Haa Yoo X̱ʼatángi Kúdi: Our Language Nest

Teachers from the Haa Yoo X̱ʼatángi Kúdi (Our Language Nest) join X̱ʼunei to talk about running a language nest. Daaljíni Mary Cruise, Kaasteen Jill Meserve, Neelaatughaa Anna Clock, Naak Emily Sheakley, And Shkayltín Claire Helgeson talk about thei work in the language nest, how the nest was started, what it takes to start one, dealing with the loss of speakers, and sharing funny stories about working with children. Haa Yoo X̱ʼatángi Kúdi is operated by the Central Council of Tlingit & Haida, a Federally Recognized Tribe.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:15):
They tried to telling uses, try to genocide us. Yeah,
I'm still here with the tongue un rope and so
hawk keas to cut juhan gonna cheege hockey des chinky
khi a ty dot yakutuku chakudzwa. Yeah, ok, yeah, a

(00:45):
ducky has to eat has outre too, gonna cheege. Thank you.
The don has broken on us again. The daylight has
broken on us again. We are in the shing It
language nest here with the teachers in the place where
the children are taught our language. This is modeled after

(01:05):
several language nests that we have seen and heard about,
and basically the idea is to have a home environment
where you put children in and you don't speak any English,
and then they become speakers of the language. It's effective,
it works. It's very difficult sometimes um and interactions with

(01:27):
my own kids. Sometimes with children that were here, I
would look and I think these kids are gonna kill
the language, because sometimes they're difficult to deal with. But
the reality is it's wonderful when when you see kids
who can understand, who start speaking the language themselves. When
our language went probably sixty years without making a single

(01:50):
speaker who knew it from birth, you know, maybe, and
and then to have children who are learning it essentially
as a first lange which now and so they come
in here. That the kids who come in they can
usually speak English already, and some of them don't know
anything it, but you give it a couple of months
and they can understand and they start speaking. So it's

(02:14):
a blessed day here at the place where the magic happens.
And I'm so excited to have this conversation. It's take
two for us, but you don't know that. Since so
we're gonna try and stay loose, have fun. We'll start
with telling the people who you are. Has to inknique
kisai ka to us school dot cheese can cheeks a

(02:44):
ji do a sock chickenadi a take yajik do a
sock thing. It you a toung city do kat dot

(03:12):
um Hi. My name is Joe. My thinking name is
costin Um. I am chew Canadi which is eagle brown bear.
I come to you guys from Juna. I live now
in Juno. Um. I am the child. My dad is white,
but I am also the child and grandchild of of
the Dainton My in laws are the Nadi and we

(03:32):
have one daughter whose name is Kakik and she is
also UM. I'm a language teacher now, which I'm so
happy to be a UM. It's such a great great
part of my life now. Um not you're um ut

(04:02):
do our teal with saw king station I Kanian has
southern to shown just kat kwan kah um yeah city

(04:29):
yeah yeah, has to has to eat dish to her
to her to you gonna chieh. My slinget name is
dash Jinny. My second clane name is kukau Do. It
was given to me by the Shanki by Kingstanwashaw. My

(04:52):
father's people and my in laws are Theati. My grandfather's
people are the conduct and Southern t showni Um. I
come from the jih hot Kwan or Chilcat area and
cho Poche which is Dalton Post in the Yukon Territory, Canada.
Um and I'm playing it language teacher and I work
with three to five year olds in the language nest
and I'm just really happy to be able to be

(05:13):
doing this with my life. I never thought that I'd
have my dream job. Um and here I am so
gonna cheegehan gonna cheege okay Ni la toga, Yeah you do,
thank it, Annika right enough, Anna clock sauk, thanks for

(05:44):
listening to us, folks. This is nil la Tova. We're
a click on athabasket and eyak um. My home right
now is on cling it Land and so that's why
I study thing it and thanks for listening. Hey you
han knock, I o u loss away um kick study

(06:08):
cuts the tea. I'm raven frog and um kick kwan
duck from cake gonna cheese kate, I'm gonna chee h h.
Clara Helguson yacked so Irish cup finished corn age and

(06:36):
yeah whishkiton Hi everyone. My name is Clara Helguson Satin.
I'm an adopted member of the whish keton Um. Although
I my family originates from Ireland and Norway. In Finland,
I am up and coming substitute here at the nest.

(06:57):
I've been working behind the scenes with the team for
the past almost three years now and I love my
job so much. Goodness cheese okay gonness change. So uh,
let's start with teaching kids and running a language nests.
What is it about? What's it like? And maybe we

(07:20):
could think of some stories we could share with folks.
Some of them might be funny, some of them might
be inspirational, But just the doing this h on a
daily basis or a regular basis, and having children in
here for a significant amount of time, like you know,
hours and hours, and to spend that time with them,

(07:42):
and having kids in the language. I guess for a
starting point of our conversation is what is a language nest?
And how do you do it? Goodna's chee jinny and
my glade Kasai is Mary crew is? I forgot to
tell you that on take one and take two, so

(08:06):
I don't know. Um, alright, So what is it to
work in a language nest? And what is it like?
What is the experiences? We have a lot of different
kinds of experiences. Some are almost traumatizing to us as teachers,
But for the most part it's been really good. We
have had kind of some on and off years, um,

(08:27):
you know, with COVID and then getting licensing through the
State of Alaska and all different kinds of things, But
I would say that overall, um, there's so much inspiration
to be had in this classroom. Like, for example, we
haven't seen our returning kids for almost three months. You know,
they got out of school in May and they just
came back to us this Tuesday was their first day.

(08:49):
And I can't believe how much uh language they retained,
how much they can understand when we're asking them to
do different things or to not do different things. And
they're really being those role models for the kids, the
new kids who have never been in this classroom and
maybe never been in a classroom period. Um, it's been

(09:10):
really helpful. Um. You know, I've been amazed at how
quickly children catch on. Um. We have. Last year, we
started in November after COVID, so it was a little
bit of a late start, and we hadn't seen the
kids like in person for almost two years. And we
get them into the classroom and within the first week

(09:32):
we have this little boy and he's been with us
kind of a lot on and off right, and he says,
stay await, Doc Jenny, And I was thinking, oh my goodness,
he just told me that's enough of you eating now,
Doc Jenny. And this continued, you know, and then pretty
soon a few weeks and you know, all these kids
are just talking to us like this there talking to

(09:54):
us and playing it. But they're really bossing us around.
And I I met with the team and I said, you, guys,
I think we need to reevaluate how we're talking to
the children because I think that they're talking to us
the way that we're talking to them and playing get right.
You know that imperative form. We all know it. We
know how to tell you to do something or to
not do something right, But how do we make more

