Tyson Alteri

Frog Girl

In simplicity comes elegance and I think that was Kathy Nielsen’s idea as she demonstrated how through children’s books we can teach adult lessons.

This being one of Angie’s favorite books I would be afraid to assigning anything under a 3 for all areas of the Evaluating Multicultural Literature Rubric. It seemed to have a well developed plot (albeit not quite on par with War & Peace), Paul Owen Lewis seems like he comes from a place authority, there was a authenticity through the characters and setting, the dialog is relevant and the theme being universal is why I chose this book.

Frog Girl is a story about how a little girl finds a frog civilization underneath a lake. One of the elder frogs in that civilization is worried because she cannot find her children while under the threat of a large erupting Pacific Rim volcano. Frog girl finds them and rushes them all to safety.

This story is applicable to a lesson covering the current 6th mass extinction period. I would apply the knowledge of the Tlingit people that only through having a respect for all beings and their habitat can we actually become stewards instead of exterminators. I would also use this to draw examples of how the lessons from many cultures can be adopted into our own to make our world a better place.

Beyond Status Quo

There are so many things people living in their dominate culture don’t usually worry about as much as others from a subdominant culture do, such as: having an encounter by law enforcement, what to tell their kids to do in the event of an encounter with the law, getting followed by someone in a store, getting arrested, if so will their peers be on a jury, having access to healthcare, having access to good food, getting stopped because they are wearing a hoodie, having store rep. insist you don’t have enough money to buy a certain item, having people avoid you, eating certain foods in public, cultural name causing your resume to be tossed in the bin, not getting hired, getting fired.

I spent a lot of time as a musician in Nashville and thus a lot of time eating beans and rice. I was broke and needed some money so I took a job on a painting crew of 3 people. There were two white guys and an African-American. We all worked equally as hard. The African-American fellow was a pleasant man to work with. He didn’t have a car but was always on time. He didn’t have quite as much experience as the rest of the crew but made up for it in work ethic. A week after I joined he got canned. This situation spelled it out for me clearly. He didn’t have a car or the experience because he couldn’t hold a job that would afford him both of those. As soon as a white man walked on the job site looking for a job he or someone of his color would be the first to go. This happens frequently in the South and elsewhere across the country. Privilege is invisible to those who are not watching and most of us in the dominant culture don’t have eyes big enough to see. Some don’t want to see.

As BH&H suggests to combat this we need to be positive about our own racial identity, have ongoing “self-examination and increased interpersonal effectiveness in multicultural” and having a “living commitment to anti-racist activity”. While I don’t think race exists racism does and we need to be active in combating it. I believe it starts through the path of knowledge as knowledge is power…

MAT & CRT

I like the name The Goldbelt Heritage Institute Culture Camp. I am assuming that was at the “Methodist Camp”? The students I spoke with were so willing to share what they learned. I really feel as if they enjoyed their time there. I enjoyed just the small amount of time I spent there. They caught a seal, deer, porcupine, fish and learned how to process them, so important yet something most will never see. I also learned how to can salmon in a pressure cooker. Finally someone explained it to me; leave it to a kid! Dancing at camp was a highlight. Stay low to stay strong and look each other in the eye. I liked David’s interior Tlingit song about women placing fish on the rack while dancing. I somehow need to incorporate that into my culture…

The math hunt was fun. I think I will incorporate that in my lesson plans. Students need to be outside more often. Also, using native art to express math concepts was beautiful. My favorite lesson, however, was the sphagnum moss experiment. When I get old and lose bladder control I got my go to… Biology today is so textbook as are all the hard sciences. What can our local plants be used for? What can the local fauna be used for? What is in our environment that is useful. That is culturally significant to all cultures in a given area.

2nd Part:

I thought Scott’s community project in Nikiski was genius! What a great project to help to build the community in Nikiski. I have never been to Nikiski but have heard from people from neighboring towns that the community there, or lack there of, has problems. Which, makes this project doubly important.

A community, tribe or a clan is of the upmost importance for any human to have and, ironically, is what lacks most in our western culture. Through this project, more specifically through the community’s children, he created a seed to help this community grow. Having stories passed down from their parents and elders to the children, knowing the biology and geology of the area and writing poetry about their home are all great ways to lift up a community and bring it together. …And it was all done through a school. What potential a school has!

Thanks to Alberta for helping to give us some understanding on how to invite elders into the room. It was very insightful and will be helpful for my future classes. I outlined a review of some of this in my lesson plan.

Ernestine was my favorite of the guest speakers. As an aspiring writer, to me her words were golden. I lived in San Francisco and know the homeless shelters she spoke of. I knew automatically how rough of a time she must of had in some of the city’s shelters. It is amazing to see her beaming with so much light.

