Download Reading Nation Proposal Narrative (.pdf)
1. Statement of National Need
A. Background: Need and Impact
“When going into a public library that is run by non-native people, there is often a fear of prejudice, an unease before even walking through the door.” (Blackfeet Tribal Librarian, December 12, 2017).
American Indian and Native Alaskans represent 6.6% or 62,551 of Montana’s one million residents (US Census Bureau, 2017). The Blackfeet Nation is the largest of the eight tribes in Montana with 15,560 officially enrolled members (Montana.Gov, nd), representing 25% of all tribal members in the state. It is also the largest tribal reservation encompassing 3,000 square miles, bordered by Glacier National Park to the west and Alberta, Canada to the north. Approximately 7,000 or 45% of the tribal members live on the reservation with the remaining 8,000 members largely residing in border towns Cut Bank and Valier (10%) and larger Montana cities such as Great Falls, Kalispell, Helena, Missoula, Bozeman, and Billings (25%). The remaining 20% of tribal members live off the reservation in other states across the US.
American Indians and tribal members have historically struggled academically and socioeconomically. In 2004, President Bush signed an executive order on American Indian and Alaska Native Education noting that “reading is the new civil right” (Reyhner & Hurtado, 2008) and they had “unique educational and culturally related academic needs.” In 2013, President Obama remarked, “Study after study shows that the sooner a child begins learning, the better he or she does down the road” (IMLS, 2013, pg. 4). Despite this continued national acknowledgement, the academic challenges for American Indian and Alaska Native students continue: a dropout rate of 6.7% (double the national average); a graduation rate of 70% (lowest of all racial groups); and they are least likely to attend college and second least-likely to graduate on time (Field, 2016).
In Montana, American Indian students make up 14% of the public school population, yet they account for over 30% of all dropouts (Field, 2016) with a higher percentage dropping out in 7th and 8th grade (MOPI, 2017). This can be partially attributed to low reading scores for Montana’s American Indian 4th graders, which have continuously declined since 2007 while the national reading average for all American Indian students have remained level. In addition, while the 2015 NAEP Montana 4th grade reading scores exceeded the national average (225 to 221), American Indian students in Montana scored a 199, 24 points below the state average (NAEP, 2015) and 7 points below the national average for all American Indians (MOPI, 2017).
Research suggests lower levels of American Indian academic success are due largely to cultural and language differences between student homes and their mainstream classrooms as well as the perception that the curriculum and goals of academic settings are often derogatory and detrimental to their own worldview and sense-of-self (St. Charles & Costantino, 2007). The Blackfeet Nation has a troubled relationship and general mistrust of formal educational institutions because of a history of assimilation efforts first promoted by Anglo missionaries in the late 1800’s and through the actions of the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs to integrate them into general society through the mid-1970’s; at which time the U.S. Indian Self-Determination legislation increased Indian control over Indian education (Wissler, Clark, Kehoe, & Alice Beck, 2013).
Many Blackfeet tribal members also face significant challenges: two thirds live in Browning, are young (median age of 29), and poor (median household income of $30,000 compared to the national average of $55,000) (Field, 2016). For all Blackfeet tribal members on and off the reservation, nearly a third (31.6 percent) have incomes below the poverty level, which is two-and-half times higher than the 12.7% national average. This percentage is greater for families with children under 5 (41.0 percent) and even greater when the family head of house is female with no husband present (42.1 percent) (US Census Bureau, 2017). According to the Blackfeet tribal librarian, the prevailing worldview for most tribal members is just survival and that unemployment, affordable housing, and single mother homes present significant challenges:
… women, girls and mothers, are the main providers for the household and men do odd jobs …There is a statistic that floats around that the reservation can have up to 70% unemployment… many people rely on welfare programs (Blackfeet Tribal Librarian, December 12, 2017).
In 2017, 100% of the 296 Browning Elementary School students qualified for free and reduced lunches (NCES, 2017).
B. The Blackfeet Nation and Literacy and Library Services
The Blackfeet reservation has two libraries located a half mile from one another in Browning, MT: a small public library overseen by the Glacier County public library system, and the Blackfeet Community College Medicine Spring Library (BCCMSL), serving both community college students (enrollment averages 500 students) and tribal members. Although BCCMSL has a dual role as a tribal college library and a tribal community library, it has zero budget for children/youth books, services and programs, or outreach. The city of Browning is located in the southwestern part of the reservation, over a 35-minute drive for one-third of tribal members living in the northern, southern, and eastern areas (See Appendix B). Just over 1,000 (6.4%) Blackfeet tribal members are library card holders (half of whom are tribal community college students), which is significantly lower than the 50% average for all Montana’s public libraries from 2006-2015 (Chow, 2017).
