Focus
The Dawes Act, when passed in 1887, was intended to abolish reservations and turn Native Americans into farmers by offering the heads of families 160 acres. Individuals were given lesser amounts of land. "Surplus" land would be sold to whites. As a consequence, Native Americans lost huge amounts of land. Today's reservations have a landownership pattern that is called "checkerboarding" because so many non-Native Americans own land on the reservation. .

Vital Theme and Narrative
Patterns of social and political interaction.

Habit of the Mind
Understand how things happen and how things change. How human intentions matter, but also how their consequences are shaped by the means of carrying them out, in a tangle of purpose and process.

Prepare to live with uncertainties and exasperating, even perilous, unfinished business, realizing that not all problems and solutions.

Objectives
Students will study the White Earth Reservation in Minnesota to understand the consequences of the Dawes Act. Students will also have an opportunity to learn about current tribal approaches to reclaiming the reservation land.

Activity
Students will be given one or more web sites to research various topics. It is up to the teacher to decide how to approach this. Individual students or groups of students can search particular topics. For example, some students might research the demographics of the reservation while others might wish to study the current direction the tribe is trying to take to reclaim land. Others many wish to use Winnie Jourdain's biography to gain an understanding of life on the reservation. Jourdain also writes about her experiences at a boarding school.

Sources
Websites for research are attached. To find more websites pertaining to the White Earth Reservation, a student could go to Google and enter White Earth Reservation. I have listed the sites that I found to be most informational.

Ideas for Assessment of Student Learning
This could take various forms.

• Students could present posters (or do a power point presentation) about the demographics of the reservation. Maps of the reservation could be included. (I have included some interesting demographic information for you based on research using
  the site).
• Students could write a newspaper or magazine editorial that would educate the public about the issues relating to reservation land and/or reservation life.
• Students could engage in a debate about the issues of reclamation of tribal land. This would require further research because I do not have web sites about the opponents of reclamation.

Web sites for further research

1. This site provides information from the 1990 census that provides students with interesting statistics. It is one thing to hear that the majority of the population on a reservation are not native Americans. Students can access actual numbers, and figure the percent of the population that is white, by adding the percent that is in other categories.
White Earth Indian Reservation, White Earth, Minnesota, Ojibwe
White Earth Indian Reservation. ... White Earth On Reservation Population:
2,759. Total Reservation Enrollment: 21,054.
http://www.digitmaster.com/hp/ohf/cim/intern/cim1/white.html

2.This site describes efforts to reclaim tribal land.
Untitled... people. For this reason we seek to reclaim the land of White Earth Reservation which was stolen from us through unethical tax foreclosures, treaty abrogations ... http://www.welrp.org/faq.xml

3.This site is a good informational site with lots of demographic information. There are also maps on this site.
-White Earth, Minnesota, Ojibwe Reservation
...White Earth Reservation Contents: surface vegetation cover type, roads, water,
res boundary, county boundary, USGS quad, public land survey Usage: Forest ...
http://www.kstrom.net/isk/maps/mn/whitearth.htm

4.This is a state of Minnesota site about reservations.
Untitled
... Location The White Earth Reservation is located in the northwestern Minnesota counties of Mahnomen, Becker, and Clearwater. The reservation is located 68 miles ...
http://www.indians.state.mn.us/wtearth.html

5. This site has an excellent map.
White Earth Tribal Council Planning Department Home Page
Planning Department...Welcome to the White Earth Reservation Tribal Council Planning Department Home Page...
http://www.whiteearthplanning.com/default.htm

6.Casino information: Notice that this does deal with tribal difficulties.

Super Chief on VHS Nick Kurzon
By 1996, millions of dollars that had come through the new casino on the White Earth
Reservation seemed to stop at the tribal chairman's desk. The self ...
http://www.buyindies.com/listings/2/5/DERE-250.html

7. Activist Winona La Duke has pushed for land reclamation.
Voices From the Gaps: Winona LaDuke...Los Angeles, California. She is Anishinabe from the Makwa Dodaem (Bear Clan) of the Mississippi Band of the White Earth reservation in northern Minnesota. Her...Description: Biography and bibliography of Ralph Nader's vice presidential running mate.
Category: Regional > North America > ... > Candidates > Nader, Ralph and Winona LaDuke http://www.voices.cla.umn.edu/authors/WinonaLaduke.html

8. This site provides some history about the reservation and the treaties.
White Earth Reservation - Summer Program - History...villages across the lands of what are now called Minnesota. Although the White Earth reservation was not their original home, the people have come to love its ...
http://www.colsch.org/ss/history.htm

9. Winnie Jourdain's autobiography is geared to younger readers, but it is a wonderful story about life on reservations and attending a boarding school.
Untitled... Fun Quiz, Winnie Jourdain saw the tears, confusion and poverty that crippled the White Earth Indian Reservation. She made it her life's work to right the wrongs. http://www.startribune.com/spirit/

10. For someone interested in pursing further information, this is about a book that can be ordered. Chippewa Families: A Social Study of White Earth Reservation, 1938 M. Inez Hilger, New Introduction by Brenda J. Child and Kimberly M. Blaeser Borealis Book204...http://www.mnhs.org/market/mhspress/0028.html