Written byMari Lu Robbins

#3436 : Native American Tales and Activities 2 ©Teacher Created Resources, Inc.

Teacher Created Resources, Inc. 6421 Industry Way

Westminster, CA 92683www.teachercreated.com

ISBN: 978-1-4206-3436-5

©2005 Teacher Created Resources, Inc. Reprinted, 2009

Made in the U.S.A.

Editor:Janet Cain

Cover Artist:Brenda DiAntonis

Illustrator:Barb Lorseyedi

The materials in this book may be reproduced for personal or classroom use only. Thereproduction of any part of this publication for an entire school or school system is strictlyprohibited. No part of this publication may be transmitted, stored, or recorded in any formwithout permission from the publisher.

©Teacher Created Resources, Inc. 3 #3436 : Native American Tales and Activities

Table of Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

Storytelling . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

In the Beginning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

Napi Makes the World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Paper Bag Vest . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Old Man Coyote Makes a New Bird . . . 13

Draw a Horse . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Hand Drum . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Why Sun and Moon Never Married . . . 19

Sun and Moon Masks . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

How the People Got Fire . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Basket. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25

Stories of How Things Came to Be . . . . 26

How Brother-Friends Came to Be . . . . 27

Paper Bead Necklace . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Why We Give Thanks . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Dancing Anklets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32

Fancy Dance Bustle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 33

Spirit of the Corn. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Cornhusk Doll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

The Tale of the Bear’s Tipi . . . . . . . . . . 38

Tipi . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Stories of the Sun, Moon, and Stars. . . 41

The Five Sisters . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42

Apple Doll . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 45

Why Mole’s Hands Are Bent Back . . . . 46

The Hand Game . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

About Fetish Necklaces . . . . . . . . . . . . 48

Fetish Necklace. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 49

Sun’s Arrival in the Sky . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Eagle Feather Dance Fan . . . . . . . . . . 54

The Origin of the North Star . . . . . . . . 55

Cardboard Weaving. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

The Animal People . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59

The Bird of Many Colors . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Sand Painting . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

The Mouse’s Children . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

Corn and Squash Soup . . . . . . . . . . . . 68

The Race of the Tails. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69

Corn Bread . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Terrapin and the Turkey . . . . . . . . . . . . 74

Petroglyphs . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77

The Ball Game Between the Birds and the Animals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Pouch . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82

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Table of Contents (cont.)

Stories of Romance and Mystery . . . . . . 83

The North Wind and the South Wind . . 84

Story Sack . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Catches-the-Clouds and the Moon-Wife. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 88

Fruit Leather . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 92

The Legend of Tutokanula . . . . . . . . . . 93

Looking and Seeing:Two Different Things . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 96

Coil Pot . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 97

The Boy and the Eagle . . . . . . . . . . . . 98

Pueblo Village . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 103

The Celestial Maidens . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

Cat’s Cradle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 109

Fish Spear . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110

The Ghost Wife . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 111

Fishing Lure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

Stories of Heroes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 115

Calling the Buffalo . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 116

Duck Decoy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 120

Parfleche. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 121

Glooscap and the Baby . . . . . . . . . . . 122

Maple Candy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125

Sweet Medicine Feeds the People . . . 126

Ring and Pin Game. . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129

Trickster Stories . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130

Coyote and the Little Blue Fox . . . . . . 131

Turtle Dance Rattle . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 136

Why Deer’s Teeth Are Blunt . . . . . . . . 137

The Antlered Rabbit . . . . . . . . . . . . . 140

Clay Beads . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141

Rabbit Escapes from the Wolves . . . . 142

Paint Your Face . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144

How Wildcat Caught the Gobbler . . . . 145

Canoe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148

Raven and the Moon . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

Scrimshaw . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152

Vieho and the Ducks . . . . . . . . . . . . 153

God’s Eye . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159

Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 160

#3436 : Native American Tales and Activities 8 ©Teacher Created Resources, Inc.

Napi Makes the World

This northwestern mountain story tells of how Napi, or Old Man, made the world andpopulated it with many different tribes. It describes how he taught the people what to doto survive. Then it tells how Napi made a difficult decision about whether people shouldlive forever.

Look around you and see all these mountains and rivers. See all the animals, plants, andeven the people. These were all made by Napi, whom we also call Old Man. He did it allby himself a long time ago. This is how he did it.

Napi traveled around the world, and it was empty. He thought it would be nice to havesomething here, so he started in the south and worked northward. He walked along, puttinga mountain here and a river there. Then he made the prairies, trees, and bushes. Sometimeshe thought to himself, “This place would be pretty if it was red,” so he’d put red paint there.Sometimes he used other colors, too.