A landmark 1989 study by U.S. National Commission on Libraries and Information Science found significant barriers and limited access to library services for American Indians due to both cultural differences and lack of culturally appropriate resources. While there continues to be a scarcity of research addressing Native American education, economic health, and use of libraries in the U.S., a 2017 evaluation of the Montana State Library LSTA program found that barriers to library services for tribal members still exist in Montana: little to no convenient access to either a public or tribal college library; little support and awareness of libraries among tribal members because their services are not typically a feature of their indigenous worldview; racial tension experienced by tribal members visiting public libraries that border tribal territory; and, lack of financial resources in tribal college libraries to prioritize early literacy resources and programming (Chow, 2017).
In considering creating a Reading Nation for Blackfoot children and youth, we will look to the potential of their caregivers in working with the BCCMSL staff. It is, therefore, important, to consider the mothers’ roles and priorities. Blackfoot mothers, like other disadvantaged mothers, might have complex information needs. They might be isolated and have little support system. They are likely struggling to meet their day-to-day needs from housing to food to education, employment, and health services. It is likely that their stress, with resultant anxiety, is heightened. They may be single parents and they may have experienced conflict within their families. Their babies and children may not have access to good nutrition and their literacy level might be low. They likely desire person-based information resources.
While a traditional Blackfoot learning model is based on oral teaching and storytelling, parents seek opportunities for their children. Such opportunities not only might result in personal advancement but also be perceived as constructive for the local community and the tribe. One tool that is universal across educational systems is that of literacy, including English language literacy. Given the remote location of family households and the low income of families, however, it is unlikely that families would have home collections of reading material, especially books. According to the Blackfeet tribal librarian:
Because survival is a key motivation of people, I don’t think that many of them see the library as a place that exists for them. Many people, once inside, realize that the library can indeed be used as a survival tool, but most people view the library as a place for books…. (N)o one looks at a person reading a book as a person that is well to do, that might be a reason that people are not focused on reading (Blackfeet Tribal Librarian, December 11, 2017).
In 2013, BCCMSL conducted a community use survey and found that most respondents did not know that the library was open to the public. Although, respondents were very enthusiastic about using the library in the future, BCCMSL has not seen a significant increase in use. For some tribal members, utilizing public library services off the reservation can be a complicated clash of cultural values and feelings of unequal treatment and/or more explicit acts of discrimination. The BCCMSL librarian noted, “One staff member is a little loud and she was coming to the library for a meeting in our conference room. She came in and boomed a hello. She instantly started to apologize and when I told her that it was okay to talk normally, she said that she doesn’t go into libraries because when she was a little girl she was made to feel ashamed and bad when she went to the library with her family. She said that they would kick them outside when they got a little loud” (Blackfeet Tribal Librarian, 2017). Many tribal members also fear their children will damage books. The BCCMSL librarian reflected, “I have parents who scold their children for taking books off the shelves. We try to step in and tell them that it is okay, we don’t mind putting books back, that their kids are welcome to look at as many books as possible, but parents still force their children to put the books down” (Blackfeet Tribal Librarian, December 2017).
Some tribal members experienced differential treatment and discrimination. The BCCMSL librarian added this example, “A student who lives in (a town bordering the reservation) said that whenever he had questions about the computer the staff acted out-of-sorts and were short with him. Meanwhile, he witnessed other people asking similar questions who were helped right away. This guy is an exceptional student, older, and I just can’t think of a reason to treat him differently.” One urban librarian even confided with the BCCMSL librarian that a self-identified tribal member was consistently stealing the Browning newspaper every week, which automatically gave the desk staff an uneasy feeling about other tribal members looking for the paper: “… are they just going to steal it, why can’t they just leave it for other people to enjoy?” (Tribal College Librarian, December 11, 2017). These are just two stories that describe the relationship between, not only reading, but the library and tribal members.
