Knots on a Counting Rope - Our Pow Wow Begins

Every November Kindergarten students at our school enjoy a Social Studies Unit on Native Americans. It culminates at our annual Pow Wow. Our class is the Lenape tripe. The Lenape are called the "Original People". They were a peaceful tribe from New York to Delaware. The Lenape helped early settlers learn how to fish in rivers and grow vegetables native to this land. Students learned that they did not have televisions, phones or iPads back then. The art of storytelling was valued as a way to pass history on from one generation to another. The story "Knots on a Counting Rope" by Bill Martin and John Archambault is about an Native American boy who hears the story of his birth from his grandfather. He was born very sick but the grandfather would not let him die. He had named him Boy-Strength-of-Blue-Horses and the boy did grow strong but the sickness left him blind. The homework this week was for parents to tell a story or stories to their child and then knot the counting rope every time they heard it so that they could one day tell the story. Enjoy listening to story "Knots on a Counting Rope."