(10:15):
complicated language so that these kids are not just bossing
us around and cling it. So we started changing the
way we talked to them. You know, don't climb up there,
I don't want you to fall, or you know, let's
speak with kindness, different things like that, and it really
shifted the way they talked. But we just it made
us really have a lot of laughs in here when
they were bossing us around and cling it, and it

(10:37):
made us very proud. Yeah. Um, yeah. So I just
think there's so many different things, Like right now, we
just started the year. We have nine kids. Last year
we only had six, and I'm kind of going, oh
my gosh, this is crazy. We have not five new kids,
we have four returning kids. And I just feel like

(10:59):
over alm we've changed our schedule around a little bit,
and like it just seems very overwhelming to me. And
yesterday I was talking to Rune outside and I said,
I think I made a mistake by having nine kids
in here this year. He said, this is really hard
and this is overwhelming. And his response was, well, they
say that that magic mark is at three months, you know,

(11:20):
when they start really grasping the language and understanding and
speaking the language. And I could just say, well, it's
going to be a long three months spokes, but no,
it's really good. It's so inspiring. You know, our children
can you know after a few months with us, they
can joke with us. Are isolating verb routs. I told
my son one day, I said, and that means I

(11:44):
love you, and the verb root in that is n
And he turned around and he looked at me and
he said, and chun. The verb root of chun is
like stinky, So I gues I'm stinky now. So But
but the point of that is, like, these children are

(12:04):
able to isolate the verb roots and make jokes in
our language, and um, it really shows us what they're
able to grasp. We don't teach verb roots in here,
or um what the classifiers are or anything like that.
They just pick it up naturally. And that's what's so
cool about this environment is that it's a natural environment.
We're just speaking the language all the time, and when

(12:26):
the kids are ready, they start speaking the language. And
it's just been so amazing. Does anybody else want to
speak to their experience in here like a kasti naya? Um? Yeah.
So this is technically my second year with the nest.
I joined UM early last year and so last year
was my first like full year working with the kids.

(12:47):
And just like duf Jenny said, it's so inspiring to
see these kids, and like the growth that I saw
from the beginning of last year to the end was phenomenal. Um.
You know, the same the same child that you were
talking about, Um that said day away Um by I
would say, by like mid year, he was starting to

(13:09):
put together sentences, like full sentences of things that again
were never like explicitly taught. But we were outside one
day and he his hands were called. So we put
my gloves on and he looked at me and he
said what gin And he said, my hand broke and
so I went over to grab it and he was

(13:30):
kind of like hiding his hand. You know so that
the glove was all floppy, and it was just a
phenomenal moment of these kids are picking this up. It's
so great, Um. And even you know, like like I said,
I have a daughter catch connect. She is also a
recent graduate from the NEST and so I've gotten to
use you know, the language with her here in the

(13:51):
classroom and the language with her at home, and I
think both of like both of our language growth just
from that first year working here has been so amazing,
And like I'm at the point now where, Um, I
try to explain something to her like a new verb
and she's like, what does that mean? And I can
explain it to her in the language and she will

(14:12):
understand it. It's really great. Um. But going back to
what you were saying about, like making jokes in the language,
I think is probably one of my favorite things, um,
because all these kids, they have such a sense of humor.
There's such little like jokesters um exchen is one of
my favorite and it's so great. UM. But I'm thinking

(14:35):
back to um, like some of the earlier jokes that
I saw my daughter couch connect. Um. I don't remember
what we were doing, but she was like just playing
with Shawn Kosay, and I remember she said, you do
what took. So the so the verb for like kind
of like what my name is, but it's kind of

(14:57):
like what I am called is you could do a
saw and the verb their sock means to like be
called or be named, and um she identified that and
change that to you do what took, which took means
but and it's it's so much fun these like these

(15:18):
jokes that these kids are making, you know, it's just
so just so incredible to see see their mind like
absorbed the knowledge, absorbed how it functions, and then replace
things with it's usually like took or hotch or watch.
So those are the ones that we really see, which
is like button, poop and fart, which I think are

(15:42):
always just universal, but I mean to see our kids
do that in the language, it's just like, oh my god.
Sometimes I could cry sometimes of laughter, but a little
bit of both. Neila Toga. This is Nila Toga. My
English name is Anna Clock and I came to the
language nest as a teaching practical student, and I'm currently

(16:04):
studying Clan good Um through a scholarship program. It's a
partnership between our University of Alaska Southeast and c Alaska
Heritage Institute and so um, you know, they funded our
schooling and part of the deal is that we get
to meet sort of the language teachers UM coordinators in

(16:28):
the community and do a teaching practical to get some experience. Well, yet,
Dutine came to our Language of Vitalization class. I was
taught by Ida Heather burge Um last spring or last fall,
and I was immediately nosy. I was like, I need
to know what's going on in there. I need to
meet folks. I need this practice because immersion for me

(16:50):
is super fun. It's kind of like my heart will
start racing and then I feel like I'm driving really fast,
recalling everything, making quick decision ends and it is such
a thrill for me. So um, right away I wanted in.
I asked her if they'd be willing to host a
language practical student, and pretty soon Ida made that connection

(17:12):
for me. So anyway, that's all to say, I was
really grateful to show up. I came last spring when
they're about halfway through their semester already, so I was
the new kid in school, super intimidated. It's embarrassing to
be intimidated and I want to be accepted by a
group of three to five year olds, but but Clint

(17:34):
told me this is a safe space, so that's why
I'm sharing. But yeah, it's just been a thrill ever since,
so having a good UM experience and yeah, back this fall.
I think since I started my language journey, like learning
thing it about four and a half years ago in

(17:55):
the university and like finding out about this space when
it opened, I've always has been drawn to just like
the power of of the movement and the people who
who started this thing. Because, um, since I've been able
to interact with you all the lead teachers, I just
noticed how there's there's never like an eye batted at

(18:16):
the obstacles because the motivation for the work is so strong,
and um, there's just such a joy and love and
in this space. And it's special because it's a really
lasting feeling, like we know that we're helping these kids
learn something that they're going to keep with them for
the rest of their life. And it's like, really it's

(18:36):
really getting to a part of their identity that is
so important in these early years. And um, just to
see them give that confidence is just so much joy
and so much motivation too to overcome those obstacles that
we face in that the language faces. Yeah chee, yeah,

(18:59):
this is thoughts JUNI Again, I just wanted to um
mention we do have another teacher. She's a co lead
teacher with me. Her name is yet Tutin or Mallory
Story and she UM is adopted Sagua d and her
and her partner are very big advocates in our language
and they're probably some of the more advanced speakers of

(19:21):
our language. And UM, she is not with us right
now because she just had a baby, who so we're
really looking forward to having her a little token a
in our class when um little Adeline turns three, So
she'll be with us UM probably starting in November or December.
But I just wanted to bring her into this into
this space with us. Cheese. Uh So, thinking back of

