A Creator, a culture & kids
Families who want spirituality in school are finding education alternatives
Story by: Katrin Madayag
Photos by: Allison Kwesell

            Most of the 7th graders streaming into Carolyn Zuback’s Blackfeet language class at Browning Middle School on the Blackfeet Reservation wear green for St. Patrick’s Day.  Right outside the door, their counselor, Kathy Black Broere, watches them.       
            “Where’s your green?” Broere mischievously asks students walking by. Giggling, they either narrowly miss her playful attempts to pinch them or triumphantly hold up arms with green circles colored in with marker.
            “Hustle, ladies!” she calls out to some girls still dawdling in the hallway when classes begin.
            Nineteen students, mostly Indian, crowd into the classroom. After discussing a possible stickball tournament, the dark-haired Zuback begins the lesson, holding a yardstick. 
            “I say, you say,” she tells the students, her stick pointing at a chart with the names of colors in English and Blackfeet.  It taps down the list.
            “Green,” she says. “Sai sikimokinaattsi.”
            “Green,” echoes the class. “Saisskimokinaattsi.”
            Zuback then makes each student take a turn reading the chart aloud alone. She urges them to close their eyes and listen to the rhythm.
            “I’m picking on you so I can teach you,” Zuback reminds them.  You shouldn’t have to learn in college from non-Blackfeet teachers, she says.
            Around the room hang signs in Blackfeet. Clock.  Iih-tai-ksi-tsi-kom-iop.  Phone.  Iik-tai-po-yop.  Scrawled on the chalkboard is a Blackfeet language map.
Zuback moves on to a “days of the week” chart and mentions that Friday is the Blackfeet’s traditional sacred day.  Now, it means “Fish Day” in Blackfeet because of the Christian influence, she says.
            “My dad does that,” one girl pipes up.  “We eat fish on Friday.”
Zuback says nothing and begins the next activity – writing Blackfeet names of landmarks on a map.
            About seven blocks away across Central Avenue sits De La Salle Blackfeet Middle School.  Like the public middle school, most students are Blackfeet, though some are from other tribes or non-Indian.
            Signs here are mostly in English. But one thing is different. Up high on the wall are posters of four prayers, written in big block letters. The Glory Be. The Hail Mary. The Our Father. And in English and Blackfeet, a traditional Blackfeet prayer.
            A large painting of a Blackfeet Jesus with Blackfeet children graces a wall in the school office: “Let the little children come to me.” Luke 18:16 is painted beneath, as is its Blackfeet translation.
            Spirituality is central to Blackfeet culture. In Browning public schools, culture pervades students’ education, but some things are out of bounds.
            We’ll talk about smudging – but you can’t burn the sweetgrass here.
            We’ll discuss the tradition of smoking the pipe – but you can’t light it here.
            We’ll learn the language of the Creator and Napi – but you can’t pray to them here.
            Montana’s Indian Education for All law requires instruction in all state schools about Indian history and culture. But in public schools, and on reservations, where that instruction has long been central to the curriculum, one aspect of culture can’t be taught — religion. Some Indian parents say cultural education without spirituality leaves a hole in their children’s education, so they’ve turned to private schools or home schooling.

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