Yup'ik Schoolroom

But it was the answer for number one. I don't know what you're talking about. Okay, you were in a library last night. The bottom of the paper that you're correcty. Okay, right down there. Okay. And the 19 is positive five. Education has been getting a lot of flack lately. Choice of textbooks, curriculum, quality of education have all recedes in abundance of critical attention. And Western Alaska, that debate intensifies to something more fundamental than which history book is best, or how many computer courses a school needs. It's an argument over who should teach the children.

Could you put your hand up on this, would you say? Me went to school. The majority of the students are Eskimos, whose first language in many cases is Yupik, not English. But they are generally taught by non-Yupik teachers to speak only English. Does that cultural difference put a cramp on successful instruction? While transplanting a teacher originally from an urban, Western society into a village setting, a Yupik community, hamper that teacher's ability to communicate with the students. The differences between the two cultures say some are too major to overlook, and those in the end they feel interfere with the educational process. Others, primarily the teachers at the rural schools, aren't convinced. Could contend that a good teacher adapts that can overcome the obvious strains of walking into a society that is different from most of the United States. They say the students are getting a good education. This is 4 chapters 7.

And like any debate over education, the arguments can go back and forth for hours. Who should teach these children? Are the cultural differences between them and their Western teachers significant? In a classroom situation, a teacher must be able to get his or her message across. It's at this point, as some believe, the trouble begins. A number of people have studied the interactional styles of Yupik's, and sometimes clear-cut, sometimes subtle differences between the way natives present a message and how English-speaking people deliver the same message. That they contend can muddy up the communication between teacher and student. It's been shown, for example, that native children learn best by observation and not by lecture. That their learning goes from the specific to the general, as opposed to Western education which tends to teach a general concept first before getting to the specific. Another factor in communication is pause patterns.

Now, natives tend to pause a slightly shorter time between thoughts or sentences than natives, and that says Ron's calling at the University of Alaska Fairbanks to install a conversation before it gets started. It's just enough. So that if a native and a non-native are speaking to each other, there'd be a tendency for the non-native person to keep talking. You wait until it's your turn to speak. You leave a minute at the end or a second at the end. The other person hasn't spoken. So you speak again, and then you wait another second. You speak again. And you end up doing all of the talking and wondering why the other person has nothing to say when you haven't given them a chance. A very relinger nap is a high school teacher or the village of Quithluck. And the children here are at first somewhat very, very shy and do not talk. And then that, I had been told, was because of the fact that it's just a difference in basically in communication.

We down in the lower 48, the acussic, the right. When we're asked a question, our response time is very short. And from what I understand with the with the Eskimos, there's definitely a longer response time. It's a, you know, you have to adjust to it. But how long does it take to adjust? The teachers we talked with thought a year is enough time. Others, such as Grant Shimonic of the Cusco Quim Community College Yupic Language Center, think it takes longer. Even though they've been teaching me maybe 18 years or still years away from really coming to a place where they can identify with the students that they're teaching. So what I would say is that I believe that a person can't over a period of years, but eventually, as you go on in life, you find more and more how much your culture affects you. You find out how much the things that you were taught and brought up with affect you.

And this happens with everybody. It happens with teachers. I don't think that a teacher outside coming into this situation would realize right away just how different it's going to be. Joan McGrath teaches kindergarten through 12th grade at the two schools of night mute, a tiny village near the Bering Sea. In her first year of teaching you big children, she discovered that even with 14 years of teaching experience in the lower 48, she had to adjust. You decide what? I don't know how I'm going to know if I win or not. Maybe if I know. I'm winning. That's great. How do I know that? I know. You score points? No. Oh, I think that if you're going to come into a situation as different as this one is from your other experiences that you have to give yourself some time to learn. I don't think that there's any college coursework or even much in-service coursework that you could do

that would totally prepare you to just step in and know exactly what to do in every situation. You're learning as you're going on. But Glen Moore-Dene, Principal of the Quithluk Schools, is in ready to separate out non-native teachers as the only ones who need this period of adjustment, whatever length it should be. You know, it's also true of the first year of native teachers. And I don't think that kind of problem is unique to those teaching for the first year of teacher. I think on the outside, the lower 48, if you're teaching in a multi-pluralistic society, you're going to come up against ethnic groups and you're going to have to make the necessary adjustments. But how easy is it to make those adjustments? Ron Schallen thinks it's more than just an intellectual process. Your ways of communicating are your personality, they're who you are, they're your identity. And to ask people to change their ways of communicating, is asking to change who they are. But language isn't the only thing that interferes. There are other more subtle differences