(19:47):
how a lot of this stuff started, I think it
was two thousand thirteen, and I went to the International
Conference of Language Documentation and Conservation I see l d
C in Hawaii, And so you start with a couple
of days of meetings at the University University of Hawaii
at Manoa in Honolulu, and I remember going there and

(20:10):
just it was incredible. It was great to just talk
to people doing stuff in languages. And then it included
this field tour to the schools at Hilo. So we
go over to the University of Hawaii at Hilo and
we kind of start there and I think we kicked
off with another couple of days. But the big difference
that I saw is they had the whole building that

(20:32):
was dedicated to their language. So there the College of
Hawaiian Language, which is called kahaka ula okay Ilikilani is
located there. And then I just noticed it was just different,
just to have your own space for your language. And
then we went to the Aha Punanalo and too Navegy,
so we we toured their language nest and then we

(20:53):
also toured their language medium school. And then once I
saw that stuff, I thought, Okay, this is something really
different than what I imagined it could be. Like, I
don't think I could even imagine what it was like
before I saw it. And then once I saw that,
I said, I think we need to do this. We
need to figure out how to get ourselves here. So

(21:16):
we came back. I ran to be a delegate of
our tribe. It's the Central Council of Clinketon Heida. They're
the ones who run this program. They're the largest tribe
in Alaska. UH. Their support has been incredible in terms
of making this happen and and putting a lot behind it.
You have to put a lot of resources behind something
like this to make it happen. And so I remember

(21:40):
seeing an article about the Cherokee language and how there
they had a language program that sounded so big that
they had a technology department in their language program. And
I thought, we don't even have a language program. We
just we have these different things. And so as a delegate,
we wrote a rest Lucian that said start a language program,

(22:02):
and then the next year we wrote tribal statutes that
said start a tribal schools program, and so that that
we thought would open the door to have these things
move forward. And then just kept pushing and pushing and
trying to figure out like, how could we replicate this,
how could we possibly do it? And Yakitet yak Dot

(22:24):
is a community north of US, and they started a
language nest I think a year before this one started.
And so we collectively were collaborating and talking and thinking
about how things would work. We brought some folks over
from Hawaii to meet with us and in some ways
break our hearts because we kept talking about all these ideas.
And the wonderful thing I think about working with some

(22:47):
of the folks in Haiti is when you first meet
them and you say what should we do? How should
we do it? And the emails I get would be
very polite and say I don't want to tell you
what to do and I I don't know. And then
but once you really get to know them, you said, well,
I think I'm gonna do this and say that won't work,
don't do it? Yes, so, And but they're right. I

(23:07):
mean they've they've built this thing. And what I try
to keep in mind is when I do go to
Hawaii and when I see their programs and what they
have is I'm trying to say, I might be looking
thirty years into our future, but we're going to have
to construct it in ways that work for us, but
that do model these successful programs. So we're going to

(23:28):
continue this conversation, but right now and take a little break.
Listen to some advertisements people trying to sell us, hopefully
good things, nothing that's too horrible and damaging to our earth.
I think it. Don uh, We'll be right back. What's happening, baby,

(23:50):
This colonization ship got you down. You gotta get on
this declization. It's time what vitalization all across North America,
the land of the language coming back into the hands
of future generations where it all blows rocks up and
have your voices be heard to beat all the colonial

(24:13):
forces that try to hold you down. I'm gonna chease
you han. So before the break, we're sort of talking
a little bit about how do you start a language
nest and what was the process? So I guess, and

(24:36):
we we are talking about working with kids, and we're
talking about some of the things to do within some
of your organizations. But just like so, this is a
it's not a visual medium. People are just listening. So
what are we seeing in this space? How did this
space get created? What did you think about in terms

(24:57):
of a daily schedule? Right? Because it's sounds wonderful and magical,
But then to say, okay, let's let's say we have
folks who feel like they're certainly learning the language and
certainly can understand it. But just to say, okay, you
are going to live in the language for eight hours
with nine kids who are under five years old. Like,

(25:17):
suddenly you have a scenario where you're in charge of
of the children and also of their activities and their
lives and how they're getting along with each other and
how how much they're listening to you folks and learning
and this is all done within the language. And so
I think you've got to have a plan in order
to do this kind of stuff, and you probably also

(25:38):
have to adjust that plan as you go along. So
I guess from that standpoint, like how did it, how
did it start, and how did you come to where
you're at now? And what recommendations might you have for
folks who are hoping to do this themselves. Well, I
want to thank you because you're really the one who

(26:00):
pushed everything forward, and you're also the one who pushed
me into this job. This is dush Jenny. Um So
I'm really grateful for it. You know, when I got
my my teaching license and my master's in education, I
was like, I'm never teaching below third grade, and now
I'm teaching preschool. So you know, life throws some surprises
at use sometimes. Um So, I mean, really, one of

(26:24):
the big things that we've we did is we opened
up under an organization and when they mentioned that we're
under Central Council Clinket Height of Indian Tribes of Alaska. UM,
so we got a childcare center license through the State
of Alaska. So that was lots and lots of hoops
jumping through and and just learning the system. UM. You know,

(26:46):
it's very it's very demanding, right. You have to have
somebody with the qualifications to be able to run run
this as an administrator. And because I had my master's
that's that was the role I played. UM. And so
after getting it open, we didn't get to open until
I think we got it. We got the ana Esther
Martinez Grant and UM that that funded us for the

(27:08):
past four years. And so that was you know a
huge feat for us to be able to get the
funding to open the doors and to get things rolling. UM.
And we actually just received another an a Esther Martinez
Grant CHIEFE, so we got that for the next five years.
So you know, there's just lots of hoops and different
things to jump through. UM. Things that we have to

(27:30):
keep track of, like within our program, you know, our
our staff needs to get their child development associates, so
they're c d A s. You can do them mostly
online or through some early childhood programs. So those are
key pieces to making sure that you have enough staff
for years. While like two and a half years, I
was the only one who had to be here at

(27:52):
all times, and so if I ever wanted to take
a day off, we had to close the nest. And
then a couple of years later, yet two teen, Malory
Story got her c d A equivalent, and now we
have two other staff in our room who got their
c d A equivalent. So now we're building that capacity
so that we're not burning out our our lead teachers
or just our staff in general by having to work

(28:13):
really long hours or feeling like we can't take time off.
So there's all those little details, um in terms of
like building the program and building that capacity and things
of that nature. Um. Day to day, I would say, uh,
things shift a lot. This is probably only are We

