Echoes of the Past • Sequence • Lenny.com

Echoes of the Past

A project-based exploration of how Native American history and culture were preserved through oral tradition, Winter Counts, wampum belts, and totem poles. Students create their own symbolic artifacts to understand history as a living, spoken, and artistic record.

Keepers of the Word

Students explore the discipline of oral history and the role of the Storyteller in Native American cultures, comparing casual retelling to trained oral preservation.

Symbols in the Snow

Students investigate the Lakota tradition of Winter Counts, analyzing how pictographs recorded community history on animal hides.

Threads of Agreement

Focusing on Eastern Woodlands nations, students decode the symbolism of wampum belts used for treaties, laws, and historical records.

Carved in Cedar

Learners examine the Pacific Northwest tradition of totem poles, understanding how carved figures represent lineage, legends, and status.

Voices of History

The sequence concludes with a living history museum where students present their symbolic artifacts and orally narrate the history they've recorded.

Echoes of the Past

A project-based exploration of how Native American history and culture were preserved through oral tradition, Winter Counts, wampum belts, and totem poles. Students create their own symbolic artifacts to understand history as a living, spoken, and artistic record.