The Old Days

Engage

20 minutes

Show students one or more of the following videos of Native Alaskans talking about changes in their communities.

Saving a Community: Shishmaref, Alaska

Orville Huntington, “It’s a Changing Thing”

Alaska Native Elders discuss change

Lead a discussion with your students about changes they have noticed in weather patterns. Was this winter longer or shorter than last year? Was there more or less snow? Was it colder, or colder for longer stretches of time? Did it rain more during the summer? Explain the difference between weather and climate and the need for observations over long periods of time to determine climate patterns.

Explore

20 minutes + 30 minutes for interview

Each student or pair of students will interview someone who has lived in the community for a long time.

Develop a set of questions that students can use in interviewing long-term residents of the community or area. These could be their parents or grandparents, elders, people who have hunted or fished, birdwatchers, naturalists, or government biologists. Review these examples of questions from the following Web sites to compile a questionnaire:

Observing Locally, Connecting Globally Sample Interview Questions for Grades K-12

Discuss interview strategies with the students:

• Be friendly, respectful, and polite.
• Be a good listener.
• Allow the speaker plenty of time to answer a question.
• If the person seems to be getting off topic, listen carefully to what they may be trying to tell you. They may be telling a story in answer to your question.
• After you have finished asking all your questions, ask them if there is anything else they might want to tell you.
• Ask permission before you take photos.

Students will need to arrange for the interview, following these steps:

• Contact the person and arrange a time and place for the interview. Try to arrange for the interview location to be at the school.
• Explain the purpose of the interview, if they will be filming or recording the interview, and about how long the interview will take.
• Ask the person to bring any old outdoor photographs taken in or around the community. Photos showing landscape and/or vegetation are preferred.
• Inform the person of what will be done with the information (presentation, report, possible newspaper, etc.)

If some interviews cannot take place at the school, arrange for parents or volunteers to take the student to the residence and wait for them to complete the interview.

At the interview:
Obtain permission to publish the interview and/or the results of the interview. Students need to have necessary materials for the interview, including:

• Pens (bring an extra one) and paper.
• Tape recorder (optional), cassettes, and extra batteries.
• Camera (optional), film or disk, extra batteries.
• Clip board or hard book to write on if the interview is not at the school (optional).
• Blank paper on hand as well, and encourage interviewees to draw maps or sketch animals, tracks, trails, trap sets, etc.
• Stress the importance for gathering as much information about photos as possible from the person that took the photo. For example, time of year will be critical when comparing historical photos with photos from today.

Xerox or scan any photos that are brought in. They will be used in the next activity. Document when and where they were taken, if possible.

Explain

50 minutes

Discuss the interviews and ask students to share information on the types of changes that have happened. List them on the board or chart paper. Ask students to write a 2-3 page report or essay that summarizes the interview and highlights the most significant changes observed by the person they interviewed.

Elaborate

60 minutes

Students can create a newspaper to share with the community highlighting the changes observed by long-time residents.

Evaluate

10 minutes

Student reports will provide evidence that the students understood the assignment and followed basic expectations and requirements for the interview.

Ideas for adapting to different local environmental or context

For Interior schools, it might help to make a connection to the ways in which the effects of climate change in the ocean affect salmon in rivers. Presentations can be adapted depending on technology available: PowerPoint, Posters, Overheads, Videos, Podcasts, Blog, Radio Program, etc.