21 Primary Source Native American Heritage Month Activities
People in the United States have honored Native American Heritage Month since 1990. Celebrated in November, it coincides with the end of the traditional harvest season for many Indigenous tribes, which is typically a time for celebration and Thanksgiving.
Each year, it gives us a chance to reflect on the contributions to our daily lives and culture made by members of the 574 federally recognized Native American tribes and Alaska Native entities.
Today, we’re sharing 21 primary source Native American Heritage Month activities to help your students better understand the Native American experience in the United States over the last 500 years.
Explore 5 government rulings and commentaries on Native American issues
Explore 5 eyewitness and first-person accounts of Native American life
Explore 5 government rulings and commentaries on Native American issues
After the United States gained independence from Britain, the newly formed government began to speculate, comment on, and create laws about Indigenous issues and affairs. Still today, the government debates topics of Indigenous people’s rights to land, voting, and lifestyle choices. Help your students understand the impact these decisions have on members of Native American communities and on our entire country by examining primary source documents.
Each primary source has an interactive activity from the shared Formative Library to help engage your students and make lesson planning easier. You can customize the activity templates by adjusting settings like awarding partial credit for specific questions, randomizing the question order, and tagging questions to additional standards. You can also edit existing questions and add content for a more targeted or comprehensive assessment.
Newsela Social Studies subscribers have access to even more great features that make teaching and sharing primary sources easier. Help students break down each resource at five different reading levels and dig into the content in a way that’s more accessible.
1. President Thomas Jefferson’s message on the Lewis and Clark Expedition, 1803
On January 18, 1803, President Thomas Jefferson sent a secret message to Congress asking for $2,500 to explore the land west of the Mississippi River. At the time, that land didn’t belong to the United States but to Native American tribes in the West. This endeavor became what we know today as the Lewis and Clark Expedition.
2. President Andrew Jackson’s message “On Indian Removal,” 1830
On December 6, 1830, President Andrew Jackson addressed Congress and defended the Indian Removal Act, which called for the relocation of eastern Indigenous groups to land west of the Mississippi River.
Government officials passed the act to open Indigenous lands for settlement, and while that happened, its policies also led to tragic events like the Trail of Tears and made him one of the most controversial U.S. presidents in history.
3. Treaty of Point No Point, 1855
Signed on January 26, 1855, the Treaty of Point No Point ceded land ownership in the Pacific Northwest from tribes of the northern Kitsap Peninsula to the United States in exchange for hunting and fishing rights. The agreement also required the Indigenous people to trade only with the United States, free all their enslaved people, and stop all future enslavement practices.
4. Dawes Act, 1887
In 1887, U.S. officials passed the Dawes Act, which aimed to assimilate Indigenous peoples into what was considered “mainstream” American society. The law encouraged them toward farming and agriculture jobs, stripped over 90 million acres of tribal land from Native Americans, and sold it to non-native U.S. citizens.
5. Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Ariz., 2012
Arizona v. Inter Tribal Council of Arizona was a 2012 Supreme Court case focused on Arizona’s voter registration requirements and the National Voter Registration Act. In a 7-2 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that Arizona’s current voter registration requirements were unlawful because they contradicted federal voting laws.
Read 5 letters to, from, and about Native American leaders
Throughout the years, Native American leaders have often conversed with explorers, government officials, or the American public to make their voices heard on important issues. Invite students to explore their words through these letters:
1. The Seneca Nation writes a letter to President Washington, 1790
In 1790, seven years after the American Revolution ended, a group of Seneca leaders—including Big Tree, Cornplanter, and Half-town—sent a letter to President George Washington requesting that he return their land, as stated in the Treaty of Fort Stanwix.
2. Tecumseh calls for a united Native American resistance, 1810
Tecumseh was a Shawnee warrior chief who called for a united Native American resistance to rise up and push back against Anglo-American settlers. In 1810, he wrote a letter to Governor William Henry Harrison—who later became the ninth president of the United States—to announce pride in his heritage and his feelings about settlers.
3. Letter from the chief of the Choctaw to the American people on removal, 1832
In 1830, Congress passed the Indian Removal Act, which gave President Jackson the power to grant land west of the Mississippi River to Native Americans so the government could take their lands in the East. The Choctaw was one of the nations forcibly moved during this time. Chief George W. Harkins wrote a letter to the American public to express his feelings on the subject of removal.
4. Andrew Jackson’s letter to the Cherokee, 1835
On March 16, 1835, President Andrew Jackson addressed the Cherokee Tribe east of the Mississippi River and tried to persuade them to accept a proposal that would cause them to move west. They would receive land and provisions for choosing to move.
5. Letter to Congress from Cherokee Chief John Ross, 1836
In 1835, the Treaty of New Echota tried to remove Cherokee people from Georgia. The tribe argued that the treaty wasn’t legitimate because it wasn’t signed by Cherokee tribal leadership. In 1836, Cherokee leader Chief John Ross signed a petition to protest the treaty and sent it to Congress to voice his nation’s opposition to the treaty and the way the U.S. Government had treated them.