(28:34):
ran in spring of twenty nineteen and then we closed
in March, and then we did online classes, So this
is going to be like only our This will be
our first full year if we make it through this
year without some kind of like pandemic hitting or something. Again.
You know this will be because we've we've done partial years, um,

(28:55):
and even within those partial years, we saw amazing growth.
So we're really like, we're trying different hours this year.
Last year we did two days a week, and we
did long days, ten hour days, so like seven thirty
to five, five thirty, and we had four staff, so
we split our shifts. Somebody would do morning and somebody
would do afternoon, and then we'd have like four hours

(29:17):
in the middle where we were all together. UM. And
what we found was, even though we were only doing
two days a week, we were kind of burning ourselves
out and and burning out the kids. Like ten hours
is a long day for kids in a language that
they may have never heard before. So this year we
shifted our schedule. We're doing kind of preschool hours, so

(29:38):
we're doing eight thirty to three, UM. But then you
have to consider working families, and so now we have
a lot of families saying, well, you know, those hours
don't really work for me. And so now we're opening
at eight for drop off, and we're providing after school
care and pretty soon we'll be providing after school transportation
because that's how important our program is to us that
we are willing to take in a lot of overtime hours.

(30:01):
We're willing to do a lot of the extra coordination
and work to make sure that we have our families
if if they want to participate in this program, they
do sacrifices to they participate in family events. There's lots
of different ways they have to sacrifice. So if we
want our program to be successful, we have to make
those sacrifices as well. And that's something all of us

(30:23):
from the beginning have been willing to do and will
continue to do. UM. Yeah, so we started with our
nine kids, we thought our schedules solid um. We're finding
that it's too many transitions, not enough time just enjoying
choices or that social emotional development. So I might have

(30:46):
I don't know, Costine, if she wants to speak to
some of the other things that we've been doing in
a classroom and kind of some pieces of advice if
you guys are wanting to start UM a language nest
and and I just think you know, for us building capacity,
you know, we're constantly like, yes we want a practical student,
Yes we want another contractor in the room, Yes we

(31:08):
want this and we want that. We want anybody who's
willing native non native. If you're willing to work in
our language and learn our language with us and teach it,
then we want you because what we're finding in in
Southeast Alaska or and I'm sure most languages are dealing
with this capacity is an issue. So when you start
a program, you're probably competing with another program for hiring

(31:30):
some language teachers for your program. And so the more
capacity that we can build, I think the better off
all the programs, UM will be. So I'll pass it
over to Costine chee cheech Um. Yeah, you mentioned, um
that you never thought that you would be teaching under
what third grade? And I mean I never thought that
I would be a teacher, um. So I mean, I

(31:55):
you know, I went to the University of Alaska Southeast.
I got my degree in Alaska Ato Languages and Studies,
and I took a lot of language classes with UNA
and I remember many many times him telling us that
if you're gonna be working in this language, you're probably
going to be end up teaching. And I just remember thinking, Nah,

(32:16):
that's not me. I don't want to teach, um. And
then here I am and I'm teaching pre school and
it's honestly like the most rewarding thing in my life.
I now that I'm here, I'm like, I cannot imagine
doing anything else. It's it's just it's so much fun.
It's so rewarding in my life, and you know, to
feel like I'm doing something for our language and our people. UM,

(32:40):
it's yeah, I can't imagine doing anything else now. Oh
oh so yeah we um so this is like technically
a childcare center, right, and like dat d Jenny mentioned, Um,
she has her master's and because I came into this
without any teaching experience at all, any like childcare experience. UM,

(33:00):
I did work over the last year and I was
just recently awarded my c d A, which is yeah, yeah,
my child Development Associate certification. And it was a lot
of work. Um Like I did do like online training,
but there's a lot more than that, Like I had
to do have a certain amount of classroom hours in
a licensed child care facility. I had to um create

(33:25):
a portfolio with like philosophy, statements and reflections and not
did the same same thing too. She just recently got
hers too. It's so great to have, um yeah for
staff now with that certification, so that we can just
trade off if somebody somebody needs to go, yeah, I'll
stay absolutely UM. But I think one thing that we

(33:48):
ran into with that was we were trying to UM
get that certification. So a part of that is that
we have to have a classroom observation by somebody who
is authorized to administer UM the childcare certification. And we
went to an early Childhood conference that was hosted hearings,

(34:11):
you know, early was that last spring or early summer,
and one of them was one of the like sessions
they had was on building your cd A portfolio. And
so Knock and I went to that and we were,
you know, putting it all together. We're allowed to ask
questions and they're kind of getting us through it. And
they said that the observation, the classroom observation had to

(34:35):
be in one language, right, and it had to be
and the same language that your portfolio was going to
be built in. So, because the portfolio is a really big,
like really big resource that you have to like write
statements about, if we wanted to get observed here in

(34:55):
the classroom and thing it, we would have had to
have somebody who can understand clean, get and come in
and understand what we're saying, understand what the kids are saying,
and understand our portfolio. UM. We ended up not needing
to do that because we worked over the summer at
a different child care facilities, still under the tribe, which

(35:17):
mainly uses English. But it was still it was quite
a struggle for us. And I know that d Jenny,
you had a lot of conversations with UM, with those
staff about like how are we going to do this?
Like this is the place that this is where we work,
we work with these kids, they're really familiar with us.
Like if I think if we were able to at
the end of the year, I would have been so

(35:37):
comfortable during the observation in here and you know, with
the kids that we had. But it was just that
hurdle of how in the heck are we going to
do this? We don't have anybody who's authorized to do
that with those UM with that skill. UM. So I mean,
I don't know. I guess I don't have any suggestions

(35:58):
for like how you might be able to overcome that,
but UM, just something to think about and look expect.
If you're also going to be working towards a languagenus
that like, if you don't have a cd A equivalent
to work in a child care facility, like you're going
to have to expect those hurdles. And it's a lot
of you know, just something like de colonization that has

(36:21):
to happen in our in our systems. I'm actually going
to add to that because I had so many conversations
around the c d A and around our language. Um,
the end result actually came out to be that the
director of the early childhood program here and Juno said

(36:41):
we don't need to understand your language to see that
you're doing good with the kids. And so we fought.
And I actually had the tribe had had the organization
not come forward and said we can move forward intling
it and we can observe you in your classroom. Had
that not happened, our tribe would have gone to bat

(37:02):
for us. So I think Costin has a valid point
that there will be hurdles like this, that if you
want to do a c d A through your classroom,
they might come at you and say, well, no, we
don't have anybody who's qualified. Well, one, we were going
to go find somebody who could, like we were going
to ask Josh Jackson if he could become an observer
and and um, so you can. You can find other avenues,

(37:26):
or you can fight it, fight it tooth and nail
and say no, this is our land and this is
our language, and this is what needs to happen. And
you can also just say you can come into any
room and not understand the language and see whether or
not we work well with children. And I think that
that was kind of that was the point at the
end where they were like, okay, we we can do this.

