Journal of American Indian Education
Abstracts — 2006

Vol. 45, #1

A STUDY OF RESILIENCY OF AMERICAN INDIAN HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS
Bill Thornton; Michele Collins; Richard Daugherty Vol. 45, #1, pp. 4-16, 2006

Relationships between resiliency and student achievement were investigated in a population of American Indian high school students in a county school district of Nevada. The Resiliency Belief System was used to assess the resiliency of students. The participants were mainly female students (62%), with local tribal affiliation (51%), with a grade point average of 2.23, and a good record of attendance. School related variable were predictive of resilience by gender, replicating the findings of earlier researchers. The results indicated a significant relationship between resiliency and gender, but a relationship between achievement and resilience was not observed.

LEARNING RESISTANCE: INUPIAT AND THE US BUREAU OF EDUCATION, 1985-1906 - DECONSTRUCTING ASSIMILATION STRATEGIES AND IMPLICATIONS FOR TODAY
Lisa M. Wexler Vol. 45, #1, pp. 17-34, 2006

Native students must be taught to deconstruct their history of assimilation in order to understand their current struggles and to strengthen their cultural identify. As an example of this, the paper considers how community education was justified, carried out and implicated in Inupiat assimilation practices during the first 20 years that the U.S. Bureau of Education was in control of Alaska Natives' education. Government documents, reports, and personal letters from missionary educators and government officials will be examined to identify the rationale that supported vocational and schooling efforts and drove educational practices. The analysis will begin to explain how education worked as an assimilation strategy that contributed to the devastating changes the Inupiat experienced between the yeas 1885 and 1906. This perspective has ramifications for schools serving Native communities. This paper concludes by highlighting the ways in which these forms of colonization persist in educational settings. The historical and present day subjugation should be made visible to help today's Native youth reclaim their cultural heritage and gain strength from the process.

AMERICAN INDIAN/ALASKA NATIVE STUDENTS' USE OF A UNIVERSITY STUDENT SUPPORT OFFICE
Raymond K. Yang; Steven R. Byers; Beverly Fenton Vol. 45, #1, pp. 35-48, 2006

American Indian/Alaska Native college students responded to two surveys: one assessing their overall psychological status; the other, their current commitment to the traditions they learned as children. Students described their psychological status in reliable, yet diverse ways: displaced and lost; comfortable and naturally embedded; sick, pessimistic, and lonely; purposeful; self-directed; invisible; optimistic; and instrumental. In their commitment to cultural traditions, students described themselves as emigrated, adrift, and/or alienated. Self-directed students reported using a student-support office less, as did students reporting higher grades. Students describing themselves as adrift used the office more. Not using the office were two worrisome types: one alienated and in poor health; the other, wishing to blend in with others. These results were interpreted in the larger context of university culture, and a unidimensional model of assimilation versus a bi-cultural model of adaptation.

Vol. 45, #2

REPORT OF A NATIONAL COLLOQUIUM - PROGRAMS & PRACTICES
Peggy McCardle; William Demmert, Guest Editors Vol. 45 #2, pp. 1-5, 2006

Introduction: Improving Academic Performance Among American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian Students

On March 16-18, 2005, several federal agencies and professional organizations and associations joined forces to hold a national colloquium to address the educational needs of Native American students, resulting in the publication of two thematic issues of the Journal of American Indian Education.

In the first of these two issues, Roland Tharp reviews the history of American Indian Education. While acknowledging the various federal attempts to educate Native American students, he focuses on two educational reforms or innovations that actually succeeded in effecting behavior change, both of which were achieved by Native Americans themselves: (1) the organization of an orthography and literacy tradition among the Cherokee in the 19th Century and (2) the socialization and enculturation of whites into American Indian communities, which resulted in changes of behavior, values, and identity of the captors. Tharp then describes the historical evolution of research on the culture and education, tracing four states through which such research has moved, which involve adapting schools to cultures; examining the different aspects of education and culture that were emphasized by researchers from different cultural backgrounds; exploring how teaching might be conducted in multicultural, multilingual settings; and collecting that information into integrated programs and studying their effectiveness. Tharp outlines and examines the standards for effective pedagogy that have resulted from these last two stages of research, discussing their cultural bases, theoretical foundations, and implications. His bottom line is that we should put effort into the further development of culture based education because all children in this nation have a right to an education, and also because we all will learn a great deal from such efforts. To quote Tharp, since he says it so well, "Native America can, uniquely, be the seedbed for infusing fundamental human processes of teaching/learning into public education."

