Westward Expansion
As Americans moved west, many Native Americans were forced onto these areas of land designated by the U.S. government.
What are reservations?
This term means pressuring a group to adopt another group's culture.
What is assimilation?
Native American children at boarding schools were pressured or forced to give up parts of this.
What is their culture/traditions?
True or False: Native American resistance always involved fighting.
False.
This Native leader said he did not want reservation houses and wanted to remain on the land where he was born.
Who is Ten Bears?
Westward expansion caused many Native nations to lose this important resource.
What is land?
The goal of U.S. assimilation policies was for Native Americans to adopt this culture.
What is white American culture?
Name ONE thing Native children could be forced to change at boarding schools.
Hair, clothing, language, or customs/traditions.
Give ONE example of Native resistance that did not involve armed fighting.
Speaking out, refusing removal, or fleeing.
Ten Bears's statements are an example of this type of resistance.
What is speaking out/refusing removal?
Explain one way westward expansion changed life for Native American communities.
Answers may include loss of land, forced relocation, reservation life, conflict, or pressure to assimilate.
This law divided tribal lands into individual plots as part of assimilation.
What is the Dawes Act?
Why was forcing a Native child to stop speaking their language an example of assimilation?
Because it pressured the child to give up part of their Native culture and adopt white American culture.
A Native leader publicly refuses to leave his people's traditional homeland. What type of resistance does this demonstrate?
Speaking out/refusing removal.
This battle is an example of armed Native American resistance.
What is the Battle of Little Bighorn?
True or False: Westward expansion gave Native nations greater control over their traditional lands.
False.
The Dawes Act changed Native landholding from land held by the ______ to land divided among individuals.
What is the tribe/community?
Boarding schools could affect generations that never personally attended them. Explain how.
Children could lose languages, traditions, and cultural knowledge that otherwise might have been passed to later generations.
Why can fleeing from the U.S. government be considered resistance?
Because Native Americans were refusing to accept government attempts to control where they lived or force them onto reservations.
Chief Joseph and the Nez Perce demonstrated resistance by doing this rather than immediately accepting removal.
What is fleeing?
Explain the connection between westward expansion and the U.S. government's assimilation policies.
As settlers expanded westward and Native Americans lost land, the government increasingly attempted to force Native Americans to adopt white American culture and ways of life.
Explain how the Dawes Act was connected to assimilation rather than simply being a policy about land.
It attempted to break up traditional tribal landholding and push Native Americans toward individual land ownership and white American ways of life.
A student says, “Boarding schools only affected the children who actually attended them.” Use evidence from the unit to challenge this claim.
The effects could continue across generations because children who lost language, customs, or traditions might not be able to pass them on to their children and communities.
Compare armed resistance with ONE other form of Native resistance. What did they have in common?
Both were ways Native Americans attempted to resist U.S. policies, removal, loss of land, or control over their lives.
Ten Bears speaking out, the Nez Perce fleeing, and Native warriors fighting at Little Bighorn support what larger conclusion about Native resistance?
There are two types of resistance: active and passive. Native Americans resisted U.S. expansion in different ways