An American Indian charter school plans to teach N

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An American Indian charter school plans to teach Navajo language

An American Indian charter school plans to teach Navajo language
By Susie Gran <mailto:[e-mail]>
Tribune Reporter
April 25, 2006
www.abqtrib.com/albq/nw_education/article/0,2564,ALBQ_19857_46491\
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Navajo Shannon Johnson builds her students' vocabulary with words of the
Navajo Code Talkers.
Navajo language teacher Shannon Johnson photographs her students
performing as the La Mesa Fancy Shawl Dancers in a recent performance at
Wilson Middle School. Johnson, who is Navajo, satisfies a growing demand
for native language teaching across the city and state, educators say.
(Steven St. John/Tribune)
NAVAJO TEACHERS IN CITY SCHOOLS
Navajo children in these schools are learning their native language:
La Mesa Elementary
Lowell Elementary
Painted Sky Elementary
Manzano High
Rio Grande High
West Mesa High
Cibola High
In August, the new Native American Academy, to be located at Wilson
Middle School, will also offer Navajo language instruction.
Source: Albuquerque Public Schools

Gah, Dzeh, Wol-la-chee and Be translate to "rabbit," "elk," "ant" and
"deer."
Her students, all Navajo children who live in Albuquerque, came to
school knowing only English.
In her La Mesa Elementary School language class, Johnson insists they
learn the way their ancestors did. In Navajo.
The demand for native languages is growing across the city and state,
educators say.
But teachers like Johnson are hard to find. The University of New Mexico
and the tribes are responding to the demand by training and certifying
more American Indians as language teachers.
Johnson's goal for her Navajo kindergarteners at La Mesa is that they
speak Navajo fluently by the time they leave fifth grade.
She has 30 minutes a day with them to get the job done.
Once they leave her, they are on their own.
Few, if any, of their parents know their native language. And
Albuquerque Public Schools does not offer any Navajo language classes
for middle schoolers.
"There's a big gap," Johnson said. "There's nothing in the middle for
these students."
The new Native American Academy, a charter school to be housed at Wilson
Middle School, plans to fill that gap. Academy officials said they will
hire a Navajo teacher.
The academy is scheduled to open in August with 100 sixth- and
seventh-graders.
Academy organizers plan to tap the American Indian teaching talent being
developed at UNM.
"They are asking us for our best and brightest," said Joseph Suina,
director of a 2-year-old program designed for American Indians who want
to teach in their tribes or pueblos. "We have identified people we'll
recommend highly."
Johnson intends to apply for UNM's American Indian Education Scholarship
to pay for expenses while she pursues a master's degree.
The scholarship program receives $900,000 annually from the Public
Education Department for scholarships to encourage American Indians to
pursue teaching careers. Those enrolled must spend at least three years
teaching in their pueblos or tribes.
Suina said scholarships and workshops have drawn 40 prospective teachers
to the program. An additional 20 UNM students are studying American
Indian languages.
In all, 47 undergraduates and 18 graduate students are enrolled in
Suina's Institute of American Indian Education.
Also, tribes and pueblos are starting to license their own language
teachers under an agreement with the Public Education Department.
Johnson was certified by the Navajo Nation to teach Navajo. She also has
her elementary-school certification.
After two years at of exclusively teaching Navajo at La Mesa, Johnson
next year moves into a third-grade classroom at the Northeast Heights
school, which counts about 10 percent of its 670 enrollment as American
Indian.
Johnson's replacement in the La Mesa language program may be recruited
from UNM's American Indian scholarship group. She's asking Suina to help
her recruit her successor.
Unlike her Navajo students, Johnson, 32, spoke her native language
before she went to preschool.
At Head Start in Arizona, she learned English and by first grade was
communicating in English with her teachers.
"Prior to this, it was a hit-and-miss program," Suina said of training
American Indian teachers, especially those wanting to teach their native
languages.
Federal funding for such training dried up in 1982.
"Native languages were not viewed on the same level as foreign
languages," he said. "They were treated as second class."
Brett Morgan (top left), 11, breathes in incense during a ceremony
before he participates with the La Mesa Sharks drum group. The Sharks
and the La Mesa Fancy Shawl dancers performed at Wilson Middle School
earlier this month. (Steven St. John/Tribune)
The Indian Education Act adopted in New Mexico in 1998 fueled the effort
to serve American Indians, Suina said.
At UNM, students can study Keres, the language of six pueblos, including
Suina's Cochiti Pueblo; Tewa, the language of six northern pueblos;
Tiwa, the language of four pueblos, including those closest to
Albuquerque, Sandia and Isleta; and Zunian, the language of the Zuni
Pueblo.
Also, they can study the Athebascan family of languages spoken by
Navajos and the Jicarilla and Mescalero Apaches.
At Sandia Pueblo, two teachers are bringing the Tiwa language to about
80 children in preschool and after-school programs at the pueblo.
The pueblo intends to hire a third teacher and is working with the
Bernalillo Public Schools to offer the Tiwa language, said Gov. Lawrence
Gutierrez.
Thirty-five percent to 50 percent of tribal members speak their native
language. The pueblo wants to make sure the language stays alive,
Gutierrez said.
"As we lose our seniors, we can't replace them," he said.
Native languages in the middle schools have been missed by American
Indian families.
"The first attention it's getting is from the new charter," UNM's Suina
said. "No one in the middle schools even asked for our assistance until
now."
UNM and the charter school will complement each other, he said. "The
school came to us and we're going to be working out the details. We have
every intention to use it as a laboratory."
Native American Academy founder Kara Bobroff said the university is a
welcome resource for the new school.
Suina and Johnson were among consultants called on to help develop the
charter school.
Johnson is one of three Navajo language teachers in the elementary
schools.
She doesn't blame Navajo parents for not teaching their native language
to their children. Most of them didn't learn it themselves and are now
afraid of losing it, she said.
Only one Navajo parent in the past two years did not sign the permission
form required to enroll children in Johnson's language classes.
She said the student attended one of her classes and "thought it was too
hard."
During her classes, Johnson rarely speaks a word of English. Her
students develop vocabulary through songs, artwork, games, stories and
life-skills instruction.
Her students will be ready to break the Navajo code for the spring
parent program.
They'll also introduce themselves and their parents and recite the
Pledge of Allegiance to the American flag and the Navajo Nation, all in
Navajo.
Johnson said she is learning what works and what doesn't as she teaches
her native language.
"In a way, you can say they are my guinea pigs," she said of her Navajo
students.