(37:46):
I think the board was fully supportive of it at
the end. But at that point we had already set
everything up for these guys to be observed in a
English speaking classroom, and we needed it before I go
moose hunting next month. So it's done now. Anyways you
want to go for it. I think the only thing
I can really contribute to this part of the conversation

(38:07):
is about building language fluency UM, because there's honestly a
lot of things I just don't know how to do, Like,
for example, I don't know how to make kids fall
asleep on Tuesday. My approach was to fall asleep during

(38:30):
nap time. It's called leading by example, and so I
would look around the room and the other teachers like
how are they doing this? And they'd be whacking them
on the back, whack whack, and I'm like, that would
not make me fall asleep. You guys, also, do I

(38:53):
have consent to touch this person? So like yesterday, I'm
staying next to one of the littler ones and I'm like,
does she want me to touch her? I'll just awkwardly
try and I would like poke her in the back
and withdraw my hand like it burned me, and she
would look up at me like who is the sketchy
weird I'm not closing my eyes fire. So anyway, yeah,

(39:19):
I have some room for improvement in that area. But
maybe if I take a c d A class they'll
teach me. I don't know. Uh yeah, So as far
as building fluency, I highly recommend um participating in immersion.
I took Thing Good at u As initially with conquass
Ishmael Hope, and then we're always having elders help us

(39:41):
and um it takes some humility and a sense of humor,
but uh, just do it, because you don't get better
at basketball by watching basketball on TV. Like you gotta
pick up the ball and throw it. You gotta make
mistakes and keep trying and just have fun with it.
Because Clay creates such a safe space in his classes. Um,
and so it's kind of on us as the learners

(40:03):
to step it up and give it a try. And
I highly recommend that. Yeah. Well, I started coming to
woosh taka wo um when my daughter she's eleven now,
when she was like four and we were at the
library and um, yeah, that's where we started from gathering

(40:28):
and doing immersion time. Une's family and Dr Jenny and
some other families. I just wanted to mention that time
for a second break, but I just want to mention
like the transition that takes place when you do something
like this, as you go from a language being something

(40:50):
that you study and practice to a language that you use.
And so one of the things that a language nest
does is it creates a space where the language live
and first thing get on a daily basis. This might
be one of the only places like on Earth where
the language has primacy, like it's the main language of communication.

(41:11):
And so it's so important this work that's happening. And
when we come back, we're gonna talk about individual language
journeys and also some of the tougher things I think
that we face looking at languages that are going from
a state of high endangerment to a place of safety
and some of the things that happened along that journey.

(41:31):
So we'll be right back in the chief. Once I
thought about a million birds all around the world sharing
their songs, thinking about the ways they have lived and
they're gonna live. And this is the way yeah, a
way yeah to see wogen yaka m yeah, the way

(42:12):
on gonna cheese. One pane canis art you can't get
That was cool. You can walk he has out here
too away and the cass art one panine has the

(42:34):
art was cool. Jeek yeah have to arsk the one
cart z a knock TANGI knock city a joy towards
the Google with the school are dots away. So coming

(42:59):
back from the break, I was thinking about this is
a podcast about language revitalization and de colonization, and that's
the work that's going on right here. It's like the
practical and like putting it into practice, putting into the
lives of ourselves and into these children. But there's a
component of it as well, which is when we lose

(43:21):
a speaker and think it is probably down to forty speakers,
I would say there's probably ten master level speakers who
who were raised in the language, and of those ten,
most of them are well over seventy years old, and
some of them are getting close to ninety. And so
as we start to engage in some of these conversations,

(43:44):
one of the things that does happen as we lose
some of our speakers. And so I wanted to recognize
chakla Irene Cardiente. She's te Qui Du. She was a wonderful,
wonderful human being and speakers. She raised children who are
leaders in our community. She went to the Pious ten

(44:07):
missionary school in Show and she shared stories with us
about being hit on the hands with rulers for speaking
shing It, and yet she held onto the language, and
so I just admire her her courage. I used to
sit next to her and Yacht Chucked Lilyan Austin at

(44:27):
language gatherings, and they wouldn't talk a whole on They
would just sit and watch everything. But they would turn
to me and tell me how they would say the
things that we're being talked about and so I'm so
thankful that they spent time and that they taught me.
And I think one of the difficult things for language
learners that I sometimes share with folks, I say, Okay,
you're gonna learn to speak this language, you learn to

(44:49):
understand it, you learn how to speak it, and then
you're gonna be able to talk to these folks who
who have spent the most big chunk of their lives
probably waiting for somebody to talk to, somebody knew, you know,
and watching the numbers go down and down. And so
I would say, when some of them were born in
the nineteen twenties, there were thousands of things IT speakers.

(45:11):
But Cyril George would talk to us and he'd say,
even when I was born, we knew that we were
losing our language and our culture. And then he would say,
but now I look around and I see the people
who are learning, and I see what they can do,
and it makes my head go up and think, well,
we're not going to lose it then, And so I
guess I want to talk a little bit about this transition.

(45:33):
I want to, uh, just make sure that everybody knows
that when when we lose an elder those of us
who speak the language, like a whole library burns down,
and a lot of our people and a lot of
people who are living on our land have no idea
what just happened in terms of you know, like a
death is always a hard thing for families. It's always

(45:54):
a hard thing for people who are close to to
those folks. But as far as like when some one
can speak and you lose them, like it can really
you know, there's there's whole languages where sometimes they've got
all this momentum and then that one speaker they worked
with a lot passes away, and then sometimes the whole
thing falls apart. And so what we're trying to do
here is something sustainable because the wisdom that these elders had,

(46:19):
they've given to us as teachers, and then our goal
is to give it to the children and in ways
that just have less trauma, less suffering, less hardship as
we try to sort of improve their lives. And but
we're dealing with elders who who suffered. Marche Dudson told

(46:39):
me a Tachandan Hakawa and she said, it's impossible for
you to understand how much we suffered when people didn't
want our language. And so I'm I'm so grateful for
what they went through. I'm so grateful for what our

(47:01):
children go through where people don't tell them to stop
speaking thing it, people don't tell them they can't speak it,
and people don't punish them. And being hit on the
hand with the ruler is traumatic, I think, for speaking
your language. But also like that's pretty mild compared to
some of the things that elders have told me about

(47:21):
putting rags of chemical stuff into kids mouths and picking
them up by their hair. And uh, some some folks
who went to a school called Wrangle Institute, they said
they saw a kid who was speaking sing it in
the wintertime and that the teachers made him go out
and put his tongue on a metal flagpole and he
was out there for for a long time. And so