The section on innovative programs is a compilation of programs that are currently being implemented with Native American students, in their schools, with any available evidence of their success. Four of these programs involve native language instruction - two American Indian, one Alaska Native, and one Native Hawaiian program. Window Rock is an immersion school which uses Navajo as the language of instruction. This school, which was started in response to community desire to make Native language and culture part of Navajo children's education, is revitalizing the use of Diné (the Navajo language) in the community. The Nizipuhwahsin School, at the Piegan Institute, is a private not-for-profit organization on the Blackfeet Reservation. This K-8 Blackfeet language immersion school has been in existence for nine years, has graduated several classes of eighth graders, all of whom are in public high schools and doing well. The Lower Kuskokwim School District (LSKD) in Alaska has developed a Yup'ik language curriculum based on English standard education, including a student assessment performance record and individual profile, a comprehensive literacy program, and Yup'ik adaptation of a math program. The program at the Näwahï Hawaiian Laboratory School has had a high level of academic success, which they attribute to their focus on the primary goal of effecting social change in Hawaii, to maintain the Hawaiian character through language, culture, and the Native Hawaiian population itself. Finally, the Northwest Native American Reading Curriculum was developed for use in the state of Washington. This curriculum uses English as the language of instruction. It contains a reading program created as a result of input from cultural specialists, curriculum specialists, and members of the tribal community; the program is aligned both with state standards and with the tribal community.

David Beaulieu presents a summary and assessment of culture based education (CBE) programs. In this paper he asserts that, if CBE is to have any influence, it must be centered on social activity and teaching in schools. Beaulieu discusses the three federal laws which represent the possibilities for culturally based education in the United States: Title VII of the Indian Education Act, The Native Languages Act, and the Union Religious Freedom Act.

To round out information on programs, several individuals responsible for funding and oversight of government programs for Native American schools and students summarize what is funded and what opportunities are available for funding of programs that could support, maintain and enhance improved educational programs for Native American students. Represented in this section is information on the programs of the Office of Indian Education Programs of the Bureau of Indian Affairs, U.S. Department of Education's Office of English Language Acquisition and Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation services, as well as information on a Department of Education-funded project called the Reading First Teacher Education Network.

Finally, the issue concludes with a commentary by the organizers of the Santa Fe workshop and its Washington, DC follow-up meeting. In this paper, they outline the issues and challenges in the delivery of improved educational opportunities to Native American students, as compiled from those two workshops.

Four Hundred Years of Evidence: Culture, Pedagogy, and Native America
Roland G. Tharp, pp. 8-25

Tséhootsooí Diné Bi'ólta'
Florian Tom Johnson; Jennifer Legatz, pp. 25-33

An Important Gift: Blackfeet Language and History
Rosalyn LaPier; William Farr, pp. 34-36

Yup'ik Language Programs at Lower Kuskokwim School District, Bethel, Alaska
Bev Williams; Nita Rearden, pp. 37-41

Näwahï Hawaiian Laboratory School
William H. Wilson; Kauanoe Kamanä; Nämaka Rawlins, pp. 42-44

Northwest Native America Reading Curriculum
Magda Constantino; Denny S. Hurtado, pp. 45-49

A Survey and Assessment of Culturally Based Education Programs for Native American Students in the United States
David Beaulieu, pp. 50-61

Introduction to Federal Government Programs
pp. 62

Office of Indian Education Programs, Bureau of Indian Affairs
Sherry Allison; Robin Butterfield, pp. 63-64

No Child Left Behind Act, Title III, Language Instruction for Limited English Proficient and Immigrant Students
Trini Torres Carrion, pp. 65-67

The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)
Troy Justesen; Robert Gilmore; Deborah Morrow, pp. 68-71

