Lesson plan ideas:

Coyote Tales can be explored in a number of curriculum areas. Below are links to lesson plans and additional ideas for using Coyote Creates Spokane Falls in your classroom.

Language Arts/Literature

1. oral narratives
2. constructs
3. use of symbol(s)
4. landscape
5. traditions
6. story maps
7. verb tenses
8. narrator/teller
9. functions/teaching

Coyote tales can be also be linked to Cautionary Tales of German fairy tales (Little Red Riding Hood) and the Pourquoi Tales from West Africa, and the Trickster Tales of slaves in America, and the Tall Tales of Manifest Destiny America…could include Urban Legends.

Social Studies

1. social constructions of tribal groups
2. current status of family and kinship ties
3. map of the territory in the tale
4. map of natural resources
5. who manages what today
6. current status of Salmon, Spokane Falls
7. current Cd'A writers references to these landmarks
8. Search Spokesman files for speeches, interviews given by elders, note the references to traditions and landscape
9. Access the GIS info on the web constructed by the tribe.
10. practices of cooperative cultures

Science and Math

Possible areas of exploration using the tale Coyote Creates Spokane Falls might include:

1. impact of dams on salmon spawning in the Spokane River.
2. ecosystem of the St. Joe, Mt. Baldy, Spokane River drainage.
3. health of the system-mining, clear-cutting, lake clean-up (EPA)

From Water cycle activities to local conservation efforts, the FWEE Website (Foundation for Water and Energy Education) has numerous lesson plans and activities surrounding water and energy.