MN American Indian Texts, Part 2

For this second installment of information on Native American texts to incorporate into ELA classrooms (or social studies, for that matter), we're focused on specific texts. Some of the resources from the previous post also include text suggestions, but here we're focused specifically on texts to use with students. So...

The MN Historical Society is a great site in general, and also has some resources available.

Braided Lives: An Anthology of Multicultural American Writing does not just include texts by and about MN Native Americans, but has some wonderful stories and poems to incorporate.

NCTE has a resource for 7-12 teachers, Roots and Branches: A Resource of Native American Literature, focused on using Native American Literature effectively.

Lessons from Turtle Island: Native Curriculum in Early Childhood Classrooms, by Guy Jones and Sally Moomaw is a resource for primary teachers.

University of Illinois Assistant Professor Debbie Reese maintains a blog focusing on American Indians in children's literature. Though her resources are not necessarily particular to MN American Indian groups (she's tribally enrolled at Nambe Pueblo in New Mexico), there are some great book and resource lists at her site. There are some additional resources listed on the University of Illinois website for Education and Social Science Library.

Noted author Joseph Bruchac's website has links to selected poems written and read by the author. He has many short stories and books that are about Minnesota American Indian populations, though not all fit.  

The Minnesota Humanities Center has many resources available on this topic. Again, several of these texts are not specific to MN Native Americans. But there are some good resources.

The MN Indian Education site on MDE has some curriculum frameworks and lesson plan ideas that might be helpful.

Birchbark Books has some great texts available in store and online.

Some additional text ideas are below. Note that many of the texts listed in Picture Books would be appropriate for older readers, particularly the texts of selected poems and stories.

Picture Books:

• All the Stars in the Sky: Native Stories from the Heavens, by C.J. Taylor
• Black Elk's Vision: A Lakota Story, by S.D. Nelson
• Boozhoo: Come Play with Us, by Fond du Lac Headstart
• The Boy & His Mud, by Paul Goble
• Dance in a Buffalo Skull, by Zitkala-Sa
• Do All Indians Live in Tipis? by the National Museum of the American Indian
• Enduring Wisdom: Sayings From Native Americans, selected by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve
• Fearless John - The Legend of John Beargrease, by Kelly Emerling Rauzi
• The Gift Horse: A Lakota Story, by S.D. Nelson
• The Good Path: Ojibwe Learning and Activity Book for Kids, by Thomas Peacock
• Hiawatha and Megissogwon, by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
• Ininatig's Gift of Sugar: Traditional Native Sugarmaking, by Laura Waterman Wittstock
• Lakota Sioux Children and Elders Talk Together, by E. Barrie Kavasch
• Lana's Lakota Moons, by Virginia Driving Hawk Sneve
• The Legend of the Lady Slipper, by Lise Lunge-Larsen
• The Mishomis Book: The Voice of the Ojibway, by Edward Benton-Banai
• A Native American Thought of It: Amazing Inventions and Innovations, by Rocky Landon
• The Ojibwe, by Michelle Levin
• Sacred Harvest: Ojibway Wild Rice Gathering, by Gordon Regguinti
• Shinebiss: An Ojibwe Legend, by Nancy Van Laan
• Shota and the Star Quilt, by Margaret Bateson-Hill
• The Star People: A Lakota Story, by S.D. Nelson
• Taku Wadaka He? (What Do You See?) by Joanne Zacharias
• When the Rain Sings: Poems by Young Native Americans, edited by the National Museum of the American Indian

Young Adult Books:

• The Birchbark House (and series), by Louise Erdrich
• From the Deep Woods to Civilization, by Charles Eastman
• Growing Up Native American: Stories of Oppression and Survival, of Heritage Denied and Reclaimed, edited by Patricia Riley
• The Journey of Crazy Horse, by Joseph M. Marshall III
• My Indian Boyhood, by Luther Standing Bear
• Night Flying Woman, by Ignatia Broker
• North Country: The Making of Minnesota, by Mary Lethert Wingerd

Here are some Ojibwe Teaching Resources, Distributed to teachers attending the Minnesota Writing Project 2011 Fall Reunion Workshop, 9/24/2011. All credit to the list below goes to the MWP. Some of these are repeats from the above list, but include annotation information. You can find additional resources at the MWP page for the Fall Workshop dedicated to MN American Indian texts.

Baraga, Frederic. A Dictionary of the Ojibway Language. (St. Paul, Borealis Books) Compiled nearly 150 years ago, this dictionary remains the most comprehensive and accurate lexicon available of the Ojibway language. This edition features a new foreword by John D. Nichols.

Bergstrom, Amy, Linda Miller Cleary and Thomas D. Peacock. The Seventh Generation: Native Students Speak about Finding the Good Path. (Charleston,W.V., ERIC Clearinghouse on Rural Education and Small Schools, 2003). From back cover:  In this book, written especially for today’s Native youth, the authors share what they learned from these remarkable young people through their stories of success and failure. Interspersed throughout the book are short fictional “teaching stories” meant to illustrate common dilemmas faced by Native youth and the characters’ responses to them. Discussion questions are included to help youth use the stories as starting points for voicing their own concerns and experiences and for considering how they, too, might find the Good Path.

