For decades, students have been hearing a fairly one-sided story about Thanksgiving. The picture that many teachers paint about the holiday involves pilgrims and Native Americans getting along peacefully and celebrating their shared bounty. We attempt to honor the past, in our homes and in our classrooms, by giving thanks for what we have. And while the sentiment of gratitude is a nice one, this story leaves out many details, and even changes some, in order to sugar-coat history. In the creation of this narrative, the truth has evolved, and many voices have been silenced.
The real story of Thanksgiving
Teaching the true story of Thanksgiving doesn’t mean we need to expose young children to the gory details of what really happened. (And if you need a refresher yourself, check out this New York Times article.) There are ways to introduce young children to the background of the holiday truthfully, without traumatizing them. One way to do this is to change the narrative we present about Native Americans altogether.
By now, hopefully every teacher knows that wearing headdresses and coloring in pictures of Native Americans isn’t okay. These activities make light of the Native Americans’ suffering at the hands of Europeans, and maintain harmful stereotypes of a group of people who are very much present in our society today. When students are introduced to Native Americans this way, it becomes their only representation of an entire, complex culture. And the image young children often receive of Native Americans places them in the past. In fact, most children grow up believing that Native Americans no longer walk among us at all.
Helpful literature for classrooms
We know teachers need to avoid leaning into the narrative that pilgrims and Native Americans got along peacefully. But this doesn’t mean they have to navigate this road on their own. Teachers and families can use books to avoid this harmful narrative while maintaining the message of gratitude that children are familiar with. The books in this list are all excellent ways to incorporate Native American voices into any classroom’s Thanksgiving lesson.
And teaching about Native Americans doesn’t just need to happen at Thanksgiving. Here are more books that teach about Native American history more generally. They have suggestions for picture books, books for middle school, and young adult novels. Teaching Thanksgiving responsibly doesn’t have to mean making it sad or scary for students. But it should mean making sure the real stories and voices of Native American people are shared and lifted up, not suppressed, as they have been for so many years.
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