Lewis and Clark: Their Journals, Their Maps, and Their Dog
By Kelli Mills and Paige Waggoner
Summer Fellowship 2010
To download this lesson plan in PDF format, click here.
Lesson 8:
Interaction with Indians (Native Americans)
Purpose:
Expose students to the idea
of Lewis and Clark as ambassadors/diplomats to the native tribes in the western
territories.
Follow the interactions that
go well and that go badly. Have
students develop questions re why.
Teacher will create a Question-Answer-Response
(QAR) chart that will record the studentsÕ questions, and guide them toward
questioning the motivations of the parties involved, specifically, the U.S.
government, the explorers, and the Native Americans. As the students questions are
answered, record that on the chart as well.
Using the following journal
entries from the Lewis and Clark expedition, students will discuss how the
explorers carried out their orders from President Jefferson to introduce
themselves to the native tribes.
This is one of many entries
where Lewis or Clark details the titles and medals given to native chiefs they
encounter.
In this entry, the Indians
are given whiskey and gunpowder.
Lewis and Clark inform the
Indians of the strength of the United States government and warn that their Òdefence and comfortÓ depend on cooperation with
representatives of the US.
Lewis writes of trading
items of little worth to the Indians in exchange for 3 horses. One of his men also trades a pair of
pants for a horse.
Clark introduces the
interaction with an Indian council.
Here, the second chief is
insolent in both words and gestures and the groups nearly exchange arrows and
guns.
LewisÕs Tuesday entry
details having the expedition blacksmith make tomahawks for the Indians.
A drawing
of the tomahawk.
Assessment:
Students will create two articles about the interactions with Indians. One will
contain a positive interaction, the other a negative interaction and how it was
resolved.