C. Project Goals and Outcomes
Reading Nation, will study the use of libraries by Blackfeet tribal members to address this guiding research question: How might libraries collaborate to foster a reading supportive environment for Blackfeet children, youth, and their caregivers? More specifically we will seek to answer these additional research questions: 1) What is the current state of library services for Blackfeet tribal members both on and off the reservation? 2) What are the unique needs and barriers to access to library services for tribal members with an emphasis on children, youth, and families? 3) What are the potential challenges faced by public libraries in understanding and meeting those needs in culturally sensitive and appropriate ways? And, 4) In what ways can the study’s community assessment process and findings be generalized to other tribes?
Reading Nation has five potential outcomes: 1) Understanding the current state of reading and library usage among Blackfeet tribal members; 2) Identifying needs and barriers to access; 3) Understanding potential challenges faced by public libraries in providing resources and services to Blackfeet tribal members; 4) Identifying potential interventions to address identified gaps and barriers in access to reading and library services for Blackfeet children, youth, and families; and 5) Piloting a research design and process for conducting a community assessment for other tribal nations, especially as it pertains to libraries and their services. We are informed by three primary assumptions based on existing data, first-hand accounts, and anecdotal observations: Blackfeet children, youth, and families are not reading or using library services at very high levels, reading scores of Blackfeet children and youth are below the state and national average, and there are real and existing barriers to library use for Blackfeet children and youth.
2. Project Design
The Reading Nation project team is comprised of tribal member and BCCMSL Librarian Aaron LaFromboise (Blackfeet); Dr. Loriene Roy (Anishinabe), Professor at the School of Information, University of Texas-Austin; and Dr. Anthony Chow, Associate Professor at the Department of Library and Information Studies at The University of North Carolina at Greensboro. Their attached CVs document their work with and for Native peoples.
Our planning project will involve four phases: Phase 1 (June – July 2018) – Collaborate with a national advisory board to help guide and oversee all aspects and phases of the project to ensure a broad perspective and expertise specific to tribal nations, education, and literacy at local and national levels. Members of the board include representatives from the Montana State Library, American Indian Library Association (AILA), Tribal College Librarians Institute (TCLI), urban and rural public library directors, national/international literacy research community, academic librarians from Montana universities, and tribal leaders and tribal members (See Appendix A). Phase 2 (July – September 2018) – Design and Conduct an environmental scan to collect and examine existing data and statistics and identify external factors to help inform the current context of tribal member library use. Phase 3 (October 2018 – January 2019) – Design and Pilot Test a community assessment process that identifies needs and potential barriers tribal members face in using public and community college libraries with a specific focus on children and youth services. This will involve a mixed-method approach of qualitative interviews, focus groups, and surveys disseminated by print and online. Participants will be recruited using convenience sampling (collecting data at the annual powwow), stratified and purposeful sampling (ensuring a diverse stratum of tribal members and public librarians), a random sample of tribal members living on and off the reservation and a general survey open to all stakeholders. Phase 4 (February – April 2019) – Analyze, Interpret, and Identify results using a phenomenological approach to understand and interpret findings through the lens of tribal members as well as with descriptive and parametric statistics (analysis of variance by factor), that will allow more precision in identifying demographic differences (where a tribal member lives, age, gender, etc.). The advisory board will also participate in conducting summative assessment and evaluation to help determine overall project performance and whether to develop a future research proposal for studying and testing possible prototypes to address challenges and barriers and generalize the community assessment process identified in the study.
The planning project will be guided by an outcomes-based evaluation logic model (See Appendix C) and crosswalk (See Appendix D), to ensure close alignment between the research questions, goals, outcomes, research design and methodology and provide built-in formative evaluation at the input, output, and outcomes level throughout the project’s four phases. Each phase will be implemented as follows:
Phase 1: Collaborate with National Advisory Board (June – July 2018)
Phase 1 involves collaborating with our national advisory board to help guide and oversee all aspects and phases of the project to help ensure a diverse perspective and to increase the project’s internal and external validity. The Board will also help account for the primary risk associated with our project: that we might not be able to collect enough usable data from tribal members. Board members were carefully selected and have already agreed to serve to ensure a diverse set of expertise with the Blackfeet Nation, Native American culture, libraries, and literacy in Montana and on a national level.
In collaboration with the advisory board, we will finalize our study’s design including goals, protocol, instruments, and sampling. Questions to be answered include: Do our goals align closely with the kind of impact IMLS wishes to see? Will the results of our study place us in a position to build a larger project study for broader impact? Is our protocol viable and culturally appropriate? Are our instruments valid and reliable? Are we asking the right questions from the right people in the right way to get answers to the questions we seek? Is our sampling method and process for recruiting participants viable?
