Honoring Tribal Legacies Launches K-12 Native American Curriculum on New Website

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Honoring Tribal Legacies: An Epic Journey of Healing officially launched its two volume publication and complimentary K-12 Native American curricula in a private recognition and gifting ceremony held in Omaha, Nebraska on May 21, 2015. The curricula can be accessed and downloaded online at http://HonoringTribalLegacies.com


Honoring Tribal Legacies: An Epic Journey of Healing officially launched its two volume publication and complimentary collection of K-12 Native American digital curricula in a private recognition and gifting ceremony held in Omaha, Nebraska on May 21, 2015 at the headquarters of the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail and the Midwest Regional Office of the National Park Service.


Sponsored by the National Park Service, the Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail, and the Lewis & Clark Trust, Inc. (Official Friends Group and Partner with the Lewis & Clark National Historic Trail), the Honoring Tribal Legacies project presents a balanced perspective of American history before, during, and after the Lewis and Clark expedition.


The goal of the project is to make resources available to educators so they can integrate Native American Tribal perspectives into curricula at all grade levels and in multiple subject areas.


According to Mark Weekley, Superintendent, Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, “Honoring Tribal Legacies: An Epic Journey of Healing represents the Trail’s long-term commitment to provide opportunities for American Indians to share their history, culture, and experiences in their own way and in their own words. This project is one example of how the Trail exemplifies this ongoing effort to honor tribes.”


A diverse team of educators applied the concepts available in the two volumes to design seven model Teachings (curricula) that are available in their entirety on a complimentary basis on the project’s website at HonoringTribalLegacies.com. These Teachings are available to be used as presented or serve as models for how educators can design curriculum using Honoring Tribal Legacies modules as core components.


Volume I is the foundation document for Honoring Tribal Legacies: An Epic Journey of Healing. It includes chapters that describe how the National Park Service embraced the Tribes as equal partners, why Honoring Tribal Legacies is important to the nation, the value of exploring deep meanings of Tribal place-names, and what is necessary to cultivate sustainable relationships between Tribes and other stakeholders.


Volume II is a guide to help educators master the schema, expressions, and place-based multi-literacies necessary to design high quality curricula. Additional chapters in Volume II attend to differentiated instruction, Common Core State Standards, and culturally responsive testing and assessment of student learning.


Honoring Tribal Legacies: An Epic Journey of Healing was developed by a multitude of people from a diverse array of backgrounds and communities: educators from preK-12, higher education, the National Park Service, Native American Tribal elders, librarians, archive and cultural specialists, historians, a videographer, mapping experts, artists, photographers, an extension specialist, graphic designers, a production manager, a social media coordinator, editors, and chapter authors.


As summarized by CHiXapkaid, Honoring Tribal Legacies Team Leader, “Honoring Tribal Legacies is about healing for the sake of goodness: a goodness extended to the young people of this world who need heroes and true stories of inspiration to aspire, to dream, and to strive to meaningfully contribute to the health and vitality of their communities each and every day.”


Release ID: 83477