Celebrating Native American Heritage Month

Second grade and fourth grade curriculums embrace studies of the first Americans. I love teaching how Native Americans value the importance of beauty in functional objects and celebrate the spiritual in the everyday natural world! 

Each 2nd grade class studies a different region and habitat: from the Seminole to the Hopi to the Tlingit to the Kansa to the Iroquois… we explore how the everyday object contains aesthetic value and meaning.

A student from 2O smearing a coil onto a pinch pot in the Hopi fashion

Each Hopi pot unique… others made Iroquois cooking pots and Seminole mortar and pestles
and Plains Indian containers…

Seminole patchwork provides 2C a great opportunity to talk about patterning,
rhythm and geometric shapes!

Glazing our mortar and pestles in 2C

2N creates a Tlingit dance button blanket featuring
the power animal that represents their clan

… finding inspiration in the artwork of the Northwest Coast Native Americans

Fourth graders create a Kachina Doll in the tradition of the Hopi Indians to teach the school rules to the children. Each mixed media assemblage doll sports an elaborate headdress,
represents a spirit of the natural world, and possesses a spirit power.