Rationale
Fortunately, through my involvement with Yale National Initiative (YNI)/Delaware Teachers Institute (DTI), I have produced seven units to date to use with my dual-enrollment Sociology course. From the seminar readings, research, and my participation in this seminar, Contemporary American Indian History, I will have an eighth unit. This one, in particular, serves two purposes: one (obviously) – enhance my content knowledge as well as that of my students, and two – provide a much needed context for the reason behind our recent mascot (Redskins) retirement. Beginning with a small group who initiated the change, a battle began and has continued over the past two years. What has ensued is a division amongst the peoples of our school community. Students were never given information about the initial reason behind the change – requests from local and national Native Americans asking us not to use the term that they considered offensive. I want my students to better understand the sociological concept of assimilation and its varieties, how it pertains to Native American history, and how that is actually connected to the use and retirement of our mascot.
Like many districts, our students are ignorant to American Indian contemporary history. As I wrote in a letter to our school board members, in our social studies curriculum, which is very similar to other states’, there is very little reference to Contemporary Native American History. In fact, most of our students are left with the images of the “First Peoples” – as those who were encountered and conquered, Manifest Destiny as it pertains to the westward movement, and the Trail of Tears. Most recently, I spoke with a US History teacher on staff stated that the Allotment Act as it pertains to the westward movement is briefly addressed. All are unaware that 2% of our country’s current population is Native American. In using this unit, my hope is that they will be more knowledgeable of Native Americans as subjects not objects and empathetic to the Native Americans as a whole and more specifically to their request and our change of the mascot.
The curriculum unit will be divided into three parts: (1) assimilation – the purpose and procedures for the Indian Boarding Schools (2) resilience – the manner in which students and families coped with the experience; and, (3) resistance – the reports and laws – the changes to these over time. As much as possible, I want to use a variety of primary sources to include personal accounts so that students see the human component of these concepts. For that reason, I will use primary source sets for each part of the curriculum unit.
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