In some places you can see where he walked. If you go to the Milk River, you can evensee where once he lay down for a sleep. He left the imprint of his body, head, arms, andlegs on the mountain. In another place, you can see where he fell after tripping on a bigrock. After getting up, he thought, “I’d better fix that, so nobody else trips like I did,” and hebuilt up those two big buttes we call the Knees.

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Napi Makes the World (cont.)

Napi put grass on the plains and some of the hills. He planted all kinds of roots: camus,wild carrots, turnips, and onions. Then he planted plums, chokecherries, and rosebuds. Heplanted many types of trees. After he was through making the plants, he started making theanimals.

At first, Napi wasn’t sure what the animals were supposed to be like or where they couldlive the best, so he made a few mistakes. He was out on the prairie when he made thebighorn sheep. Right away he saw that he’d put them in the wrong place. Their horns wereheavy and awkward out there on the plains, so he picked them up and set them in the highmountains. That was the right place for the sheep, and they were happy there.

Next, while he was still up on the mountains, Napi created the antelope, and he madeanother mistake with these animals. The antelopes’ slim little feet and legs had a hard timerunning around the mountains because they got caught in the little chinks between the rocks.So Napi picked up the antelope and set them down on the prairie. That was much better.Napi kept on this way, making a variety of animals and trying them out in different places tosee which was the best for each of them. After awhile, he had all of them in places wherethey were well suited. Then, he started creating people.

#3436 : Native American Tales and Activities 10 ©Teacher Created Resources, Inc.

Napi Makes the World (cont.)

Napi took a handful of clay, and he made it into a woman and child. He kept experimenting with them, just as he had with the animals, until they looked pretty good. He covered them and went away for a day. After some time had passed, he came back, uncovered the woman and child, and looked at them. However, they weren’t ready yet, so he covered them back up and left again. He returned to check on them every day for four days. On the fourth day, he decided they were just right. He said to them, “Get up and walk around,” and they did.

After that, Napi went around the countryside and made more people. All of the people you see today came from those first ones that Napi made. He did not do as good a job with them as he had wanted, though, because those first people were not very smart. For one thing, they let the buffalo eat them when they were supposed to eat the buffalo. So, Napi had to teach them how to do things correctly. They did not know how to dig up roots or even that they were supposed to wear clothes. Finally, the people learned how to do all those things. They became fairly skillful at surviving in the world Napi had made for them.

One day, one of the first women came to Napi. He was still in the country then, and the people could talk to him about their troubles. She asked him, “Napi, are we going to live forever?”

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Napi Makes the World (cont.)

Napi stood with his hand to his chin and wondered. He had not thought about thisquestion before and was not certain what the answer should be. After thinking for awhile, hesaid, “I’m not sure about that. We’ll do this. I’ll take a buffalo chip and throw it into theriver. If it floats, then people will die for only four days, and after that, they will come back tolife. If it sinks, however, people will die forever.”

He threw a chip into the river, and it floated.

“Hmm,” the woman said. “I’ll throw a stone into the water, and if it floats, people will liveforever.”

She threw a stone into the river, and it sank.

“Well, that settles it,” Napi said. “When people die, they will stay dead. That way, theywill learn to have pity on other people.”

Four days later the woman’s child died, so she went back to Napi. “I changed my mind,”she said. “I think that when people die, it should be for only four days. Then, after that, theyshould come back to life.”

“Sorry!” Napi said. “We made a deal. When a person dies, it is forever.”

That is the reason dying is part of life and why we do not rise again. Because of this, wemourn when someone goes, because we know we are going to miss that person. It turnedout death is a good thing, though, because many babies are born, and if they all lived forever,there would not be any place left for them to live.

• Large brown paper grocery bag• Pencils• Scissors• Crayons, paint and paintbrushes, or markers• Yarn• Cellophane tape

#3436 : Native American Tales and Activities 12 ©Teacher Created Resources, Inc.

Paper Bag Vest

MATERIALS

FOR YOUR INFORMATION

* Vests made from animals skins were worn in the Great Plains and the Northwestmountain areas by the Chippewa, Sioux, Crow, Cheyenne, and Blackfoot, as well asother tribes. Many of these vests were decorated with colorful designs using beads ordyed porcupine quills. The bottom of a vest was fringed to symbolize the rays of lightthat come from each person’s spirit. Add beads, yarn, feathers, ribbons, shells, and/orcolored pasta to decorate your vest.

LET’S DO IT!!1. Open the paper bag. Draw circles where the neck and arms will go. Draw a line up the

center of the bag for the opening in the front of the vest.

2. Cut the center line from the bottom of the bag to the neck circle. Reinforce each side ofthe cut line with cellophane tape.

3. Cut out the neck and arm circles.

4. Cut some fringe along the bottom.Then, decorate the vest with pictures and designs, using crayons, paints, or markers.

5. Carefully cut small holes at equal distancesalong each side of the opening in the front ofthe vest. Cut pieces of yarn to tie each set ofholes. Step 2 Step 5