ABSTRACT
There is an extensive literature concerned with the education of Native American children,1 and it includes a significant body of excellent historical works.2 With very few exceptions, however, this historical literature deals with the education of Indian children after the arrival of European settlers. In other words, the focus of scholarship has been not so much on Native American education as it has been on the formal, Western schooling processes to which Indian children have been exposed (or, some would say, subjected). The history of the treatment of the indigenous peoples of North America is an important, and largely shameful, part of our history, and the historical studies of Indian education constitute a significant and potent piece of the broader history of American education. Our concern in this chapter, however, is not with the history of the interaction of Indians and others in North America, but rather, with the educational ideas and practices that existed before that interaction began, many of which continue to play roles in Native American cultural and childrearing practices even today.
