Dakota language immersion

[Beth Brown]

Thanks for posting this, Phil! Those children in the video clips are  
my little language students in the Wicoie Nandagikendan Urban  
Language Immersion Program here in Minneapolis. For those that  
haven't heard of us, here is some background information about our  
program:
The Wicoie Nandagikendan Early Childhood Urban Immersion Project  
provides a 3-hour-a-day early childhood language immersion experience  
that builds on the integral connections between culture, literacy,  
and educational attainment. The project partners with existing  
programs to provide fluent speakers and language curriculum.

Wicoie Nandagikendan began in January 2006 with a grant from ANA.  
Because the future of native languages is in the children, it is  
crucial to expose children to these languages at a young age. When  
the language (Dakota or Ojibwe) is not spoken in the home, due to  
generations of language loss, schools and day care facilities offer  
an alternative opportunity to expose children to their heritage  
languages in a supportive, non-threatening environment.

Wicoie currently facilitates two Ojibwe immersion classrooms, and one  
Dakota immersion classroom. The Ojibwe sites are located at Four  
Directions Family Center (ages 2-5) and at Anishinabe Academy (ages  
4-5), a public Native American magnet school in Minneapolis. The  
Dakota classroom (ages 4-5) is also located at Anishinabe Academy.  
Each class meets for about 3 hours each day, Monday through Friday,  
and class sizes range from 10-25 students. In the fall, the program  
will be adding an after-school immersion option for children in  
grades K-2.

The classes are held in separate rooms of each daycare facility or  
school from the regular classrooms. In each immersion classroom,  
teachers speak only Dakota or Ojibwe (depending on the class).  
Because there is not always an overlap between childcare  
professionals and fluent speakers, each classroom has a licensed  
childcare professional or teacher in the room at all times, though he  
or she may not speak the language. An auxiliary program exists to  
help these caregivers and parents further instruction in the language.

For more information, contact me, Beth Brown, at brow0857 at umn.edu,  
612-624-8217.

Wopida!

On Jun 11, 2008, at 9:04 PM, phil cash cash wrote:

> Greetings everybody,
>
> Although very brief (less than a minute), several video clips were  
> just posted
> to YouTube on Dakota language immersion from Minneapolis, MN.  The  
> children are
> seen and heard conversing in the Dakota language!  Very inspiring!
>
> The clips are entitled: "Caga Sni" AND "Wiciyanna kais Hoksidan?"
>
> You can view them here at my YouTube clips page:
> http://www.youtube.com/weyiiletpu
>
> Phil Cash Cash
> UofA ILAT

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