that a scholar says are part of a teacher's personality. So ingrained, it may be hard to adjust to the cultural personality of the village. A study was conducted at three Athabaskan teachers to see what they did if anything that was different. If cultural similarities were a factor, the classes were chosen because they were the most successful in the school. Now the researchers videotaped them whole days at a time and after analyzing the tapes, they found subtle traits. The teachers spent less time talking to the classes as a whole and more time on individual instruction. There was more quiet time for study, and the students were well behaved. But perhaps the most subtle observation of all was, as the researchers put it, their verbal interaction was rhythmically integrated. Carol Barnhart was on the staff of researchers. When they spoke, they were speaking sort of in harmony or in rhythm. And it wasn't a choppy kind of thing where when the students stopped talking,

a teacher came in and disrupted it. It was very harmonious. And we also found this in the nonverbal interactions. For instance, we turned off the sound on the videotapes and then we could actually beat out the rhythm of the students. They were in a reading group and they were getting ready for the teacher. We would watch the students and you could find a very definite rhythm as they opened their pages, got into their table, took their pencils, and they had a definite rhythm established within the group of four or five students. When the teacher came to join the group, she got it from her desk and walked over in exactly the same rhythm pattern that had already been established by the students sat down and joined them. So it was an example that we found happen many, many times of teachers adapting to sort of the rhythm that the students had already sat. And they didn't impose something different when they entered the situation. Presumably then, the native teachers have little to change in order to adapt, but there aren't many working in the schools to prove the point. And the lower Cusco-quim school district in western Alaska,

approximately 8% of the certified teaching staff is native. Many of them raised in the village they work in. We don't have any quota, if you will, in mind, but we will continue to give preference to any kind of an individual who has a teaching certificate in this area. Carl Peterson recently resigned superintendent of LCASD, agrees there should be more native teachers. The school district actively recruits for U-Bix to fill the instructor gaps in their bilingual programs, but like many, Peterson doesn't think this means anyone group is more qualified to teach than another. The nature of teaching is such that you cannot make a generalization, simply saying that because the person is you pick that they are going to be a better or not as good a teacher as anybody else. The two do not necessarily correlate. So certainly a good teacher with U-Bix skills is a far more valuable individual than a good teacher

without U-Bix skills, but good teachers are good teachers and we want good teachers. I'm not looking for any affirmative action, X number native teachers as compared to a certain number of say gussic teachers. I'm more interested in finding the best qualified person than indeed helps instruction. And that brings us back to the original question. Who is the best qualified person to teach native children? And how handicapped or English-speaking teachers when confronted by a classroom of students who speak both U-Bix and English? We can be the best teacher and have all the cultural savvy and cross-cultural communication techniques, but if you're not my lingual and if you really don't have, you know, in touch with your students being able to manipulate the information

between languages, then I don't see how you could be. This word is... Pauline Avon grew up in Quithluck before teaching at the Village High School. Second word? Quieran. When I'm trying to teach A concept, when the English words are fairly hard to comprehend, then I switch into U-Bix so that they can understand the English word or the concept that I'm trying to teach so they can better understand the concept. No one we talk to denies this is an advantage, but language isn't necessarily an insurmountable problem. Teachers' aides are often available to give that bilingual edge to the non-native teacher. I think the advantage of having you with teachers is tremendous, because oftentimes they can explain to the children in their native language that they are. That's what she meant. And then we can go on where as I could struggle with the English language and not have something to... that I could, you know, figure to relate

to the concept that I'm trying to teach. But Cecilia Martz, who tied in the Village of Chief Act, doesn't think the aides are always used to their fullest potential. If they can help far beyond the interpreter function, acting as a teacher's connection to the village life and culture. They can be used as resources, information sources for. Incorporating a lot of the stuff that's in the community into their classroom. And, you know, they could also be used as a link between the community people and the school and the classroom. And they could also be used like during parent teacher conferences when they make programs and stuff they could use that native to present, you know, you pick programs. There's some argument over what those you pick programs should be. The approach has been to supplement the traditional English methods

