Teaching Truly - A Curriculum to Indigenize Mainstream Education

For the first time in educational publishing, Teaching Truly offers K-16 teachers course-specific guidelines for indigenizing mainstream education. The goal is to facilitate greater educational integrity and relevance in the classroom now, without waiting for more «reforms» to policy, standards or curricula in general. Incorporating reality-based teaching common in traditional Indigenous learning cultures, each chapter first exposes educational hegemony, including that existing within the new «common core standards», and then offers alternative, time-tested perspectives and exercises to counter and/or counter-balance such hegemony. Addressing eight common subject areas, the material can be adapted for different grade levels and can be applied to other mainstream courses.

List of contents

Contents: The West: Anti-Indianism in Education and in the Academe; Historical Trauma and Its Prevention in the Classroom - The North: The STAR (Service To All relations) Navajo School Model; Indigenous Teaching and Learning Pathways - The East: Health; Music; English Language Arts; United States History; Mathematics; Economics; Science; Geography - The South: From Fear to Fearlessness (Religion/Psychology and Spirituality).

About the author

Four Arrows (Don Trent Jacobs) has a PhD in Health Psychology from Columbia Pacific University and an EdD in Curriculum and Instruction with a Cognate in Indigenous Worldviews from Boise State University. Former Dean of Education at Oglala Lakota College and a tenured professor at Northern Arizona University, Four Arrows is currently on the faculty in the College of Educational Leadership and Change at Fielding Graduate University. Recipient of Canadäs Mid Day Star Award for his service to Aboriginal Peoples and the Moral Courage Award from the Martin Springer Institute on Holocaust Studies, Four Arrows is the author of 20 books and numerous chapters and articles on the positive application of Indigenous perspectives generalized from a number of First Nations on mainstream issues. He lives in a small fishing village in Mexico with his artist wife where he plays arena polo, stand-up paddle surfs and plays one-wall handball. In 2012, he placed fourth in the world championships of «old time piano playing contests» and can be seen in the documentary, The Entertainers.

Summary

Teaching Truly offers K-16 teachers course-specific guidelines for indigenizing mainstream education. Each chapter first exposes educational hegemony, including that existing within the new "common core standards", and then offers alternative, time-tested perspectives and exercises to counter and/or counter-balance such hegemony.

Report

«Penetrating, fearless and practical, this book offers educators (and anyone else with an interest in our future) a way to create a better world U8211 before it is too late!» (Thom Hartmann, award-winning syndicated progressive talk show host and author of numerous books including The Last Hours of Ancient Sunlight)

«This remarkable, nerve-touching book provides a missing link between the knowledge and ways of seeing and learning of indigenous peoples, that is 'part of the soul', and the imperial education of the liberal West. In exposing and then pushing back a corporate screen behind which we all live and learn, Four Arrows hands us a new way to resist.» (John Pilger, Author, investigative journalist (International reporter of the Year and recipient of a United Nations Peace Prize) and academy award winning documentary film-maker)

«This enlightening book reminds us that the grim prognosis for life on this planet is the consequence of a few centuries of forgetting what traditional societies knew, and the surviving ones still recognize. We must nurture and preserve our common possession, the traditional commons, for future generations, and this must be one of our highest values, or we are all doomed. To regain this sensibility from those who have preserved it we must pay careful attention to their understanding and practices, especially their educational practices as brought to us in these thoughtful chapters.» (Noam Chomsky, Professor Emeritus at MIT, author of more than 120 books, recipient of the 2011 Sydney Peace Prize and one of the top ten most-cited individuals in the world, living or dead)

«Teaching Truly subtly raises the issue of the difference between education for the purpose of raising human consciousness and education for the purpose of creating workers for the global economy. Four Arrows makes it clear that our focus on the material and away from the spiritual aspect of our nature has created not only an imbalance in our mind/body/spirit that manifests in disease, dispirited communities and alienated children but also in the outward imbalance and disharmony on the planet that gives us life. In order to move forward, sometimes we need to connect with the best of our past. This book and its curriculum ideas are an opportunity and a gift to our children and the future. It is time to remember, to honor and to teach the great wisdom of our indigenous ancestors - this may be our last hope.» (Nancy Turner Banks, M.D., author of AIDS, Opium, Diamonds and Empire)

«Teaching Truly is a singularly provocative book with the unsettling analysis that education is not about learning and economics is not about the well-being of society. As today's institutions crumble in their dysfunction, Four Arrows draws upon tens of thousands of years of empirical data within Indigenous societies, crucial intelligence on what works and how to unleash the kind of learning that will help us become human beings present and in balance with Mother Earth.» (Rebecca Adamson, president of First Nations Development Institute, founder of First Peoples Worldwide and inductee to The National Woman's History Hall of Fame)

«This is a necessary book, a part of the revolution we so desperately need.» (Derrick Jensen, author of A Language Older than Words)

«At a time when mainstream education is viewed as impoverished and lacking in meaning, this engaging book invites educators to start a self-reflective dialogue on educational innovation stimulated and inspired by the indigenous wisdom. With humility, sensitivity and force, Teaching Truly gives rise to the possibility of transforming education from inside out.» (Scherto Gill, Executive Secretary of the Guerrand-Hermès Foundation for Peace, and author of Learning

Product details

• Authors: "Four Arrows", Four Arrows (Don Trent Jacobs), Donald Trent Jacobs, Donald Trent Jacobs
• Publisher: Peter Lang
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 31.03.2016
• EAN: 9781433122491
• ISBN: 978-1-4331-2249-1
• No. of pages: 282
• Dimensions: 150 mm x 21 mm x 225 mm
• Weight: 530 g
• Series: Critical Praxis and Curriculum Guides; Critical Praxis and Curriculum Guides
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Education > General, dictionaries; Social sciences, law, business > Sociology > General, dictionaries