Broker, Ignatia. Night Flying Woman: An Ojibway Narrative. (St. Paul, Borealis Books, 1983).  With the art of a practiced storyteller, Ignatia Broker recounts the life of her great-great-grandmother, Night Flying Woman, who was born in the mid-19th century and lived during a chaotic time of enormous change, uprootings, and loss for the Minnesota Ojibway. But this story also tells of her people's great strength and continuity.

Densmore, Frances. Chippewa Customs. (St. Paul, Borealis Books, 1979).  This is an authoritative source for the tribal history, customs, legends, traditions, art, music, economy, and leisure activities of the Ojibwe people. It includes a new introduction by Nina Marchetti Archabal.

Erdrich, Louise. The Birchbark House. (New York: Hyperion Paperbacks for Children, 1999). This beloved National Book Award finalist tells the story of a young Ojibwe girl living on an island in Lake Superior in 1847.

Frances Densmore and Brenda J. Child. Strength of the Earth: The Classic Guide to Ojibwe Uses of Native Plants. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2006). From a pioneering ethnographer, an invaluable recording of how early-twentieth-century Ojibwe women used wild plants in their everyday lives.

Grover, Linda Legarde. The Dance Boots. Athens, GA. University of Georgia Press. 2010. Winner of Flannery O’ Connor Award for Short Fiction 2010. From inside cover: With its attention to the Ojibwe language, customs, and history, this unique collection of riveting stories illuminates the very nature of storytelling. The Dance Boots narrates a century’s progression of Native Americans making choices and compromises, often dictated by a white majority, as they try to balance survival, tribal traditions, and obligations to future generations.

Kenney, Dave. Northern Lights: The Stories of Minnesota’s Past. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2003). Read the stories of Minnesota's past through lively text and colorful illustrations of artifacts from the collections of the Minnesota Historical Society. Northern Lights provides an entertaining overview of Minnesota history that is stimulating reading for all ages. Written at a sixth-grade level, Northern Lights is one of the few state history texts created by a historical society. In addition to this Student Edition, an Annotated Teacher’s Edition and Classroom Resources workbook are also available.

Loew, Patty. Native People of Wisconsin. (Madison: State Historical Society of Wisconsin, 2003). Native People of Wisconsin, the fifth text in the New Badger History series for upper elementary and middle school students, focuses on the Indian Nations in the state: the Menominee, Ho-Chunk, Ojibwe, Oneida, Mohican Nation, Stockbridge-Munsee Band, and the Brothertown Indians. Patty Loew has followed the same structure she used in "Indian Nations of Wisconsin", her book for general audiences, in which she provided chapters on Early History and European Arrivals, then devoted the remaining chapters to each of the Indian Nations in Wisconsin today.

McNally, Michael D. Ojibwe Singers: Hymns, Grief, and a Native Culture in Motion. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2009) Author Michael McNally considers the cultural processes through which Native American peoples have made room for their cultural identity within the confines of colonialism.

Nichols, John and Earl Nyholm.  A Concise Dictionary of Minnesota Ojibwe  ( Minneapolis, Mn. University of Minnesota Press, 1995). The most up-to-date resource for those interested in the linguistic and cultural heritage of the Anishinaabe, A Concise Dictionary of Minnesota Ojibwe contains more than 7,000 of the most frequently used Ojibwe words. Presented in Ojibwe-English and English-Ojibwe sections, this dictionary spells words to reflect their actual pronunciation with a direct match between the letters used and the speech sounds of Ojibwe. It contains many ancient words and meanings as well as language added in the twentieth century. The most widely used modern standard writing system for Ojibwe is used throughout, and some of the key objects of Ojibwe life are authentically illustrated by coauthor and artist Earl Nyholm … an essential reference for all students of Ojibwe culture, history, language, and literature.

Peacock, Thomas and Marlene Wisuri, The Four Hills of Life: Ojibwe Wisdom. (Afton, MN: Afton Press, 2006). From cover:  The Four Hills of Life is a wise and beautiful story about the path we walk through the seasons of life, from springtime of youth through the winter of old age. The hills we climb along the way are the challenges we face and the responsibilities we accept. The path is not always wasy; some of us lose our way. We question the meaning of life. But when we walk the Good Path – when we commit to values and fulfill our goals – the meaning of life finds us. Through engaging text, illustrations, and activities designed especially for kids, The Four Hills of Life shows how everything in creation follows this path in the great circle of life. It is a timeless Ojibwe teaching for all young readers.

Peacock, Thomas and Marlene Wisuri, The Good Path: Ojibwe Learning and Activity Book for Kids. (Afton, MN: Afton Press, 2002). Children of all cultures journey through time with the Ojibwe people as their guide to the Good Path and its nine universal lessons of courage, cooperation, and honor. Through traditional native tales, hear about Grandmother Moon, the mysterious Megis shell, and the souls of plants and animals. Through Ojibwe history, learn how trading posts, treaties, and warfare affected Native Americans. Through activities designed especially for children, discover fun ways to follow the Good Path's timeless wisdom every day.

