Suggestions from Fellow Teachers

IEFA and ELA

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post on the classroom sets of books that OPI's Indian Education division has available to borrow. At the end of the post, I asked for your recommendations. 

Marla Unruh, an elementary librarian in Helena, also wrote in: "I love the Birchbark House - the whole series. Unfortunately, in library I don't have enough time to teach a novel. If I were back in the English classroom, I wouldn't hesitate." [If you are planning on teacher Birchbark House, check out the OPI Model Teaching Unit for grades 5-8.] 

April Wills, an elementary teacher in Bainville, had recommendations for books that weren't on the OPI list of books you can borrow--but they sounded so interesting I thought I'd share: "Our school bought the book Fry Bread by Kevin Noble Maillard [Seminole], and Go Show the World: A Celebration of Indigenous Heroes, by Wab Kinew [Ojibwa]. I feel like they are both exceptional texts and allowed for great conversations." 

Dylan Huisken, Bonner Middle School, also wrote in: "Mike Jetty recommended Counting Coup to me and I use it to teach 8^th graders about postbellum indigenous life in Montana, focusing on themes like continuity and change and of course, the importance of indigenous voices when studying history (and not just focusing on deficit narratives of defeat and massacre).  It is such an accessible book with short chapters.  With advanced readers, it is a supplemental material that they can get through quickly, and for struggling readers, it is a book we can take a chapter at a time.  I highly recommend it. I know some teachers use Good Luck Cat, and our 4^th grade teacher turned literacy coach (she is AWESOME at teaching social studies) did Birchbark House with success. ... Last year our new English teacher did Code Talkers with 7^th graders and said it was a bit of a struggle."  

Dylan also forwarded me an email from the Bonner kindergarten teacher, Amy Paffhausen, with more details about how she teaches Good Luck Cat. On Day 1, she starts with a book walk and make predictions about the book. They also discuss words that rhyme with cat and the /at/ family. After they've read the story the look at their predictions and discuss if "Woogie" was a "good luck cat." Then she has students either illustrate one event from the story or having them draw/write about the beginning, middle, and end. On Day 2, she rereads the story, recall events, and then discuss Woogie's family and their own families. She focused on where Woogie lived, the members of his family, and the activities his family participated in, including powwows. They discuss powwows and watch a video of a powwow. Her students then wrote about a family tradition of their own. (Some years they write about a pet instead.) Finally, on Day 3, she they compare Good Luck Cat to another cat story (like Cat in the Hat) and talk about the difference between fantastic and more realistic stories. They also make a pinch pot cat! I'm including so much detail because Amy was nice enough to take the time to write it out, but also because I love this as an example of how to incorporate Indian Education for all in kindergarten.  

OPI has created a model teaching unit for Counting Coup: Becoming a Crow Chief on the Reservation and Beyond, by Joseph Medicine Crow, which is truly an excellent book. All the books Dylan mentioned are available to borrow from OPI as classroom sets.

 

Teaching Mapping Montana Online

Corvallis teacher Jenifer Powell is teaching online this year and so she's been adapting lesson plans for her the new format. I know that Mapping Montana, A-Z is one of our best-loved and most-used lesson plans, so I was delighted when she sent me links to the way she's adapted that lesson plan for online learning with a note that I can share her work. She commented, "there are definitely flaws, but I have given up being a perfectionist at this point." Good advice to all of us! And thanks, Jenifer, for this very useful material, which is sure to save your fellow teachers many hours of prep!

• Her presentation, Reading a Map, includes a series of short videos on, well--on how to read a map--but also an introduction to the assignment.
• She converted the worksheets that accompanied the lesson plan into Google Docs. 
• And she created a separate presentation on how to complete the worksheets. 

If you have converted other MHS assignments to make them more friendly for online teaching and are willing to share your work, send it along, or share it directly to the Teaching Montana History Facebook page. 

 

 

Teaching Montana History is written by Martha Kohl, Outreach and Interpretation Historian at the Montana Historical Society.