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PUTTING CHILDREN BACK IN THE CENTER




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Emily Nelson is pictured here with one of the children attending Owayawa Cikala/Lakota Immersion Montessori. Arlo Iron Cloud photo.

Emily Nelson is pictured here with one of the children attending Owayawa Cikala/Lakota Immersion Montessori. Arlo Iron Cloud photo.

PAYABYA, S.D. – Montessori education is an innovative child-centered approach which allows children the opportunity to think critically and work collaboratively. This worldly approach has been used for over a hundred years and focuses on the child’s natural curiosity. Children are given the ability to pave the journey of their own development. That liberation only allows for more independence, curiosity, and organic learning. Something the Lakota have been doing for centuries.

One of the many important initiatives at Thunder Valley Community Development Corporation has focused on is Lakota Language.

Through that initiative Iyapi Glukinipi (Reviving the Language) was derived. This initiative is a diverse effort to revitalize Lakota language and life-ways on the Pine Ridge reservation. The program has created curriculums and resources for every age group from infant to elder. This process of reviving the “village” approach involves every community member and those who preserve the life-ways. Through this approach learners are able to foster their natural interest in an environment that is tailored specifically for them. Teachers are seen as Guides and they are trained in recognizing and observing what the child is focusing on at the time of attentiveness. This approach runs parallel with the Lakota teaching process. This made the method an ideal plan to initiate.

“We believe that our children in our communities deserve to have access to the highest quality of Early Childhood Education and that for us is the Lakota Immersion Montessori. Early childhood education is the most important and critical stage of development for our children,” said Dallas Nelson, Lakota Language Initiative Director. Nelson recalls his Auntie Betty Archambault, whom has preached about Montessori since Nelson has been alive. “She has been one of his inspirations. She’s helped with Montessori schools in Standing Rock Reservation and Little Eagle, South Dakota and has been a life-long advocate for Montessori,” he added.

A few years ago, the Lakota Language Initiative had the opportunity to send a couple of staff to Montessori Center of Minnesota in St. Paul to train staff to be guides in the Montessori approach. The training would take nine months. However, they had only days to decide and send staff. After a wide extensive search for people to go, no one turned up

Continued on A4 or was able to give up 9 months of their lives for this considerable opportunity. Dallas and his wife Emily Nelson talked and understood the circumstances and decided she would go and learn the way of the Montessori. Her and Nelson’s sister Dusty Nelson would attend the 9-month deep dive into Montessori. After only days of making the major decision Emily and Dusty were on their way to Minnesota. Even though their lives were transformed in a matter of days they successfully completed the 9-month course. Both ladies have brought back what they learned; other staff have attended the program and programs alike.

This education and promotion led to the opening of the very first Lakota Immersion Montessori on the Pine Ridge Reservation. On Monday January 27th, 2020 the doors opened in Payabya Community in South Dakota as the new Owayawa Cikala – Lakota Immersion Montessori. This monumental day was dedicated to all those that have committed their lives to putting children first in education.

Currently the school has 15 children between the ages of 3-5 years old attending the Montessori. The future of the Montessori looks bright, adding a school at the Thunder Valley CDC Regenerative Community Development. Also, adding space for additional ages, like infant to 2 years old, will allow the school to serve more students.

“We believe that Lakota Immersion Montessori will be one of the pivotal moments in history that spark systemic change for future generations,” Nelson said.

This is all dedicated to partnerships with the Oglala Sioux Tribe Child Care & Development Program, Wakpamni District, the Montessori Center of Minnesota and many others individuals, foundations and champions of education, language revitalization and systemic chance.

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