Well, a number of articles have come in during the past day and a half,
and have been sent out to Jay for approval, but I haven't seen them
coming back through, and I haven't been able to reach Jay, so I don't
really know what's happening. Upon reflection, I've decided that I want
to wait to hear from Jay before taking any action myself. Moderation is
now Jay's responsibility, and I feel it's best to let him handle things.
I just wanted to let you all know that your articles have been received,
however, and that they have been sent to Jay for approval. (Jay and I
tested things on the weekend, so I have no doubt that the software is
working OK.)
While I have your attention, let me mention something that's been on my
mind for a while. I've said that one of the reasons I wanted to turn
over the moderation task was because I wanted to have time to work on a
number of projects. One of these projects, which we've been calling the
"electronic outreach" education project, feels to me as if it represents
something that can produce some meaningful and important results. I'd
like to say just a bit about this project and to solicit your suggestions.
The project was initially conceived in early May of this year, and was
announced by myself via an article sent to members of the NAT-EDU list.
The idea is to think about putting together electronic mail-based ex-
changes among students concerning the subject of indigenous peoples.
There would be opportunities for Native students from all over the world
to learn about one another and each other's cultures and traditions, and
it would also be possible for non-Native students to engage in dialogue
with the Native students. (We haven't yet worked out the details as to
whether these two efforts should be kept separate from one another, or
whether they could be combined.)
Rather than just establishing the "pen-pal" kinds of exchanges that various
groups have done, which are fine for just introducing folks to one another,
my idea is that it's important to design curriculum to provide a solid basis
for the exchanges, and that we should be thinking about exchanging graphical
images (photographs and drawings) and sound and video clips, if and when the
technology permits doing so. I have set up a special-purpose mailing list
(called "nn.outreach"), which now has over fifty subscribers, many of them
teachers of Native students, in order to facilitate a planning discussion.
After an initial flurry of articles from list members, including self-intro-
ductions, things have gotten fairly quiet - which causes me to wonder how
difficult it might be to sustain the levels of interest and commitment
required to actually accomplish meaningful goals. I have the idea that if
we had a project ready to go, we might have lots of people eager to sign
up, but they may be less interested in doing the work necessary to get us
from here to there.
One important aspect of the approach I would like to take, which I've
thought might be one reason that some people have become rather reticent,
is that I've insisted whenever discussing this idea that it's extremely
important to involve elders and teachers from the communities of Native
people about and with whom we would be having electronic dialogue. As
those of you on the NATCHAT list realize, there is a danger, whether con-
sciously or unconsciously, of perpetuating stereotypes, and of doing other
things which can be perceived by Native people as being culturally insen-
sitive. An even stronger reason for Native people to be involved in the
conception and planning of the project is that it should really be *their*
project - an opportunity to present themselves as they feel they can and
should be presented to young people. As technologists and educators in
various so-called "developed" nations prepare to take advantage of the
much-touted "information superhighway" that we're being told is just around
the corner, there are already planners and designers preparing instructional
materials about indigenous peoples, many of them likely based on the very
unsatisfactory printed texts which preceded them. I feel this project might
give us a means to provide the kind of alternative we've been talking about
on NATCHAT for some time, and to use some of the materials we've collected,
such as the "stereotypes list" - and to create reading lists and sample
dialogues based on some of those we've had about such matters as ethnic
identity.
I spent an evening a couple of weeks ago with a member of the "nn.outreach"
list here in the Boston area who is a professional designer of multi-media
materials. We talked about the possibility and practicality of creating a
CD-ROM which could become the basis of an initial project that could be
ready for use sometime during the coming school year *if we start planning
and collecting material right now*. There are also existing materials we
should look at, whether they are available in printed or machine-readable
forms. We should look at some of the existing projects that have been
undertaken and which are now ongoing, such as the "Legends" project, which
is sponsored by the Apple Computer Corporation, using their "HyperCard"
technology (which has the drawback of being machine-specific; we might
want to look at "SuperCard" or other portable hypertext alternatives).
We can also look at what's being done by I*EARN with their "First Peoples
Project" as well as what the BIA-sponsored ENAN ("Electronic Native American
Network") folks are up to. And we can consider the design of projects like
KIDLINK, started by Odd de Presno in Norway, with participants in all of
the Scandanavian countries and others around the world, in which they're
exchanging GIF-format student art works, as well as textual discussion
materials (I was able to meet and talk with some of the architects and
leaders of this project a bit over a month ago at a conference here in
Boston, and got a copy of samples of the student artwork, which can also
be obtained from a LISTSERV-based archive they have set up).
Another important avenue to explore is the use of the kind of hypermedia
technology represented by the World Wide Web system, especially as is made
available using the "Mosaic" software that is becoming so popular in Inter-
net-land. I am working with Marc Becker (graduate student in the History
Department at the University of Kansas, soon to begin a year-long intern-
ship at the South and Meso-American Indian Information Center in Oakland,
California [my own birthplace, BTW :) ] ). We want to set up a number of
WWW archives, containing text, graphics and sound to provide a top-quality
repository of materials of, by, and about the indigenous peoples of the
world, many of which are bound to be suitable to be used in conjunction
with collaborative learning projects, such as the one we're trying to put
together.
Quite frankly, I've been disappointed by the low level of discussion that
has been present on the "nn.outreach" list during the past couple of months.
Perhaps the approach I'm taking, of identifying and involving elders and
other members of Native communities who embody the wisdom and values of
those communities (some of whom I have already identified, at least in the
New England area), is difficult for some of the members of that list,
since it might seem to imply that their own ideas are of lesser importance.
I have suggested that we try to find such people in our own areas who can
play the roles of advisors and active participants in the planning dis-
cussions. I've also suggested that we can start some short-term experi-
ments based on our tried-and-true (if primitive) mailing list technology,
to get students talking to one another in the near term, in order that we
can get some experience and start to construct actual working relationships
with one another that can be important to us during the next few years,
during which we can expect to be working together on a longer-term, more
substantial plan.
I turn now to you, the members of NATIVE-L and NATCHAT (and NAT-EDU, to
whom I've decided to also send a slightly-edited copy of this article) to
help me decide whether now is the time to embark on such a project. It
feels to me that we have most of the necessary materials to do so, but
clearly I have not been able to provide the necessary motivation to "get
the ball rolling" and sustain the necessary momentum to accomplish real
results. Please let me know if you have suggestions, or if you'd like
to join the planning discussion - and feel you are willing and able to
contribute to that discussion in an active way, and that you're also able
to work on some of the actual tasks that will need to be worked on for us
to produce the necessary materials (curriculum, archival materials, CD-ROM
collections, teachers' guides, guidelines for evaluating programs, etc.).
Also, if any of you are members of educational mailing lists (like KIDSPHERE
or the "k12." private Usenet hierarchy) and would be willing to help write
an article presenting these ideas to one of those communities, please let
me know.
I'll look forward to hearing from any and all who like the idea of this
project and especially from those who might be willing to work on it
actively during the next several years.
Gary
--
Gary S. Trujillo gst@gnosys.svle.ma.us
Somerville, Massachusetts {wjh12,bu.edu,spdcc,cdp}!gnosys!gst