The story she told about how she came back to Alaska to enter the writing program at the university and she thought admissions didn’t want her to enter which turned out not to be the case. She attributed it to be the part of her hurtful past. How many times I thought some people meant something derogatory when they didn’t really! I am sure we all thought that at some point. Never assume… Her words were specific, to the point and truthful even about stuff that hurts. Especially the story of her on the dock as a little girl. The first step to healing is to talk about it; hearing someone else open up with the truth helps others have courage to do the same.

Impact of Climate Change on Inupiaq Whaling

My intended audience is an Anchorage 10^th grade biology class.

I am factoring this lesson will take up three 45min class periods.

The essential question for this lesson is how much of an impact does climate change have on whaling for the Inupiaq people of the north coast of Alaska?

So far I have two sources for this lesson: https://www.jstor.org/stable/pdf/40863619.pdf?_=1466303286137

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959378005000786

I plan to acquire more.

Perhaps embedded in a unit on Cetaceans I’d do this lesson. For the first class I’d like to go over the background knowledge needed for this exercise. First looking at Bowhead habitat and niches. Secondly, I like to look at what a hunt consists of. Thirdly, I’d like to go over the impacts of climate change in the area.

Generally speaking the fist class period will go over the Bowhead whale and whaling of the Inupiaq people. The Second class will look at climate change over the Inupiaq area and what they have done to adapt. For the final class I was thinking of splitting the class up into pairs and have them come up with a budget analysis of hunting Bowheads now in comparison to 40 years ago.

Some questions I’d like students to investigate: Does it cost more to hunt Bowheads today? Is it worth it? What now are the associated risks? If you had to depend on that as a resource for your livelihood what new strategies for hunting whales can you come up with?

Of course, I welcome any suggestions.

Inupiaq and Yup’ik Kayaks

As a kayak guide and having kayaked many
nautical miles myself I was enamored with the kayak exhibit, particularly with the different designs of the coastal Native Americans. The above photo is circumpolar map of the many different designs of kayak for each specific location. Different designs relate to the different tasks each kayak was used for. For instance the kayaks of the Norton Sound were longer, sleeker and had a faster hull design than most other Bering Sea Kayaks. The design of a fast kayak was necessary to hunt belugas in the Sound. In comparison, the King Island kayaks of the Bering Sea were much slower yet some of the sturdiest crafts built by Native Alaskans.

Kayak frames are engineered with intricately carved wood and wrapped tightly with waterproof seal skin. Walrus skin covered areas susceptible to more wear. These were lightweight, fast and able to be paddled in high winds and stormy seas. Skilled boat builders would supervise construction inside their ceremonial houses. They used body measurements to ensure the kayak fit its intended user. After frame parts were lashed together women cut and stitched sealskins for the covering. They were built in the winter for use in spring time.

Single bladed paddles were used for normal use and double bladed paddles were used for speed. Paddles were also used to right themselves in the water if they had flipped over.

Gunalcheesh

I have rarely heard my elders speak like this. It floors me to hear such rich words from this small Tligit council of Elders. Perhaps that which stands out the most is that the ancient food is love and we are starved from it. Instead many of us are consumed with calling each other names and putting each other down.

Somehow I feel like I know deep down inside it is because of the lack of community (tribe) which our culture affords us. Nuclear families just don’t cut it. We in our western culture are starved for love in so many ways: conversation, touch, deep meaningful relationships. No one person can satisfy all our needs. We are longing for deep human interaction, a feeling of being with our kin in our clans. We don’t have that in our culture. So we try and make up for that in what ever way we can. Our nature still speaks loudly in our modern lives.

Some other words that were spoken which I hope not to forget:
-The disciplines are not isolated from each other; they are interconnected.
-You have to know your students well to be able to teach them.
-Each of us is precious and noble.
-You can only control how you receive what someone else says to you and what you say to them, not what they say nor how they receive it.
-Plant seeds in your students by telling them how awesome they are so they can grow.
-You are a human being and intelligent.
-There is nothing you can’t learn.
-We all live in one and only one world; it is in the here and now.

I am fortunate to have these words bestowed upon me, so, Gunalcheesh to you dearest Elders.

Denali West Buttress

After finishing my undergraduate studies at UAA four colleagues, friends and climbing partners and I climbed the West Buttress, the main climbing route, on Denali. Here is a map of our adventure:

I found this to be a little cumbersome to use. For instance you cannot change the angle of view like on google earth. Moreover, I had to redo the line of travel a number of times. Despite all of this I do believe this to be a useful tool especially when they upgrade it to have the same flow as google earth.