Phase 2: Conduct Environmental Scan (July – September 2018)
Phase 2 will take place from July to September 2018. The Blackfeet Nation holds their annual powwow in the second week of July and the research team will conduct preliminary interviews and have informal discussions with tribal members and leaders about the role of books, reading, literacy, and use of libraries in their daily lives and, especially, as it impacts reading and library use by children and youth. Existing research and reports to be gathered and analyzed to help identify the current environment and context of tribal member use of library services include Annual AIHEC AIMS report, the Integrated Postsecondary Education Data System (IPEDS), the Glacier County’s Annual Report for the Browning public library branch, Browning school library circulation statistics, reading scores and other student performance measures for the Browning public schools, and general circulation statistics for bordering public libraries. In addition, we will use stratified purposeful sampling to set up interviews and conduct focus groups with a diverse set of major stakeholders including tribal leaders and elders, parents and families, educators, recent high school graduates, and public librarians about literacy, reading, and libraries inside and outside the Blackfeet reservation.
Our preliminary findings will be presented to the advisory board and serve as a community-centered foundation for our final research questions and data collection instruments that will be scaled to a larger community-wide assessment. These initial discussions with the community will greatly increase the overall internal validity of our entire research design, especially our instruments, because they will be directly informed by the participants themselves and then vetted by our national advisory board. This will increase the likelihood that the assessment will be asking relevant and culturally appropriate questions.
Phase 3: Design and Implement Community Assessment (October 2018 – January 2019)
Phase 3 of Reading Nation involves designing and implementing a community assessment to build on the environmental scan by expanding our data collection methods to reach a broader sample of tribal members and local public librarians. This will involve a mixed-method approach of qualitative interviews, focus groups, and surveys disseminated by print and online. Participants will be recruited using convenience sampling (collecting data and recruiting participants at the annual powwow), stratified and purposeful sampling (ensuring a diverse stratum of tribal members and public librarians), and a random sample of 1,000 tribal members living on and off the reservation. To increase participation and the overall sample size, a random drawing for six $50 gift certificates – three for the random sample and three for the general sample of interview, focus group, and survey participants – will be widely publicized.
Designing the Community Assessment
In developing and finalizing the community assessment design, a project evaluation crosswalk will be established to ensure alignment between research questions, goals, and all project inputs, outputs, and outcomes. An evaluation crosswalk is a tool used as a checklist that describes the intersection between data collection methods and instruments and the research questions and results. This includes finalizing interview, focus group, and survey questions and instruments, and identifying interview and focus group participants using convenience and stratified, purposeful sampling.
We anticipate conducting at least 16 interviews with tribal leaders (n=3), families with children and youth (n=3), recent high school graduates (n=2), librarians (n=3), teachers (n=2), community leaders (n=3), and others. Interview questions will be aligned to the study’s research questions using the research and evaluation crosswalk; questions will be semi-structured so there is flexibility based on participant responses. Examples of questions that may be asked include understanding the information needs of tribal members, the role of and frequency of use of libraries, the role of books and reading literacy for children and youth, potential barriers to access, ways libraries could better serve tribal members in more relevant and culturally appropriate ways, and potential challenges and opportunities in the future for how libraries could better support the Blackfeet Nation. While these will be the core questions that remain the same for all participants, some customization will take place based on stakeholder group (e.g. some different questions for tribal leaders and public librarians, etc.). All interviews will be audio recorded for transcription and coding purposes.
Focus groups will involve similar questions with representative and stratified groups of users and service providers. We anticipate conducting at least eight focus groups: tribal leaders (n=1), families with children and youth (n=2), recent high school graduates (n=1), public librarians (n=2), school librarians (n=2), and others identified during the study. We will increase sample size and validity by inviting participants from different strata both inside and outside the tribe.
