Science: Through Native American Eyes

People who used to see Native American culture represented only in the fall as an exotic extra - “just after we study dinosaurs and just before we study Columbus” - now can study both Science and the real deal about Native America.

Students and teachers now can learn unexpected things about America’s first cultures at the same time as doing their required science lessons, applying their computer skills, and having fun.

Science: Through Native American Eyes is the first interactive multimedia CD Rom that meets American National Content Standards for middle school science while addressing scientific concepts from within Native American culture. The CD is recommended for grades 5 through adult levels

Students are tested and automatically graded, and are apprised of their own progress throughout the CD, seeing at any point what they have left to do. There are Entry and Exit tests, as well as true-false and multiple choice quizzes, and writing activities

Automatic teacher tracking, Help pages, printable PDF files, activities, lessons, experiments, and vocabulary words appropriate to each section help teachers to grade and evaluate each student’s work as they go through the CD.

The first of Cradleboard’s planned fifteen core curriculum CDs, it addresses the scientific principles underlying sound, friction, and lodge construction which are presented as interactive media via video, audio, text, and animation.

Principles of Sound:

The Nature of Sound How Sound Travels Sound Waves Frequency Amplitude How Flutes Work Drums Rattles Mouth Bows
Apache Fiddles Powwow
Cradleboard Juke Box

Principles of Sound includes multimedia lessons- videos, animation, audio and interactive text to help students to understand how instruments work. Students study Native American flutes, drums, rattles, mouth bows, and Apache violin - live and interactive in multisensory ways that print alone just can’t cover.

To reinforce the lessons they learn in the Principles of Sound section, students get to listen to some of Native America’s best traditional, powwow, instrumental, and contemporary artists by way of the built in Cradleboard Juke Box

This year students can study SOUND - frequency, amplitude, decibels, and wave lengths etc. - by using interactive sliders like recording studios use.

Native American Lodges:

Construction materials and methods
Pueblo Adobe Houses Plains Tipis Wigwams
Earth Lodges Apache Wikiups Longhouses

In the Native American Lodges section, you learn how and why different Tribal groups have made various styles of homes, and the benefits and constraints of the materials they use.

Principles of Friction:

Heat, Sound, & Motion Making Fire Grinding Tools
Sleds & Toboggans Snow Snake - a traditional game

Principles of Friction uses video, slide show, narration, and text to teach how friction is at work when we make fire; when we grind things; and when we use sleds and toboggans.

Students can play a simple interactive animated game based on the traditional Native American sport of Snow Snake, to reinforce what they have just studied about friction and speed.