MIHS teachers causing wisdom to sprout with plants

By: 
Ryan Winn
Columnist

The Menominee name for the month of May is Pāhkwan-kēsoq — The Budding Moon. While many Wisconsinites will spend the month cultivating their own gardens in anticipation of a fruitful crop, Menominee Indian High School students will mark Pāhkwan-kēsoq through culturally grounded cross-curricular activities centered on planting and gardening.

Although the pandemic has halted some educational opportunities due to COVID-19 restrictions, MIHS has used its school’s shutdown as a catalyst for monthly collaborative teaching initiatives that span their course offerings. Yet, this is more than a theme for MIHS — it’s demonstrative evidence of how the school uses a restorative practices based approach to teach the whole student body about their culture.

The school begins each month with Menominee Language and Culture Coordinator John Teller Jr. and Menominee Language, Culture, and History Teacher Dawn Wilber presenting the wisdom embedded in that month’s teachings, thereby enabling the entire staff to gain an appreciation of the tribe’s seasonal practices.

“The goal is for our teachers to gain insight on our tribe’s culture and then recognize how they can infuse it into their classroom teachings,” Wilber said.

MIHS’s mission states that it strives to “provide a safe learning environment that allows every child an opportunity to succeed culturally, intellectually, academically, emotionally, socially, and physically.” The connectivity of this teaching strategy is evidenced in how the school instructs its students through hands-on learning.

April was Sūpomāhkwan-kēsoq — Sugar Making Moon, and so the students and staff donned masks and held a sugar camp to tap the maple trees near MIHS. While the work was completed, those gathered recognized how each subject area offered opportunities for critical reflection.

“The health classes compared the nutritional value of real maple syrup with those sold in stores, math and science classes delivered lessons on the equations involved in the process, the English classes wrote poetry about it all, and the physical education courses even talked about the best ways to traipse through the snow,” Wilber said.

While the appreciative gains for the teachings are evident, MIHS is also ensuring that lessons are taught using the pedagogy of their ancestors — namely, the oral tradition.

“We’re storytellers,” Wilber said about the Menominee people. “We tell stories to teach students how to listen because that’s how our culture has always been taught.”

To help facilitate students’ access to tribal stories within their culture courses, Wilber began recording herself performing Menominee stories. Like all schools, MIHS has students of varying abilities, and Wilber’s recordings level the playing field by enabling them to engage with the teachings in ways reading alone cannot replicate.

Wilber also capitalized upon the opportunity to use Menominee language, incorporating both the words and their pronunciation. Still, the most important lesson is that the stories themselves model the Seven Grandfather Teachings — wisdom, love, respect, bravery, honesty, humility, and truth.

“Our class begins with an explanation on why oral stories are so important and why learning them as they were passed down is equally important.” Throughout the teachings, be it inside or outside the classroom, Wilber specified, “Students realize that our ancestors weren’t just sitting around and making up stories. The stories all have meanings. They all teach us about life.”

Associate Principal Kate Mikle noted that while the 2020-21 academic year has featured faculty members’ sharing how their specific discipline connects to each month’s traditional meaning for Menominee people, next year the focus will shift to the students, asking them to consider how what they’re learning is reflected in ancient Menominee wisdom.

The outside enthusiasm for their culturally grounded pedagogical approach is palpable, as was evidenced by Teller’s much-lauded presentation about the initiative at the April Wisconsin Indian Education Association’s virtual conference. He was praised for noting that MIHS was not asking for non-Native teachers to become experts, but rather to be conduits for Menominee teachings.

MIHS is thinking beyond the next two years, as Wilber added, “Our goal is for our students to get a better view of their identity and who they are as Menominee people. That means having respect, love, kindness, and trust surround our hearts.”

If the proceeding months are any indication, Pāhkwan-kēsoq’s teachings at MIHS will germinate literal and metaphorical seeds that yield a rich cultural harvest.


Ryan Winn teaches communications, English and theater at the College of Menominee Nation. Visit www.menominee.edu for more information about the school.

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