The Impact of the Reading First Teacher Education Network on Increasing the Reading Proficiency of American Indian Children - How a Summer Reading Institute Brought Together Educators, Parents, and a Community
B. Denise Hawkins, pp. 72-76

Conclusions and Commentary
William Demmert; Peggy McCardle; Kathleen Leos, pp. 77-88

Abstracts, Vol. 45 #3

REPORT OF A NATIONAL COLLOQUIUM, II - RESEARCH
Peggy McCardle & William Demmert, Guest Editors, Vol. 45, #3, pp. 1-4

Introduction: Improving Academic Performance Among American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian Students

This issue is the second of two thematic issues evolving from a national colloquium held in Santa Fe, New Mexico to address the educational needs of American Indian, Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian students. This issue features the papers from a follow-up meeting held in Washington, DC, in August 2005. The companion first special issue focused on Programs and Practices, while this issue presents a blueprint for needed research on educational practices as well as for foundational research on culture and learning among American Indians, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians.

This issue is organized into three sections: What we know, challenging and promising areas for research, and what we need to know - The Blueprint. In laying out what we know, Demmert, Grissmer, and Towner offer insights from a major synthesis of the research literature on Native students' educational experiences, and a summary of available data on Native students from large national studies. August, Goldenberg, and Rueda, in a thorough review and synthesis, discuss research on the influence of culture, notably differences in discourse and interaction characteristics between children's homes and classrooms, on the academic engagement and performance of Native American children. Section two comprises three papers. In the first, Mohatt, Trimble, and Dickson discuss culture-based education. They identify and explore several psychosocial variables and models that can be used to inform the development and study of appropriate culture-based educational approaches. They then offer their own culture-based education framework for understanding and improving the schools performance and achievement of American Indian and Native Alaskan children. Also in this section, the paper by Pugh, Sandak, Frost, Moore, and Mencl address a research tool that has been little used in students of Native student's educational performance. The authors note that in neurobiological studies of reading and reading disorders to date, there appears to be more similarity than difference across languages and cultures. These authors discuss how developmental neuroimaging might be used to help to discriminate children with reading disabilities that are of a congenital origin from children who are at risk for or have developed reading disability of difficulty as a result of environmental risk factors. Morris, Pae, Arrington, and Sevcik, in the final paper of this section, discuss research methodologies that might be applied to the study of reading performance in Native students, and the importance of being aware of children's context and culture when attempting to measure their performance and their growth over time. The final section consists of one paper, by Demmert, McCardle, Mele-McCarthy, and Leos, which reviews information from major reports that have addressed educational performance in Native students and ultimately presents a research agenda - The Blueprint for Research. This Blueprint is drawn from the existing research literature in part, and the presentations of all of the presenters at the Santa Fe Colloquium, but is informed by the rich discussions that were held at that and the Washington, DC follow-up meeting, as well as by email and correspondence from those who reviewed the draft document but were unable to attend either meeting in person. As such, the Blueprint represents, to some extent, a consensus of Native American researchers and practitioners and non-Native researchers and practitioners and other stakeholders who work with Native American students

The names of articles, authors and page numbers are as follows:

A Review and Analysis of the Research on Native American Students
William G. Demmert; David Grissmer; John Towner, pp. 5-23

Native American Children and Youth: Culture, Language, and Literacy
Diane August; Claude Goldenberg; Robert Rueda, pp. 24-37

Psychosocial Foundations of Academic Performance in Culture Based Education Programs for American Indian and Alaska Native Youth: Reflections on a Multidisciplinary Perspective
Gerald V. Mohatt; Joseph Trimble; Ryan A. Dickson, pp. 38-59

Examining Reading Development and Reading Disability in Diverse Languages and Cultures: Potential Contributions from Functional Neuroimaging
Kenneth R. Pugh; Rebecca Sandak; Stephen J. Frost; Dina Moore; W. Einar Mencl , pp. 60-76

The Assessment Challenge of Native American Educational Researchers
Robin Morris; Hye Kyeong Pae; Cynthia Arrington; Rose Sevcik, pp. 77-91

Preparing Native American Children for Academic Success: A Blueprint for Research
William Demmert; Peggy McCardle; Joan Mele-McCarthy; Kathleen Leos , pp. 92-106