Native teacher works to correct the Thanksgiving Day myths, with still much work to be done

In a year of firsts, this year was the first Thanksgiving Day to line up with the Oregon Department of Education’s new “Tribal History/Shared History” curriculum.

The curriculum was created so schools across Oregon would have a standard of historically accurate and culturally inclusive lessons to teach about Native Americans and local tribes.

The goal is to rid stereotypes, myths and inaccuracies about Native people from Oregon’s education system.

It was brought about from 2017 legislation, created in collaboration with the state’s nine tribes and finally distributed to schools in January, to roll out immediately.

The state’s curriculum, however, has no lessons specific to teaching the true history of Thanksgiving Day – a holiday with a narrative told widely through a colonialist lens for centuries.

Individual teachers are tasked with creating lessons on the history of Thanksgiving Day without clear parameters, leaving room for long-held inaccuracies to stay, some educators said.

ODE’s Indian Education Advisor April Campbell said they plan to develop more resources addressing Thanksgiving in the future, in the meantime pointing teachers to existing lessons that teach how to challenge biases and stereotypes.

But some local educators put in extra work to provide historically accurate lessons specific to the holiday this year.

“Not only do we need to teach what’s authentic and accurate – we need to unteach, unlearn our biases and preconceived inaccurate notions of what this holiday is or was,” said Brenda Brainard, a member of the Confederated Tribe of Coos, Lower Umpqua and Siuslaw Indians who runs the Eugene School District’s Natives Program.

This is Brainard’s 29th year working to highlight Native American lessons in local schools. She’s seen pushback on more inclusive and accurate curriculum over the years.

It’s why she was excited to have the tribal history curriculum from the state in the first place, but she still sees some missed opportunities – the lack of Thanksgiving lessons being one.

The history of Thanksgiving

Stories about Thanksgiving have typically been focused on Separatists, or “Pilgrims,” and had Native Americans as a footnote, taught as a day of unity for the two groups when the Pilgrims invited the Native Americans to the feast.

In reality, while the first harvest feast happened in 1621, it was not a grand spread laid out by the Pilgrims to connect with the Wampanoag people, who made up several tribes and were the original natives of Massachusetts and Rhode Island.

The Pilgrims were celebrating the first harvest, and the Wampanoag stumbled upon them. The common image of Pilgrims bringing food for Native Americans and inviting them outright is drawn from the colonialist idea of Pilgrims being “saviors,” when in reality they relied heavily on the Native Americans’ skills and resources.

Relations were incredibly strained between them, as the Pilgrims often stole food, resources and valuables from the Native Americans. While they did share a meal for several days, settlers for years pushed Native American people out of their land across the country. Many Native Americans see Thanksgiving as a day of mourning.

Thanksgiving Day was not celebrated until more than 200 years later when President Abraham Lincoln declared it a holiday as a political tool, hoping to unite a nation in civil war.

“It was all based on someone’s glorified mental image of how it should have been or how they wanted it to be rather than the way it really was,” Brainard said, calling it an example of whitewashing or rewriting history.

The thought behind our more modern take on Thanksgiving is not a bad one, she said. People should absolutely think of it as a time to reflect and express gratitude – with the right context.

“Thanksgiving in and of itself is not a bad holiday,” Brainard said. “It’s a fantastic holiday to be grateful for what we have in these stressful times … that we can be safe – those are very, very important. They just have no relationship to the first harvest feast.”

Correcting myths in the classroom

Work on the tribal history curriculum is ongoing, Campbell said. ODE started with lessons for grades four, eight and 10. The plan is to have lessons for K-11 in 2021, and full K-12 curriculum by 2025.

Until then, Brainard took it upon herself to create a portfolio of lessons, videos and other educational resources for teachers in 4J to use.

The majority of teachers she works with have been receptive and grateful to adjust their lessons, she said. But some longtime teachers are more hesitant to change their plans. Without a state standard, they carry on with outdated materials.

Brainard said some teachers still show the 1994 Disney movie “Squanto: A Warrior’s Tale.” The movie is not historically accurate, and often uses stereotypes and derogatory language to describe the Native Americans.

“The terminology is very colonial,” Brainard said. “It still continues this subordinate and the dominant reinforcements, even if it’s very subtle. … (Teachers) need to try to stand in the shoes of a Native American person and say, ‘How would I feel hearing this?’ ”

Campbell urged teachers to teach about the holiday in a socially responsible and culturally responsive way, which means thinking with an “Indigenous lens.”

“It means challenging dominant narratives and recognizing the impact of colonialism in the classroom, such as having Thanksgiving feasts where students dress up as Native Americans,” she said.

Teachers can start by acknowledging the aboriginal homelands, and that Native Americans have been here since time immemorial.

“They can also teach the meaning and significance of tribal sovereignty and emphasize the survivance and strengths of Native peoples today in their classroom,” she said, by highlighting Native literature, philanthropy, land management and more.

When she teaches a lesson, Brainard said she tasks students with making positive change based on what they’ve learned and challenging the status quo, and asks others do the same this holiday.

“Thanksgiving is a time to truly be thankful, but to stop for a moment and look at the food on your plate and have a real conversation about: Was this even at the first Thanksgiving? What was that first Thanksgiving all about, if there wasn’t turkey and football and the things that we now associate with a contemporary Thanksgiving?” Brainard said.

“There is nothing wrong … with a contemporary Thanksgiving meal with our family and our friends, even if it’s by Zoom this year,” she said.

“It is a good thing to do, but it’s also a necessary thing to compare and contrast what we’ve historically been taught, with what was really true.”