How NOT to teach Thanksgiving
In North Carolina, for example, teachers receive this guidance from the Wake County school system’s Office of Equity Affairs, as shown in this tweet by Lauryn Mascareñaz, a director in that office:
Teachers! Repeat after me:
I will not have my students make "Indian" feathers/clothes.
I will not culturally appropriate an entire people for "cute" activities.
I will tell my students the truth about this country's relationship with Indigenous people.#PinterestIsNotPedagogy
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The office provided links to help teachers look at the holiday in “a historical and culturally appropriate way.”
Do you teach Thanksgiving in a historical & culturally appropriate way? Are you centering voices of Indigenous people?
See links from NCDPI, @RaceJusticeEd about this crucial & often misrepresented part of our nation's history. ncpublicschools.org/americanindian…docs.google.com/document/d/1Gs…
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The nonprofit Center for Racial Justice in Education has compiled a guide for teachers on how to approach Thanksgiving, which you can find here. And one educator, Debbie Reese, posted a striking series of tweets (see below) in which she tells teachers how not to teach Thanksgiving.
Reese has taught elementary school in traditional public schools and in two schools for American Indians: Riverside Indian School in Anadarko, Okla., and Santa Fe Indian School in Santa Fe, N.M.
Enrolled in the Nambé Pueblo tribe in northern New Mexico, she taught children’s literature, American Indian studies and other courses at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. And she is the founder of an organization called American Indians in Children’s Literature.
Here are many of the tweets she posted:
1) Dear #Parents of kids in elem schools:
I'm not tagging your account or your school's account, but a lot of schools do biased and racist and educationally WRONG activities to "teach" kids about "the First Thanksgiving" and they share photos of the activities on social media.
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2) If you signed a waiver that your school could take and use photos of your child, you might find photos of your child in a costume that is meant to be an "Indian" at that "first Thanksgiving." Some parents think it is cute and share photos, too.
3) It isn't cute. One day, your kid might ask you why you let that happen.
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4) These activities are horrendous for Native kids.
They may have a name given to them in a ceremony specific to their nation.
Teacher's asking them to "pick an Indian name" is such a violation of their spiritual traditions that are every bit as sacred as yours.
5) I'm looking at a photo right now of a row of girls in costumes. On each costume is a dark-skinned face with braids and feathers, and beneath it, a name. See?
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6) A video was circulating yesterday that showed a group of kids--not in costume--but singing lyrics including "We are the red men" and "feathers in our hair men" and "down among the dead men" and "powwow, powwow" and "hunting for mooses for our papooses." As they sang...
7) They did gestures with their hands, fingers, and arms. That video is gone, now. I guess the person who shared it read the tweet replies. Did she take it down because she was embarrassed after realizing it was not a good activity? I hope so but I don't know.
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8) There is so much wrong with all of these songs, re-enactments, picture books... it has to end but it won't end unless you--parents/teachers/librarians--speak up. I hope the person in tweets 6 and 7 learned and will NOT do that song again.
9) If your child comes home with this nonsense, talk to their teacher. Whether you speak calmly or with fury, speak up!
And teachers/school admin: if you are approached by a parent about this, don't defend the activity. Apologize to that parent AND in public, too.
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10) In order for these activities to end, schools have to issue public apologies and acknowledgements of wrong to the families they serve. Administrators have to tell teachers at the start of EVERY SCHOOL YEAR that these activities betray the trust that parents place in them.
11) I know... these activities generate all kinds of feel-good emotions in people but they are not educational.
I know... you'll feel shame and be embarrassed and might feel defensive, but come on. You're an educator! Your job is to educate!
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12) Educ professors-what did you do in your classroom that would help your students know NOT to do these activities? @AERA_EdResearch
Professional associations, what are you doing to help your members know they should NOT do these activities? @NCTE @ILAToday @NCSSNetwork @NAEYC
13) I'm looking at another photo of kids dressed up, stereotypically, like Indians, and standing behind a large cardboard cutout that is supposed to be the Mayflower. They're smiling and waving. But...
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14) ... there were, in fact, Native ppl in ships like that... kidnapped, taken into captivity, to be sold into slavery.
That's not what that photo is supposed to be about, but, my gosh! See how ignorant folks are?!
15) And I see photos of classrooms where the teacher(s) must have decided that it is wrong to do stereotypical Indians... so they just do stereotypical Pilgrims instead.
They don't realize they're erasing Native peoples from our own lands when they do that.
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17) I'm also seeing some parents defend these reenactments as fun, without "political correctness."
If you're that parent, please revisit what you think/say/do.
Accuracy of information kids are taught is important.
18) If you want to see some of these photos I'm seeing, do a twitter photo search on each of these words: Wampanoags, Indians, Pilgrims.
See Dr. Debbie Reese (tribally enrolled, Nambé Pueblo)'s other Tweets