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Read and listen to 4 speeches on Native American rights
One of the most common ways to bring light to important issues is to speak about them in public forums. Have students read or listen to important speeches from Indigenous trailblazers and leaders throughout history.
1. Chief Minavavana warns the English against taking Indigenous land, 1761
Following the British victory in the Seven Years’ War, also known as the French and Indian War, the English expanded further into the Americas. As they moved, they began to take more Indigenous land for themselves. Chief Minavavana was a leader of either the Chippewa or Ojibwa people, and while he wanted peace with the new settlers, he also didn’t want them to take Indigenous land.
2. Red Jacket’s defense of Native American religion, 1805
Red Jacket was a Native American Seneca chief and a member of the Iroquois Confederacy. He became a mediator for the nations with government officials of the newly formed United States following the Revolutionary War. In 1805, a missionary group from Boston asked Red Jacket’s permission to bring their religion to the Iroquois groups in the area.
3. Zitkála-Šá speaks to Indigenous activists, 1919
Zitkála-Šá was a Yankton Sioux writer, educator, and activist. On October 2, 1919, she gave a speech at the Annual Convention of the Society of American Indians where she encouraged Indigenous people to stand up for their rights and fight to have their experiences included in what was considered “American life” for the time.
4. Megan Red Shirt-Shaw’s Harvard commencement speech, 2017
Megan Red Shirt-Shaw is a member of the Oglala Sioux Tribe. When she earned her master’s degree in Education from Harvard University in 2017, she gave a speech where she spoke in an Indigenous language, reflected on her experience at Harvard, and encouraged those who listened to remember those who came before them and helped them succeed.
Read 2 articles about key events in Native American history
Important events in history are often recorded in newspapers, magazine articles, and other current events publications for their time. Take students on a trip back to those events and eras with these historical articles:
1. The Cherokees and the Trail of Tears, 1838
Following the Indian Removal Act of 1830 and the Treaty of New Echota in 1835, American soldiers went to the south to collect Cherokee members and lead them west of the Mississippi. The conditions on this march were terrible, and about 4,000 members of the Cherokee nation died. It later became known as “The Trail of Tears.”
Articles published in the “Vermont Telegraph” newspaper in 1838 discussed the Cherokee Nation’s protests against the Treaty of New Echota and their appeal for protection from Congress.
2. “Manifest Destiny” and annexing California and Texas, 1845
In 1845, editor of the “United States Magazine and Democratic Review,” John O’Sullivan, coined the term “Manifest Destiny.” It represented the U.S. taking western territory and removing Native Americans from those lands. In his article, O’Sullivan argued that the annexation of California and Texas was the right decision for the country.
Explore 5 eyewitness and first-person accounts of Native American life
One of the best ways to understand history is to hear accounts from those who experienced it. Teach students about Indigenous life across the country with these eyewitness and first-person accounts:
1. Powhatan exchanges views with Captain John Smith, 1608
Captain John Smith was an English explorer who helped set up the first permanent English colony in Jamestown. In 1607, Powhatan, chief leader of the Native American nations in the area, captured him. After Smith’s release, he and Powhatan tried to create peace and trade between the two groups.
2. Junípero Serra encounters Indigenous people, 1769
Junípero Serra was a Spanish Franciscan friar. He served as a missionary in Mexico until 1767, when the Franciscan Order took control of the Baja California Missions. On his journey from Mexico to California, he encountered Indigenous people in the area.
3. Life at a California mission, 1830s
The Luiseño were one of the Indigenous groups of coastal Southern California. In the 1800s. Pablo Tac, a member of the group, spent his childhood in the San Luis Rey Roman Catholic Mission. His writings are one of the few existing accounts of Indigenous peoples with experience living in a mission.
4. A soldier’s account of the Cherokee Trail of Tears, 1838
Soldiers who went to remove the Cherokee from their land in 1838 and bring them west of the Mississippi weren’t unaffected by the tragedy that became known as the Trail of Tears. On his 80th birthday, Private John G. Burnett, one of the soldiers who partook in this mission, wrote a letter to his children describing his experience.
5. Invading Alcatraz, 1969
In 1969, Red Lake Chippewa member Adam Fortunate Eagle and Mohawk activist Richard Oakes helped organize a 19-month occupation of Alcatraz Island in San Francisco Bay, which closed its federal prison in 1968.
According to an 1868 treaty, the U.S. government could turn over abandoned federal properties—like Alcatraz—to Indigenous peoples at their request. The Indigenous nations requested a symbolic purchase of the land for $24 in beads and cloth. The group did not succeed in getting the island but did change U.S. policy on how it treats Indigenous tribes.
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