History lessons for Navajo youths revamped

DENVER — Immersed in a sea of rich documents — including copies of Navajo land treaties, aged photographs and decades-old essays — a group of educators meeting in Denver last week engaged in a national experiment. They hope to change the way Navajo students learn American history.

The 29 teachers — 23 of whom are Navajo and all of whom teach children on the Navajo Nation reservation in Arizona, Utah and New Mexico — are engaged in "The Middle Ground Project," a federally funded venture based at the University of Northern Colorado.

Over five years, the $2 million project will train 125 educators to teach history and civics in a way that is culturally relevant, first to Navajo students and ultimately to any student, including urban at-risk kids and those in rural communities.

"Research indicates Navajo students learn better when it is culturally relevant, starting with what they're familiar with and expanding that to the national level and global," said Elvira Bitsoi Largie, a consultant and executive director of the New Mexico-based Navajo Education Technology Consortium.

They need to know about the Liberty Bell and the 13 colonies, but they should know about what was happening in South Dakota with Native Americans during that same period, said Largie.

Larry Shaw, director of sponsored programs at Northern Colorado, said the goal of the program is to find the middle ground between U.S. history and civics and Native American history and civics, and help educators teach it in a way that engages students.

For example, Shaw said, students learning about the Civil War should also know that the "Long Walk" — a 300-mile plus trek the Navajo made to Fort Sumner, N.M., when Col. Kit Carson forced them off their land — also happened during the 1860s.

For Native American students the need is urgent. Nationally, Indian students lag far behind their white and Asian peers academically, and have high dropout rates.

Several years ago, the Southern Utes in Colorado opened the Ute Indian Academy because they were worried about a loss of culture and high dropout rates, said Pearl Casias, a founder of the Montessori school.

Before the school opened, students "were taught Colorado history and American history and they weren't taught anything about Ute history on the territory of Colorado," she said.

Michael Welsh, director of the Middle Ground Project, said loss of culture has been an obstacle to learning for Native students since the late 1800s and mid-1900s, when Indian children were sent to boarding schools.

"The theory was the quickest, cheapest way to civilize them was to move them away," said Welsh.

Today, Navajo youth on the reservation are heavily influenced by the culture of iPods, MTV, alcohol and drugs, said Denise Pete-Thomas, a sixth-grade teacher at the Ganado Unified School District in Arizona who is participating in the program.

"At middle-school age, they're really ashamed of being Navajo," she said.