Two surveys will be used. The questions will be similar to those used in the interview and focus group protocol but will include optional demographic questions (e.g. age, race, gender, residential status, education level, family size) and utilize more close-ended scale-items to increase the validity and reliability in how a particular construct is measured. For example, participants can rate the importance of different information resources identified during the environmental scan. Print copies of the first survey will be mailed to a random sample of 1,000 Blackfeet tribal members both on and off the reservation. Each survey mailer will also contain a prepaid, self-addressed envelope and an online option. A second mailing will be sent to those who did not respond. The second survey will be the same used for the random sample but will be open and available to anyone including tribal members not selected in the random sample, public librarians, educators, students, government officials, etc. Both surveys will be available in print and online. Because of the Blackfeet people’s oral tradition, the research team will be supported by a research assistant who will talk through the questions with the participants to help them complete the print or online survey. With a population size of 15,560 people, the total sample we will need to ensure our results are representative of the tribe with 95% confidence and 5% error rate will be 375 tribal members. IRB approval will be attained at both the Blackfeet Community College and UNC at Greensboro and, due to time constraints around IRB approval, no participants under 18 will be asked to participate in the study.
Implementing the Community Assessment
PI LaFromboise, the BCCMSL Librarian, will be the local, in-person project member and will help coordinate all data collection meetings. PI Chow and Roy, both seasoned researchers, will collaborate with PI LaFromboise in conducting interviews and focus groups; in the event some data collection will need to take place outside of two scheduled site visits in July and November, PI LaFromboise will help connect participants using WebEx video conferencing software used by PI Chow’s university. PI Chow will also take the lead in survey dissemination and evaluation guided by the study’s logic model and Roy will serve as a project consultant on aspects including data collection, analysis, and interpretation.
Phase 4: Analyze, Interpret, and Identify (February – April 2019)
Phase 4 will involve analyzing, interpreting, and identifying potential barriers and solutions based on results, understanding and interpreting results through the lens of tribal members and with descriptive and parametric statistics (analysis of variance by factor), that will allow more precision in identifying demographic differences such as where a tribal member lives. The advisory board will provide a summative assessment and evaluation based on the progress demonstrated using the logic model that will help determine whether to develop a future dissemination proposal for study and testing.
All interviews will be recorded and transcribed. Transcriptions will be coded by at least two researchers to increase validity and interrater reliability. All qualitative focus group and survey comments will be coded and analyzed. Results and interpretations will be checked by tribal members and the advisory board to ensure an accurate phenomenological and broad perspective is represented. Quantitative analysis will be used to conduct analyses using descriptive (e.g. percentages, mean ratings, frequency counts) and parametric statistics (e.g. analysis of variance and regression analysis) on the random sample and nonparametric statistics (e.g. chi square) on the general survey data by demographic factors (e.g. age, gender, housing status, education level). Interitem reliability between survey scale items will also be checked using the Cronbach alpha coefficient. Statistically significant differences in survey responses will be identified by demographic factor and a best fit model will be created for different demographic profiles (e.g. reading consumption on the reservation vs. off the reservation) using regression analysis (identifying all significant correlational relationships between variables into one “best” model).
Major themes from both qualitative and quantitative data will be identified. This will involve
using basic statistics and statistically significant differences and trends across demographic factors to identify major usage patterns, needs, gaps, and barriers. The best fit regression models will give us the primary correlational (not causal but a real relationship) factors for library access and barriers by demographic variables. The quantitative data will provide the “what” behind current conditions while the qualitative data will provide the “why” behind real stories, quotes, and provide a rich descriptive context for current conditions and goals for potential ways to help close gaps in the future.
The project will be guided by a research evaluation crosswalk and logic model created and vetted prior to data collection. The crosswalk will ensure close alignment between project goals, research methods, and instrumentation. The logic model will track progress of all project activity at four levels: inputs, activities, outputs, and outcomes. The advisory board will help identify major trends in the findings as well as significant barriers and potential future solutions.
Project results will be disseminated to tribal leadership, academic presentations at local, state, and national venues as well as academic publication; summary findings will be shared on a website. The primary goal for our planning grant is to understand the current situation in a comprehensive and valid manner and identify some preliminary ideas on how to increase opportunities and reduce barriers to reading and literacy for Blackfeet children, youth, and their families. We hope to build a prototype for how to conduct a community assessment in tribal nations, identify current gaps, and potential solutions to those gaps that will be addressed in the future. If this planning grant is funded we will continue this study through submitting a three-year project grant to build on our work in 2018-2019.
3. Diversity Plan
Indigenous worldview is an orientation to the world based on tribal heritage. It encompasses a shared philosophy, ways of behaving, and traditions. Indigenous worldview also explains how Native people interpret the present while respecting the past. Worldview is never set as it is learned over a lifetime of experience and reflection. Psychologist Abraham Maslow based his “hierarchy of needs” on the perspectives—or worldview—of the Blackfoot people. The Blackfoot view places knowledge of self or self-actualization as the basis of continuing to learn and grow, upon which is built knowledge of the community or community actualization, on top of which is cultural perpetuity or shared understanding. Indigenous worldview is largely experiential. It is learned through observation and sharing: seeing, doing, reflecting, and storytelling.
