Grandmother Cedar as History Teacher? Non-Indigenous Teachers Implementing Tribal Curriculum and Indigenous Knowledges

• In Event: The Importance of Family and Place in Professional Development

Abstract

In 2018, Washington became the first state to require teacher education courses in tribal history, culture and sovereignty. Can non-Indigenous teachers accurately and respectfully teach this curriculum, when their own schooling and teaching practices may contradict its content and Indigenous perspectives? Informed by Indigenous research methodologies and using interviews, observations, student interviews, and audio-recordings of monthly teachers’ circles, this qualitative study examines how non-Indigenous teachers take up this effort. Based on research on Indigenous and settler colonial studies and heterogeneity in learning, early findings suggest that those teaching such curriculum most coherently also work to deepen personal relationships with local Indigenous peoples and lands. Teachers’ approaches, tools and learning processes may offer important contributions for teacher and social studies education.

Author

• Jenni Conrad, Temple University