with the occasional craft display given by a local resident. We'll have elders and or talented people say in skin sewing or things of this nature. Come in and do work in the schools and this really occurs throughout the district. You know, for example, in the took survey last year, they had one of the older gentlemen in the community come in and build a kayak right there in the school. And in many cases, students will be receiving instruction in the elements of skin sewing, in some cases trapping, some cases sled building other aspects of the Eskimo culture. But privately, some instructors say this alternative to a strict diet of lower 48 instruction doesn't take seriously by the students. The course and say skin sewing is forgotten in favor of clothes from a store. Others criticize this approach as zeroing in on arts and crafts while forgetting other less easily defined aspects

of you pick culture. Alice Wardlow is a former member of the Bethel Advisory School Board. I think they should acknowledge the fact that they have a culture and a strong culture and it should be part of the teaching. Because my culture is my part of my identity. It's who I am, traditionally by cultural programs are just mostly arts and crafts. And that's just one teeny little part of the culture. You know, they have my collection making or basketball making or skin sewing. You know, just those that part that is subtle and is not really and can't be seen right away is just completely ignored. For instance, there's a lot of interaction, communications, values,

history, cult, native literature. The school does not exist in a vacuum. In other words, instruction in the culture is a responsibility of the entire community and certainly doesn't just confine itself to the school itself. Curriculum development has been a hard nut to crack. The question has always been what programs are most appropriate to the students? What subjects best offer a blend between you, big and western culture? How can I stay as preferably that task in large part to local advisory school boards? The advisory school boards in each of our communities in a sense act like a local school board. They do through there what we call all five old regulations develop an educational plan for their activities each year. They do an evaluation of their educational program and process and give direction to the administration of that particular school

and to some extent the central administration of exactly what type of an educational program they would like offered. The advisory school board has determined that it's important for our students to as part of their cultural heritage as part of practical living in the community as part of learning survival skills that hunting and trapping for the young men and women is important. LKSD conducted a survey of the bilingual and bicultural needs of the district as a whole. The assessment report found in great interest in the teaching of you big cultural subjects. For example, the survey asked what do you want your bilingual program to do? Most of the students and adults chose a curriculum composed of equal amounts of you big in English. Interestingly, the certified staff consisting of mostly non-native teachers prefer to see more English-ton than you big. On the question, are you big language,

culture, traditional skills and values important and overwhelming majority replied yes? Lastly, a large majority felt both English and you big were important in assisting children to meet their lives' goals although a smaller percentage of certified staff agreed with that statement. So it would seem a bilingual bicultural education is important to the people of the lower cusp of school district but the question remains who is going to teach it. Teresa Allrone is a certified teacher and chief act. Allrone is from the village and taught in the school as an aid before getting her certificate. She says her aim is to blend the two cultures in English so that the children learn as much about the western world as they do about the world they come from. We take our heritage and our culture right into the classroom

and apply to whatever knowledge or whatever school we're studying. It makes school learn not more relevant. Allrone's advantage is her cultural background which is the same as her students. No one denies that. For many teachers say it makes of the English and UPIC instructors is essential because it provides the students with both cultural perspectives. Barbara Segal, a teacher at night mute. You know, so much of what is happening in the village right now is not necessarily following the Eskimo culture. The kids get pieces of male every single day that they can't understand because it's all in English and it's all in vocabulary that they don't understand. As we're teaching our youngsters to learn how not only to operate successfully within their own culture

but also how to operate successfully in the Anglo-dominated world outside the village. Most of the pressure is on the need to go out and learn all this like a sword. But to me it should be both ways Native people learning that western world and people that are coming into the village's learning that you be world. And most agree, non- UPIC teachers coming into the village need to learn more about the culture. But ideas vary on how to go about that. There have been programs in the past to prepare teachers. You'll ask a rural school project, for example, but teachers through an intensive eight-week course of Alaska anthropology, language, and rural teaching methods. Mike Murray, who started his village teaching in the coastal village of Kwanahan before later teaching in Baffel, went through the course along with his wife. I think that that preparation was one of the things that really kept us up here

because I think without it we would have been floundering a lot more than we were. The Alaska Rural School project ended over 10 years ago. It's funding source gone. And there's been little to replace its sense. One alternative, the lower Cusk Quim School District recently instituted, is a requirement that teachers pass a UPIC culture exam at the end of the first year. While the district does provide study materials, something the best way to pass that exam is learning from experience. I think they should move into the village, stay out of the teacher's quarters and get to know the people there. Good relationships and become accepted in the community for who they are first, not as a teacher or anything else. They should come maybe three to six weeks ahead of time and not, you know, just present themselves to the community, not as a teacher but as just themselves. Naturally, being themselves won't get them through a day in class

