Socializing and Learning

Subject Area:

Social Studies/Arts Education

Grade Level:

Seven to Eight

Objectives:

Students will be able to share what types of recreational activities they like to do in the winter.

Students will be able to create a story individually or in a group and perform it for their classmates.

Video Recommendations:

Tipi-raising video with Glen Anaquod or tipi raising with Tim Haywahe.

Note:

This lesson is to be taught in the winter season

Introduction:

Discuss with the students what they do for recreational purposes during the winter time with family and friends. As the educator, you can share what types of activities you like doing with your family and friends over the holidays.

For this lesson, it would be great for students to hear a story or legend from a First Nations storyteller or from an elder. This will help spark their own ideas.

Activity:

Show your students the tipi raising videos, either with Glen Anaquod or Tim Haywahe.

Explain to students that Plains Indian people in the past would sleep in tipis during both the summer and winter seasons. Winter seasons were different though because Plains Indian people had a lot of hours to fill on cold winter nights. During this time the old peoples would share legends and stories to the adults and young ones. Some stories taught lessons while others would be for the sake of entertainment.

In the present day we still like to entertain each other by telling stories. In groups or individually, students are going to create a story and use drama to share it. They can choose to use props, costumes or anything else that will help them to share their story.

Their story must include:

A conflict and resolution --> A lesson learned.

One or more props, or costumes.

Creativity, should entertain their peers.

Any other things you as the educator would like to see,
or what the students would like to see.

Assessment:

As a class create a rubric for how each individual or group should be graded on their performance. Be sure to include the items above. As the teacher you can grade each individual/group or have a peer evaluation.

Aboriginal Perspectives is supported by the University of Regina, the Imperial Oil Foundation, the Canadian Mathematical Society and the Pacific Institute for the Mathematical Sciences.