Teaching Native American Histories

FAIN: ES-250905-16

Five Colleges, Inc. (Amherst, MA 01002-2324)
Alice Nash (Project Director: February 2016 to December 2019)

A two-week summer institute for twenty-five schoolteachers to examine themes of Native American history through the lens of one tribe, the Wampanoags, of southwestern Massachusetts.

This summer institute examines 5 key concepts in Native American Studies through a rigorous interdisciplinary humanities program that includes primary source analysis, museum and Native community visits, and discussions with Native and non-Native presenters. Scholars will live and work together in the Wampanoag homelands of southeastern Massachusetts exploring Native histories and their relationship to contemporary issues through the frameworks of 1)grounded history, 2)identities, 3)land, 4)historical trauma and 5)re-evaluating classroom resources for teaching Native American histories. This subject is timely because a wealth of exciting scholarship has appeared in the last decade, but these new understandings have not been widely incorporated into K-12 or even post-secondary teaching. The Institute is particularly well suited for History and Social Studies teachers because questions about sources and interpretation are integrated throughout and approached from several directions.