however important to the Tlingit that the details be correct, for if not this can lead to perpetuations of error and worsen the transmission of the information in the future, as well as degrade the value of the knowledge.
Tlingit
http://www.thefreedictionary.com/Tlingit
Tlingit - a member of a seafaring group of North American Indians living in southern Alaska
Tlingit - the Na-Dene - a family of North American Indian languages spoken by the Tlingit people
LEARN WHY ENGLISH IS A CRAZY LANGUAGE
"Hooch" goes back to Alaska of 1867. There the Hoochinoo Indians made a liquor dubbed "hoochinoo" or "hoch" by American soldiers sent there when Alaska was sold to the U.S. by Russia.
The story begins with the Athabaskan (Ghunanaa) people of interior Alaska and western Canada, a land of lakes and rivers, of birch and spruce forests, and the moose and caribou. Life in this continental climate is harsh, with bitterly cold winters and hot summers. One year the people had a particularly poor harvest over a summer, and it was obvious that the winter would bring with it many deaths from starvation. The elders gathered together and decided that people would be sent out to find a land which was rumored to be rich in food, a place where one did not even have to hunt for something to eat. A group of people were selected and sent out to find this new place, and would come back to tell the elders where this land could be found. They were never heard from again. However, we now know that these people were the Navajo and Apache, for they left the Athabaskan lands for a different place far south of their home, and yet retain a close relationship with their Athabaskan ancestors.
The Killer Whale is on the Eagle side and Salmon is the Raven side, so they can get married.
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It is balance of marriage. When Norman designed this print, he was inspired by a couple who are his close friend. The faces in the Killer Whale are Killer Whale's children. The image between the Killer Whale and the Salmon is a Human and represents the connection of the human world and animal world.
Jackson is a recognized Master Artist in metal engraving by the Alaska State Council on the Arts Master Apprentice Grant and has received numerous honors for his excellence in wood carving.
Totem Poles
are monumental sculptures carved from great trees, typically Western Redcedar, by a number of Native American cultures along the Pacific northwest coast of North America. the center of pole construction was centered around the Haida people of the Queen Charlotte Islands, from whence it spread outward to the Tsimshian and Tlingit and then down the coast to the tribes of British Columbia and northern Washington. The designs themselves are generally considered the property of a particular clan or family group, and this ownership may not be transferred to the owner of a pole (See also Heraldry). As such, pictures, paintings, and other copies of the designs may be an infringement of posessory rights of a certain family or cultural group. Thus it is important that the ownership of the artistic designs represented on a pole are respected as private property to the same extent that the pole itself is property. Public display and sale of pictures and other representations of totem pole designs should be cleared with both the owners of the pole and the cultural group or tribal government associated with the designs on the pole.
Shame Poles
The poles used for public ridicule are usually called "shame poles", and were erected to shame individuals or groups for unpaid debts. Shame poles are today rarely discussed, and their meanings have in many places been forgotten. However they formed an important subset of poles carved throughout the 19th century.
One famous shame pole is the Lincoln Pole in Saxman, Alaska; it was apparently created to shame the U.S. government into repaying the Tlingit people for the value of slaves which were freed after the Emancipation Proclamation. Other explanations for it have arisen as the original reason was forgotten or suppressed, however this meaning is still clearly recounted by a number of Tlingit elders today.
Alaska First Nation people and Slavery
In the past the Tlingit were avid practicers of slavery. The outward wealth of a person or family was roughly calculated by the number of slaves held. Slaves were taken from all peoples that the Tlingit encountered, from the Aleuts in the west, the Athabascan tribes of the interior, and all of the many tribes along the Pacific coast as far south as California. Slaves were bought and sold in a barter economy along the same lines as any other trade goods. They were often ceremonially freed at potlatches, the giving of freedom to the slave being a gift from the potlatch holder. However, they were just as often ceremonially killed at potlatches as well, to demonstrate economic power or to provide slaves for dead relatives in the afterlife. Treatment of slaves seems to have differed from individual to individual, and both stories and historical records give examples of slaves being treated very kindly as well as very cruelly.
