The Story of 13 Moons: Developing an Environmental Health and Sustainability Curriculum Founded on Indigenous First Foods and Technologies

Jamie Donatuto, Larry Campbell, Joyce K. LeCompte, Diana Rohlman and Sonni Tadlock
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Jamie Donatuto: Swinomish Community Environmental Health Program, Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, La Conner, WA 98257, USA
Larry Campbell: Swinomish Community Environmental Health Program, Swinomish Indian Tribal Community, La Conner, WA 98257, USA
Joyce K. LeCompte: Camassia Resource Stewardship, Rochester, WA 98579, USA
Diana Rohlman: College of Public Health and Human Sciences, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331, USA
Sonni Tadlock: Washington SeaGrant, Seattle, WA 98105, USA

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 21, 1-15

Abstract: The Swinomish Indian Tribal Community developed an informal environmental health and sustainability (EHS) curriculum based on Swinomish beliefs and practices. EHS programs developed and implemented by Indigenous communities are extremely scarce. The mainstream view of EHS does not do justice to how many Indigenous peoples define EHS as reciprocal relationships between people, nonhuman beings, homelands, air, and waters. The curriculum provides an alternative informal educational platform for teaching science, technology, engineering, art, and mathematics (STEAM) using identification, harvest, and preparation activities of First Foods and medicines that are important to community members in order to increase awareness and understanding of local EHS issues. The curriculum, called 13 Moons, is founded on a set of guiding principles which may be useful for other Indigenous communities seeking to develop their own curricula.

Keywords: indigenous; environmental sustainability; environmental awareness; free-choice learning; informal learning (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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