and stories abound of teachers who approach the village school, like an urban school. In fact, the 1981 report on small high schools put out by the Center for Cross Cultural Studies at the University of Alaska Fairbanks stated the problem like this. Their natural tendency, when thrown into an unfamiliar setting, is to recreate that with which they are familiar. Presto, a standard comprehensive high school. Consequently, after a year or two of agonizing over why it's not working the way it did back home, they move on to a more comfortable setting. A new recruiter brought in to start the process over again. I can remember a teacher that I had in the village all he did was talk. I don't remember what he talked about. I talked to the other people that were in the same school as I did. They don't remember what he was saying. The same report on small high schools concluded that teachers should adapt their methods to the culture at hand, and it recommended. Small high school teacher training and certification program

should be oriented to the preparation of teachers who are knowledgeable about the people and environments in Alaska and who can effectively utilize the resources that exist in rural Alaskan communities and their teaching. In my first year here, I think it's probably going to take me a couple of years to develop all the types of techniques that other people have learned to use within their classroom. I'm feeling more and more comfortable as I go along every week, but I'm still learning. I feel this is a real learning experience for me as a teacher, as well as hopefully for the children. Usually if they're really good teachers in a cross-cultural situation, I think they can teach anywhere. But if they're successful in our western classroom with same-culture students as themselves, and they're really good teachers, they don't necessarily are good teachers in a cross-cultural situation. The need for native teachers then is great.

The high school report recommended whenever possible to encourage and support village residents to pursue teaching certificates and then work in the local schools. There is a program that takes that suggestion and produces such a teacher. It's called Exceed, which is an acronym for cross-cultural education development program. Generally students request you into the Exceed program because they're very involved and committed to the community they live and to uproot their families and move to Fairbanks just isn't realistic for them. When a move is the director of Exceed for the UConn Delta region, Exceed takes the college campus to the village in the form of correspondence, teleconferences, instructors visiting the students at their villages, plus an occasional trip to the community college for courses that can't be taught anywhere, but a true classroom setting. A move feels that developing this staff of home-grown teachers is beneficial to the students because they have someone instructing them who knows their culture.

I think because they're of the culture than they're more aware of and more sensitive of what's going on with kids and communication styles, there's obviously is going to be more similar to the students than someone that's coming in from outside and is not familiar with the patterns of interaction. It's not the easiest way to get a college degree. Students need to fly into Bethel and take intensive weekend courses at Cusco Quinn Community College. When the instructor can't make it, the classes conducted over telephone. But these future teachers will have an advantage. The courses are designed specifically for the village situation. And that means that everything is definitely relevant. There are a lot of practicums. We expect them to do a lot of work in the school prior to student teaching and actually getting the certificate. Teresa Allrone is a graduate of the Exceed program. Those courses also tell me the idea to take our culture and our heritage and take it into the classroom

as part of our learning resource. And it works because it's relevant, very relevant to students. Well, events to the students that might be the crux of this issue. Can a teacher coming from an urban, English-speaking background drive home the subjects and make it relevant? Or is a teacher from the village better equipped culturally to handle the task? Even if it were proven conclusively that you pick teachers were more successful than non-upics, the non-native instructors would not be sent packing in the Yukon Delta area. There are only 14 students enrolled in the Exceed program. So there's hardly a large number of natives waiting in the wings to take their Western counterparts place. And even to achieve the half-and-half mix, which many feel is the best ratio, will take years. The advantages of bilingual teachers have been documented, but because so few are available, the non-bilingual teachers coming from outside the village

will need to be aware of the cultural differences that will encounter. Although some teachers admit knowing those differences and actually teaching within the culture are two different things, perhaps the best warning non-native teachers could get comes from the report on small high schools, which recommends teachers should not accept a position in a small high school unless they are self-reliant, are willing and able to improvise and are able to tolerate a high degree of ambiguity. I'm Bill Sharpsstein reporting. Let's put your name at the bottom of the paper that you're correcting. What is the answer for this one? I will tell you how to find where the decimal point goes. Are you working or talking? I'm not going to do it.

Are you working here? I'm going to try to do it over here. I'm going to do it over here. I'm going to do it over here. I'm going to do it over here.

I'm going to do it over here.