(47:42):
as we think about this stuff, and we want kids,
I think, to grow up absent of that, but not
not not at a point where they don't know that
that's things that happened. And so when I was raising
my daughter and I was telling about some of this
stuff and how they used to be signs up in
our community that said no Indians allowed uh, And I
told her all and think it. It was very hard

(48:03):
to come out with ways to talk about racism in
shing it, like I had to really think about like
I would say, they hated us because we weren't white,
and they wouldn't let us go into these buildings. And
so she was probably three years old and she looked
at me and she was very mad, and she said,
when I grew up, I'm gonna make signs that say
no English. And so that was neat because she just

(48:26):
related it to a language, like she couldn't even relate
it to these other concepts. And you know, I was
very as a wonderful response and to think about that.
And so as I raised my kids, like I want
them to know these things happened and to know that
they live in a different world where no one's going
to do that to us. But then also I want
to honor these elders and these ones that we worked

(48:47):
with because because they're so wonderful and they they know
I think what's at stake, and they also know that
they have limited time. You know, when you're working with
nine year olds sometimes you have limited time and there's
a lot of pressure. But I want to make sure
that people know that there's medicine in our language, and
that the medicine is continuing to go to the elders

(49:09):
to get the knowledge and to pass it along two children.
And so for some of these, like with jack Claw,
thanks to her daughter and Rinalda, I was able to
send videos back and forth with her speaking cling it
so that she would have, you know, someone to talk to,
and just she really had fun talking and speaking cling it.

(49:31):
She was just so wonderful when when I see her,
just how happy she was to to see me and
to be able to just start speaking and cling it
with each other. So it's difficult subject, and so we'll
talk about this for a few minutes and then we'll
transition and we'll start to wrap up the episode with
funny things, because you gotta laugh after doing some of

(49:51):
the harder stuff. But things that have happened, um, maybe
in the nest or just with the language, dealing with
family ease and getting your family to speak and get again.
It could be very very fun and also very funny. Um.
But anyone have any thoughts on these transition periods that
we live in where we're losing speakers, but we're also

(50:12):
making speakers at the same time. Yeah. Um. You know, recently,
see Alaska Heritage Institute has started releasing um, the nineteen
eighties celebration videos, which are really fantastic. Um. You get
to see like a lot of the grandparents that we

(50:33):
grew up with, or you know a lot of the
old dancing and singing and the way things were done.
How many years ago, forty years ago? Are we that old? Um?
But one of the things that really struck me about
those videos is that somebody on the stage could tell
a joke and cling it and the whole room would laugh.

(50:57):
You know, it really struck me when I watched that
and jokes happening, and and and everybody in the room
understanding the thing it or most everybody and laughing at
that joke. And you know, I I work really hard
to make sure also that my children are aware of,
you know, the situation and what the situation used to

(51:19):
be like, and what it's like now, and what we're
trying to do. And we recently went to a language
gathering and sometimes, you know, my eight year old daughter
would be like, oh, this is so long, and I
you know, it's getting kind of boring, and I don't
understand what they're saying, and I have to talk to her.
I talked to her about when I was a kid,
And when I was a kid, I grew up in

(51:40):
day shoe drive in Haynes. I grew up next to
the old Folks Home, and Haynes I had all these
grandmas and grandpas who spoke cling it, right. I grew
up at a culture camp with all these grandmas and
grandpas who spoke cling it. And at that point in
my life, I don't think a lot of us understood
how amazing that was. Like, like, I wish that as

(52:00):
a kid, somebody would have told me, like, these guys
aren't going to be around very long. There's some of
the last speakers of this thing at language, and that
really instead of you running over there to play, let's
go sit by the grandmas and grandpas and to have
that opportunity as a kid. And I look back and
I just wish that I would have done it differently.
But I didn't know any better. And so I want
to make sure that my children no better and that

(52:22):
they can consciously make that choice to say, Hey, I'm
gonna go sit by that grandma. I'm gonna go hug
that auntie or you know, I'm gonna go check in
and kind of be more present. Um. And so I
think it's really important that we we keep that connection
for our our children so that they know, but also
being careful and mindful to know that they are kids,
right and they want to play, and you know, we

(52:43):
can put so much pressure on them, but we have
to be mindful that that they don't resent it. Um.
Which reminds me my daughter actually resented my job. I
was with her her whole babyhood and when I started
working in the language nest and I was working with
other children, she resented the language because it took me
away from her. And um, now she's she's back in it.

(53:04):
She wants to learn it, and she's actually mad at
me that she doesn't know as much. But I was like,
you resisted so much, right like um, But she she
said one something one time when I was talking to
her about our languages, she said, our language is like
a spirit, and you can't take that away from us.
She was very angry, right, and and that stuck with me,
like you can't take it away. It's like a spirit,

(53:25):
and I'm gonna leave it there. Chee cheeksty naya Um. Yeah.
I mean I I'm a bead work artist, right, And
I just recently was just in Santa Fe for the
Santa Fe Indied Market, and I was sitting in the
airport in Santa Fe when I saw the news about Irene.

(53:49):
And I was sitting in the airport like bawling, like
already you know, exhausted and emotional, and then just getting
that news, it all just hit me and I was
sitting there crying my eyes out just the way of
the loss of a single speaker. You know, there's so
much that we lose from a single person. And I

(54:14):
just remember sitting there and I thought, you know, I
was initially really stressed because I was getting it at
midnight and we're going to come in and open the
nests that immediately the next morning at eight, and I
was like, I went from thinking, I'm so stressed about
this too. Man, I cannot wait to get back into

(54:35):
the classroom to work with these kids because the work
that we're doing is so important, I think, and you know,
like you're saying, we're trying to build more speakers, that's
what we're doing. We absolutely are doing that, and it's
there's no other way that that we can do it. Um,
And it was it was just really hard, um, really

(54:56):
hard news. But I mean as far as like my
own language journey, I mentioned before that, you know, I
never expected to be a teacher. I never expected to
be here. I came into this job with language grant experience,
you know, which was great. I could do it. But um,
I went to a conference. It was a language gathering,

(55:20):
a language teacher conference that I think A. S. B
Had coordinated, and a lot of you folks were there.
And I remember sitting in that classroom and seeing all
this work that all these really amazing teachers are doing,
both with clinge and had kill and smell, and realizing
that like, I'm not doing this work that everyone else is.