Since slavery was an extremely important economic activity to the Tlingit, it came as a tremendous blow to the society when emancipation was enforced in Alaska some time after its purchase from Russia. This forced removal of slaves from the culture incensed many Tlingit who were not so disturbed by its outlawing as much as by the fact that they were not repaid for their loss of property. In a move traditional against those with unpaid debts, a totem pole was erected that would shame the Americans for not having paid back the Tlingits for their loss, and at its top for all to see was a very carefully executed carving of Abraham Lincoln, whom the Tlingits were told was the person responsible for freeing the slaves. This has since been frequently misinterpreted as intending to honor Lincoln, but it was in fact done as a way to shame the US government into repaying the Tlingits for a profound loss of wealth. [source]
Alaska Activities
Totem Poles of the North American Northwest Coast Indians The North American Northwest Coast Indians of the past had no written language. How can we know about them or their past culture if they left no books? All they left behind was their material culture, their artifacts, their things. Yet these artifacts are a great legacy for they tell us as much about the culture as a written record. As Mihaly Czikszentmihalyi stated in his book The Meaning of Things: “Things embody goals, make skills manifest and shape the identities of their users.” Through the study and analysis of artifacts, students can gain valuable knowledge and insight into the, creators and their culture. Objects are visual records of what their makers considered important or significant, and learning occurs through looking at and analyzing the concrete object. Reciprocally, our own culture speaks or expresses itself through our own objects. It is important that students understand that learning and communicating are not limited to reading and writing. Visual perception and awareness also play a part in the learning process.
Learn Why the Iditarod got Started - sled dog race
The Alaska / Irish connection of interest is the sled dog mushers
<snip>
But five years later the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 - 1919 wiped out entire Eskimo villages. The whole world suffered from that post-WW I disease that killed in every country, city and village. It struck hard in rural Alaska, including Nome. Then on an ordinary mid-January day in 1925, the U.S. Public Health doctor in Nome, Dr. Curtis Welch, was summoned by an anxious Eskimo man who told him his two children were very, very sick with sore throats. The children were so ill that they couldn't open their mouths for him to examine them. A day or two later the doctor was called to the home of a white family whose little boy was also ill with a sore throat and raging fever. When Dr. Welch saw the telltale white membranes of diphtheria closing off the boy's air passages, he knew what the town was facing! The doctor met at once with the town's mayor and city council, explaining to them that they could have a devastating epidemic on their hands and some way must be found to get diphtheria antitoxin to Nome as soon as possible! The serum was found, it was rushed to the Alaska Railroad train, which carried it to Nenana. The railroad turns east at Nenana and heads into Fairbanks. So twenty dog mushers were alerted and waiting to begin the overland relay from Nenana to Nome. The mushers were Eskimos, Russian-Eskimos, Norwegians, Irish and Indians. And the serum arrived in Nome in time to save the lives of dozens and dozens of children, also of every race and nationality. Today that serum run is memorialized in the annual 1,049-mile Iditarod dog sled race that ends under the finish-line arch in Nome.
Read American Indian and Alaska Native Children: Findings From the Base Year of the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Birth Cohort:
Read Status and Trends in the Education of American Indians and Alaska Natives
Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository - Kodiak, Alaska
Click to Hear, See and Learn the Word of the Week - How do you say "hi" in Alutiiq? What is the origin of the word Kodiak?
Alaska Native Curriculum and Teacher Development Project involves educators across the state who develop and publish online Native curriculum and resources.
Alaska Native Heritage Center is a gathering place in Anchorage that celebrates, perpetuates, and shares Alaska Native cultures. Find online FAQs about Alaska for students and other education resources.
Alaska Native Knowledge Network offers a deep wealth of educational resources on Alaska Native knowledge systems and ways of knowing, including culturally responsive standards for students, schools, teachers, communities, and libraries.
Alutiiq Museum and Archaeological Repository won the 2000 National Award for Museum Service, awarded annually to outstanding American museums by the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services. This site offers many educational resources, including the Alutiiq word of the week.