Peacock, Thomas and Marlene Wisuri. To Be Free: Understanding and Eliminating Racism. (Afton, MN: Afton Press, 2010). Imagine if we were free of racism--free from the physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual toll that it takes on both racists and those subjected to racism. Imagine to be free . Many people of color deal with the reality of racism in all its forms on a daily basis--in stores, in schools, at work, on the bus, while watching television, listening to music, browsing the Internet, or reading magazines and newspapers. They can't pretend it go away because it is always there in all its ugliness before them. What if, however, we decided to acknowledge racism and talk about ways of preventing, reducing, and alleviating it? And what if we began the discussion among young people, before they solidify their beliefs about people and other races? 'To Be Free' is written to help facilitate that discussion.

Peacock, Thomas and Marlene Wisuri. Ojibwe: Wasa-Inaabidaa: We Look in All Direction. (Afton, MN: Afton Press, 2002). “A story of land-based cultures in Indian Country. It is also an amazing and wondrous set of stories told by those who dearly love their history and peoples – a great gift to us all: the scattered and dispersed leaves of our stories brought together with this generation’s faces and living words” – Winona LaDuke from back cover.

Truer, Anton, et al.  Awesiinyensag - dibaajimowinan ji-gikinoo'amaageng.  (Minneapolis, Mn. Wiigwaas Press, 2011). A monolingual Ojibwe young reader named Minnesota’s Best Read for 2011 by the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress, Minnesota’s official selection to represent all publications in the state for 2011. Awesiinyensag presents original stories, written in Anishinaabemowin, that delight readers and language learners with the antics of animals who playfully deal with situations familiar to children in all cultures. Suitable for all ages, this book can be read aloud, assigned to classes, shared at language tables, gifted to elders, and enjoyed by those curious about the language and all who love Anishinaabemowin. 
Authored by a team of twelve and richly illustrated by Ojibwe artist Wesley Ballinger, Awesiinyensag will be the first in a series created to encourage learning Anishinaabemowin, the language of Ojibwe people. 

Truer, Anton. Ojibwe in Minnesota. St. Paul, Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2010. From back cover: Anton Truer traces thousands of years of the complicated history of the Ojibwe people – their economy, culture, and clan system and how these have changed throughout time, perhaps most dramatically with the arrival of Europeans into Minnesota territory.

Treuer, Anton, Ed. Living Our Language: Ojibwe Tales and Oral Histories (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2001) Fifty-seven Ojibwe Indian tales collected from Anishinaabe elders, reproduced in Ojibwe and in English translation.

Vennum, Thomas. The Ojibwa Dance Drum: Its History and Construction. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2009). Initially published in 1982 in the Smithsonian Folklife Series, Thomas Vennum's The Ojibwa Dance Drum is widely recognized as a significant ethnography of woodland Indians." This edition features an afterword by Rick St. Germaine.

Vennum, Thomas, Jr. Wild Rice and the Ojibway People. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 1988). Examines in detail the technology of harvesting and processing the grain, the important place of wild rice in Ojibway ceremony and legend, including the rich social life of the traditional rice camps, and the volatile issues of treaty rights.

Vizenor, Gerald. The Everlasting Sky: Voices of the Anishinabe People. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2000). Vizenor's classic first book provides a unique view of reservation life in the late 1960s and early 1970s and the early days of the American Indian Movement.

Vizenor, Gerald. Summer in the Spring: Anishinaabe Lyric Poems and Stories, New Edition. (Norman and London: University of Oklahoma Press, 1993). This anthology, illustrated with tribal pictomyths and helpfully annotated, includes translations and a glossary of the Anishinaabe words in which the poems and stories originally were spoken.

Walker, Niki, Life in an Anishinabe Camp. (New York: Crabtree Publishing Company, 2003) Beautiful artwork illuminates the daily lives of the Anishinabe, or 'first people', also known as the Chippewa or Ojibwa. Living in the Western Great Lakes region, the Anishinabe adapted to each season by changing camp locations to better suit the changing weather. Text describes clan life, different camps for different seasons, how wigwams and other dwellings were built, hunting, clothing, celebrations, and the roles of men and women.

Warren, William W. History of the Ojibway People: Second Edition. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2009). William Warren's History of the Ojibway People, written in 1852 and first published in 1885, is perhaps the most important history of the Ojibway (Chippewa) ever written. The edited, annotated second edition contains an introduction by Theresa Schenck.

White, Bruce. We are at Home: Pictures of the Ojibwe People. (St. Paul: Minnesota Historical Society Press, 2009). A fascinating history of the Ojibwe people at home in the Minnesota landscape through 1950-as told through more than 200 vivid photographs. This book was a winner of the 2008 Award of Merit from the American Association for State and Local History (AASLH) Leadership in History Awards.

More to come in the future, but I hope this gives you some ideas to start. Leave a comment if you know of other fantastic resources about or by Minnesota American Indians!