(55:44):
I'm doing more work around the language, and having just
that kind of like epiphany moment of this is the
work that I want to be doing. I need to
be working in the language just like everybody else. Because
how am I contributing to the language when I'm just
working around it? You know, Like I can organize events,
but like I could, I could do so much more

(56:07):
for our language actually working in it. And so I
mean I made that leap. But we're really closely with us,
Jenny and everybody here at the nest, and um, I'm
so thankful for that gonna che she couldn't not go away.
I'm I'm just so thankful for having that support and

(56:30):
you know, the opportunity to come over and work at
the language, just because now i feel like I'm doing
what I should have been doing with my life a
long time ago. And I'm seeing, you know, the growth
in my own language and in my daughter's language, and
you know, there are just moments every day where she
says something or you know, she does something, and I'm like,

(56:51):
this is what this is making it all worth it.
You know, we're doing the work, we're creating these new speakers,
and it's yeah, it's about a lot um. I'm not
going to cheage. Yeah, it's for me. It's so important
to know how to grieve because language work is so

(57:15):
close to home. It's so heavy, so important, but it's
also so fun and it matters that when you're working
on the language, you're putting love into it. That when
you sit by elders, they can tell you're happy to
see them and be by them, and when you're setting
an example for younger learners. They can see that you're
having fun and they like being there too because it

(57:37):
affects your learning process. And so UM A big part
of that for me and being on my healing journey
is knowing how to grieve. And I learned through the
hea the potlatches in Caltag and Nelato, that's where my
dad's from. And I think something that helped me was

(57:58):
one of the nights. You know, our potlatches last for
eight days, and towards as the week went on, UM
we were singing our morning songs and one of the
uncles came on the mic and he said, if you
lost somebody, if you're hurting, don't wipe your tears because
this is your time to grieve and you need to

(58:19):
let your tears fall all the way to the ground.
And for me it was such a moment of release.
And um our potlatches take us through that grieving period
because you need to go through it. You need to
be deliberate about it so that when you go to
do your work you're ready again. And so another interesting

(58:40):
part of it for me is learning how to set
emotional boundaries with class because it's heavy, it's hard news
looking at the numbers. It's hard to take in. It
can consume you. And I think when I did start
learning about the loss of our languages and the process
um of harm that was done to our elders, Um,

(59:01):
it did consume me a little bit, like it beat
me to the ground, and I was ineffective. I wasn't
able to learn or put myself out there. And so
now what I try to share with younger people is
if you're in class and it's Orange Shirt Day honoring
the loss and the trauma of our boarding school history, Um,
maybe you have your own process for grieving and you're

(59:25):
only you know your own pattern of energy and your healing.
So um, sometimes I'm like, it's okay to have an
emotional boundary if someone sharing hard news with you, it's
okay to be like, I'm aware of this history already.
I live and breathe it every day. Every day is
Orange Shirt day for me. And today I've been working
hard on my social and emotional well being and I

(59:47):
have work to do. So um that's been important to
me in my language journey and my healing journey. Is
like you know, and then maybe on Sunday I'll wake
up and I'll be I can feel the weight of it,
and I'll be like today's the day, so I'll go
burn food from my ancestors on the beach and that
I'll just let the tears fall all the way. So

(01:00:08):
um that helps me a lot. Okay uh cheeh uh.
A while back, we we had lots of speaker named
dosty Ethel MacKinnon and I did a lot of work
with her. She's trip from Sitka chicklate cause from Ongoon,

(01:00:28):
and I remember just how devastated I was, and so
I just I just wanted to fall into that sadness
for a while. So I agree, you've got to give
yourself that time, that space to just just mourn that loss,
but then to find a way out of that and
to get back into the energy, you know. So for me,

(01:00:50):
I basically try and think of, like what is everything
that these colonizers did to our people's, especially the ones
who were like call And there's like a scale of
being a colonizer. And then on one side you've got
like Andrew Jackson and Richard Pratt's and just some really
it's so the worst human beings I think, who have
ever lived. And then and then you've got these are

(01:01:13):
other sort of areas that his spectrum. And so when
I think of folks who are pretty far on the
spectrum in terms of being just horrible, I think of
I have to counter the things that they did with
my work and my energy and my dedication and my
efforts to be transformative, and so I try to catch
a breath get arrest. It's almost like this Raven story

(01:01:35):
where the whole world floods and Raven sticks his nose
through the sky and he's just twirling and swinging, and
at some point he begins to say, cut Jacketski, let
me fall on this kelp island. And so he looks
down and there's a kelp island and he falls down
there and and then he's like, finally I can rest.
And then he hears this breathing behind him and there's

(01:01:57):
his sea Honor, and he's like, oh, time to get
back to work. So that's also the thing is like
you you can, but you also have to find a
way out of it. And you also have to watch
out for those who are in this language movement so
that you can pull them out of it as well.
Because we've seen people who who have a breakdown and
then we lose them, and we can't really afford that either.

(01:02:20):
And it's difficult because in language revitalization work, it's it's
like that old saying, like you could pick your friends,
but you can't pick your family. So you also can't
pick your language revitalization team. And in many ways, we're
very fortunate, we're very you know usu like the good
fortune has come that we have people who get along
and could laugh together and who can bond and who

(01:02:43):
can help each other. But sometimes you have to be
working with people you don't get along with it, and
that could be really difficult. And that also requires a
lot of maturity and and I think also boundaries and
then just having good open communication about how to overcome
some of the times when you're not only going to disagree,
but you're gonna do things that really actually hurt each other,

(01:03:05):
and to try and move beyond that. And so to
start to wrap us up and to get us you know,
our ceremonies that you have a morning time and then
you have a fun time. So we're gonna try and
push this sakud nat. We're gonna try and get it
towards fun. And I'll start with a couple of stories
that I think are just magical moments of language comprehension

(01:03:28):
and also just like just general funniness with kids. So
there are two children who are in the language Nest
Custine is Seek, Dutch, Ginny eat shinook. Say. So these
two children who are probably four or five. So they're

(01:03:48):
at celebration, which is one of our gatherings, and there's
like dance group after dance group, and lots of you know,
thousands of people watching dancers and performances and artwork and
language and all this stuff that's going on is just
so wonderful, and knock your to seek. Your daughter is
introducing herself, and you know, we have clans and our

(01:04:09):
clans have houses and one of these houses is called
cocon hit which means Sun house. Beautiful name. But your
daughter is introducing herself and she says a sock uh
Cocon hitty duck. So she says, cluck on hitty duck
from the sunhouse. And I hear your daughter say cocon

(01:04:35):
and then your son says, she's not from cocon. Don't
listen to her. And that was so amazing because I
was thinking, well, I don't know about that response, but
they understand it. And they're also hilarious and there, you know,
but just they're like, she's not from the sun, don't

(01:04:56):
listen to her. And it was just so neat. And then,
you know, as I committed to speaking only shing It
to our kids, and as I would walk around the
community and to speak with them, and it doesn't matter
who's around us, doesn't matter where we're at, I will
just speak to them and think it at which includes
arguing about over whether or not we should be buying
bell peppers and all kinds of just fun stuff with kids.