As such, indigenous worldview is supported by traditional knowledge systems rather than print or other media. This is not only because of a lack of print and other resources but also because of the use of print and reading as colonial approaches to diminish and even eradicate Native cultures. Native children in boarding schools were forbidden to speak their home languages and lived in an educational environment that mirrored military training with uniforms, drilling, and required labor to prepare them for vocational careers. Some students suffered abuse. Some boarding schools remained until the late twentieth century; some schools were taken over by the tribes or, like Haskell, evolved into colleges. Boarding schools altered the lives of Indian people over generations and the trauma that students experienced is still felt as intergenerational wounding. These experiences are reflected when tribal members are cautious about the presence of formal educational systems, including libraries as social institutions that reflect and support these systems. We are cognizant and respectful of Blackfeet indigenous world view as we envision the potential of a library in creating and sustaining a Reading Nation.
4. National Impact
The Reading Nation planning project aligns closely to the library as community anchor IMLS strategic goal and has pulled together a national team of advisors and primary investigators to further study the preliminary findings found during the Montana 2017 LSTA evaluation.
“You must learn to read before you read to learn.” This ALA statement helps encapsulate the role libraries serve in many communities as hubs of free resources and services that connect the present with the past in an objective, unbiased, and unconditional way. The IMLS Future Minds report (2013) noted a significant difference between library usage for those in poverty vs. the affluent: are the affluent just in a better situation to travel to and access library services or is part of their affluence because of the literacy and knowledge that comes from using library services? For many of us, the relationship with libraries starts as children prior to ever attending a formal school environment by providing unfettered and limitless access to books and other resources and services. It is a place of wonder, excitement, and community that represents a relationship which starts as a child and lasts a lifetime. Reading and literacy is a means to a higher end – a skill that opens doors to information, knowledge, and new ideas and places we will never visit. According to the BCCMSL Librarian, libraries are not a large part of the worldview for many tribal members due to a myriad of factors; they are not necessarily seen as a great equalizer, a place for respite, or somewhere to connect to and build community.
It is our hope that this project may promote dialogue around barriers to access, provide some insight into how to address some of them, and explore ways libraries might be able to better support tribal members in their daily lives across their lifespan. Reading Nation could become a model that promotes greater understanding of how libraries can better serve tribal members and possibly generalize to other tribal nations in Montana and across the country. The potential is there to shift the discussion around literacy and reading away from suspicions around a historical and institutional attempt to assimilate and denigrate their culture to libraries as a positive and safe place for tribal members to go to empower themselves, their children, their families, and their nation.
Works Cited
Chow, Anthony (2017). Montana State Library LSTA 2013-2017 Five-Year Evaluation Report. The State Library of Montana.
Field, Kelly. (2016, August 5). For native students, education’s promise has long been broken. The Chronicle of Higher Education, LXII, 42, 20-24.
Howard, Mary Lynn. (2013, June). Growing young minds: How museums and libraries create lifelong learners. Retrieved from https://www.imls.gov/assets/1/AssetManager/GrowingYoungMinds.pdf
Montana Office of Public Instruction. (2017, Fall). Montana American Indian student achievement data report. Retrieved from https://opi.mt.gov/Portals/182/Page%20Files/Indian%20Education/Indian%20Student%20Achievement/Docs/Student%20Data%20Report%202017.pdf
National Assessment of Educational Progress. (2015). Mathematics & Reading Assessments. Retrieved from https://www.nationsreportcard.gov/reading_math_2015/#?grade=4
Reyhner, J., & Hurtado, D. S. (January 01, 2008). Reading first, literacy, and American Indian/Alaska native students. Journal of American Indian Education, 47, 1, 82-95.
St. Charles, Joe, & Costantino, Magda. (June, 2000). Reading and the Native American Learner. Research Report. Retrieved from https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED451026
State of Montana website. Blackfeet Nation. Retrieved from http://tribalnations.mt.gov/blackfeet
Wissler, Clark, Kehoe, & Alice Beck, 2013. Amskapi Pikuni: The Blackfeet People. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press (SUNY).