Anchorage Museum of History and Art provides online photographs and images of artifacts as well as education information.
LitSite Alaska is an online magazine and gathering place for readers and writers of all ages.
Resources
National Indian Telecommunications Institute
110 N. Guadeloupe, Suite 9 Santa Fe, NM 87501
(505) 986-3872 Issues, Education, Events ~Look for teacher created webpages and other information on our cultural curriculum model.
Native Village Fabuous resource for everyone.
Paiute children playing game called wolf and deer, northern Arizona. Photographed by John K. Hillers, October 1872
Cradelboard Project by Buffy Sainte-Marie
Delivering a lot of the Project online including testing, student handouts, teacher lesson plans etc.
Listening To Our Ancestors: The Art of Native Life Along the NorthPacific Coast
http://www.nmai.si.edu/listening/
Presented by the National Museum of the American Indian, this Web exhibit focuses on ceremonial and everyday objects created and used by 11 Native communities that have lived in the Pacific Northwest: Coast Salish, Gitxsan, Haida, Heiltsuk, Kwakwaka'wakw, Makah, Nisga'a, Nuu-chah-nulth, Nuxalk, Tlingit, and Tsimshian. The Credits section of the site provides complete information about how information and materials were gathered from each community. For each community, visitors to the site can read commentary by community curators and view objects that were used for a variety of purposes. The theme of the Coast Salish gallery is "Everything is connected", and curator Marilyn G. Jones notes, "The items weren't made for art, they were made for use." Examples include baskets and mats, canoes, and weaving items such as whorls (parts of a spindle, used for spinning fiber into thread by hand), which, despite Jones' disclaimer, are exquisitely decorated. On the other hand, the Tlingit gallery starts with the statement "These are our treasures" and includes art - sculptures of a Raven and a pipe in the shape of an eagle; body ornaments - for hair, bracelets and
earrings; and a treasure chest.
LACROSSE
Lacrosse is the oldest sport in North America
The origin of Lacrosse dates back to the 1400s when the Hyron Indians played it. It got the name from Priest Jean de Brebeuf likened the stick the indians competed with, to the "crosier" carried at religious ceremonies by a bishop. Thus, the namela crosse evolved, and this later became simply "lacrosse." Teams were made up of one hundred to one thousand braves on each side. The goals were usually five-hundred yards to one-half mile apart, but could be several miles. Games lasted over two or three days. The French adopted some crude rules in the 1800's and are now credited for being the forefathers of lacrosse, along with the indians. Potawatomi Tradition also see Lacrosse Biomechanical and Ergonomic Issues
IMAGES
American Historical Images On File
"This collection of historical photographs is provided with the permission of Facts on File, Inc., and is a comprehensive collection of images of Native American people. The collection is arranged chronologically from the prehistoric period and the Paleo-Indians to 1990 and the appointment of R. Richard West as director of the National Museum of the American Indian. The collection includes information and images which describe the lifeways of various tribes and include historical entries for particular Indian groups. Narrative is provided that provides the historical and cultural background describing the event, person, or subject presented."
Famous Native Americans
http://photoswest.org/exhib/faves/famsNAintro.htm
Selection of historical photos of well-known Native Americans. Includes photos of Rain in the Face, Sitting Bull, Red Cloud, Ouray and Chipeta, Chief Joseph, Geronimo, Ignacio, and American Horse. Part of the photography collection at Denver Public Library. Note: may not display enlarged images.
Canada
Education Nunavut
P.O.Box 390 Arviat,Nunavut, X0C 0E0, Canada [phone] 867-857-3066
Where Are the Children? Healing the Legacy of Residential Schools - This exhibit "attempts to give voice to the untold stories of so many Aboriginal boys and girls who attended residential schools in Canada from 1831 to the 1990's." Articles and stories discuss assimilation of Aboriginal people, physical and sexual abuse in the school system, and related topics. Includes images and video clips. In English and French. From the Legacy of Hope Foundation, Aboriginal Healing Foundation, and Library and Archives Canada
