Aloha Lakota!
The Institute ran from June 1-19 and consisted of 11 courses ranging from Lakota Morphology, Phonetics, Syntax, Methodology, and Conversational classes. A total of 32 teachers representing the Rosebud, Cheyenne River, Standing Rock, and Pine Ridge Reservations, as well as Sioux Falls School, and Colorado and Minnesota schools had the opportunity to get a head start on using the New Lakota Dictionary and forthcoming Level 3 Textbook.Participants of the 3rd Annual Lakota Summer Institute (LSI) received the triple benefit of working with the upcoming Level 3 Lakota Language Textbook, the New Lakota Dictionary (which by the way received a bronze medal at the 13th Annual Independent Publishers Book Awards competition), and Pila Wilson, a founding member of the very successful Hawaiian Language Revitalization program.
Sacheen Whitetail Cross, the Education Coordinator for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe, is a 3-year veteran of LSI. In a recent conversation with Sacheen she lent her perspective on the progress of the program and the teachers:
So after 3 years—things are beginning to take shape and the teachers have gained a feel for the strategy of the comprehensive curriculum plan, and the 3rd LSI seemed to crystallize training and experience into a shared vision of the value of LSI and a line of sight for future progress.
Sacheen has had the opportunity to see a lot of progress at LSI. Who I really wanted to interview was LSI instructor Pila Wilson, co-founder of the Hawaiian Studies Program at the University of Hawaii in Hilo.