(01:05:17):
And we're at a pretty large public function here. I
was talking to my two daughters and sing it, and
someone who's sitting next to them says, do they understand
what you're saying? I said, yes, they understand everything that
I say. And I looked at my oldest daughters and
I said, which is do you understand shing It? And
she says no, and she said and she pauses, she

(01:05:41):
has this nice comedic pause, and she says, only Spanish. Okay.
So then we just sort of carried on. We finished
our business there, and we got in the car hours
later and she said, I was just kidding Dad, and
I said it was hilarious, since like that's that's what

(01:06:02):
we want. It's a living language, which includes sometimes moments
that you couldn't predict, Like I couldn't predict that these
moments would happen, and that they, you know, would have
children who could understand the language and could do things
that are sometimes funny, and sometimes they're not trying to
be funny, they're just being, you know, being kids and
learning about the world. You get any stories to share

(01:06:23):
before we wrapped this whole thing up, It's okay with you.
We'll see. So my daughter Kinsey is best friends with
Rene's daughter show at Gay and we had picked her
up and we were driving out to our house one
day and she's going on blah blah blah blah blah
and oh yeah that goose and and she says, well,

(01:06:45):
not this goose and she points down because in Thlingett
goos is a vagina. And she says, not this goose,
but the one that's flying in the sky over there.
And she was like dead serious. It was like for
her it wasn't funny, But to me, I was like
cracking up inside because I'm like, now she has to
differentiate between what a slinger goose is and what a
goose is in English? And you know, and then it

(01:07:07):
reminded me at one time like, you know, my daughter
didn't even know like the word for vagina, just like
my son probably doesn't know the word for penis and English.
And um, my cousin came over one time and my
daughter was about too and he's like, oh my gosh,
aren't you just a silly goose? And my daughter looked
at me like, oh my gosh, who is this and
why is he talking about me being a goose? And so,

(01:07:30):
you know, finding that kind of humor in in our
language when when the kids probably don't even realize like
he was saying that that it's funny, but like you know,
they're differentiating things or maybe they don't know the other
English word or maybe you know, just making those references.
And so we have a lot of fun um teaching
our children our language. Can cheach cast um. I have

(01:07:52):
a couple of fun stories, I think, um. One of
them is that we were just up in Klukwan with
my in laws and catch connect had you know, she
started get a fever and then she was like, my
throat hurts, and I looked and she had stripped. And
it was like Saturday night when we figured this out,

(01:08:14):
and you know, there's no clinics open in Haynes or
Org clock one at the time, and so we had
to go through this whole process of like trying to
you know, being on call with the like nurse line whatever.
And then we finally got to go to like the
search which is our Southeast Regional Health Consortium UM there

(01:08:34):
after hours, I guess kind of clinic, which was like
technically in the emergency room. It was like ten pm
by the time we got down there, and she was
just you know, she wasn't feeling good. She was really
nervous because it was a doctor, you know. Um. And
so we're as we were sitting there and waiting, I
was like, hey, June has this podcast and he talks
with his kids at the end of this do you

(01:08:55):
want to listen to it with me? So we're sitting
there and listening. And it was at the very end
of your first pisode, which was just phenomenal, and I
think you were talking with and um, I think you
said wankans with Yaka, just just like and after you

(01:09:19):
said that, she interrupted and she looked at me and
she goes, it's like that story where the teacher didn't
want the kids to speak cling it, And that was
just such a phenomenal. I was like, hold on, see
it again. I like got my phone out, it's a recorder.
But um so, for people that don't know, um so,

(01:09:43):
what he had said, it was sometimes people say that
I don't need cling it and that we only use
English here. And she looked at me and she recognized that,
like the relevance of that, and she was like, it's
like the teacher that didn't want the kids to speak
clean it. Because I've also had really long conversations with
my daughter about boarding schools and you know what that's

(01:10:05):
done to our languages, and so I thought one that
was phenomenal that she remembered it and that she was
able to relate to our histories. But I almost cried
because I was like she understood him, you know, it
was it was such a great moment. I was like, Ah,
like this work, all this work, these choices are all
paying off. Um So, that was a really great moment,

(01:10:28):
just a really recent one. But um I think having
such young kids, especially in like our families that are
doing this work in the language too. They don't realize
that it's work, you know. They just think like, oh,
we're going to think at schoon, you know. But um,
the like change that I've seen in my family has
just been phenomenal. Um she has, I think because her

(01:10:50):
and also her cousins are also tcl also they're all
doing work in the language, and so it's I think
it's encouraged her grandpa to also start to learn more,
which is really amazing. Um he's you know, downloading the
Selaska Heritage abs, getting all the books and stuff and
trying to use it with them at home. But he

(01:11:11):
always likes to tell the story where he was trying
to say something to her and Cotch Connect just looks
at him and goes, I think you need to keep practicing, Papa.
It's it's just it's so great, you know, to see
these like the generations that um didn't learn it start
to participate in it. And it's such a such a

(01:11:32):
wholesome experience out of that. Um, Well she won last
story and then I'll be done, I promise. UM. So,
like I said, we were just up in cluck On
recently and catch Connect. She just loves to joke in
the language, and um, I don't remember what we were
talking about. But then she goes to cut you hot.

(01:11:52):
So to cut you han means hey, everybody are kind
of like all y'all, but she changed it to hot,
which means poop, and I kind of want to use
it now as like our own version of like shit asses,
do you know hot? Oh, she just reminded me of

(01:12:15):
one more story about Jenny. Um, you know, my mom
was always like very resistant. You know, our our family
didn't have singed in it since my great grandmother went
to tow a boarding school, and so my mom would
always say, well, I'm just never going to learn the thing.
I'm never going to learn it. I'm never going to
learn that language. But what she didn't know was that
we were going to inadvertently do that to her and
make her learn the language. So we just use certain

(01:12:37):
words in our house for our babies, so like itch
off or a bottle, or a kakaiki for a binky,
or took for a diaper, and so we constantly used
that where our children didn't know even slow like a
penis or a vagina, so like we, they don't know
the English words for it, and so pretty soon. My
mom's like, oh, go get your jaw, go get your kokaiki,

(01:12:58):
you know, and so she's she started using the language
without even knowing it. And so that's that's one tactic
you can use, is just use the language. Don't teach
your children the English words for them, and then the
people around you will have to learn it. Mila Telta,
you got some anti laugh jokes for us. I don't

(01:13:20):
have any jokes, and I don't have anything funny because
nothing is funny to me. But uh, let's see. The
only thing I would add is just how cool it
is that the kids have such open minds. Because um
I was here this year for the first day of school,
and when I went home, I realized those kids spent

(01:13:41):
the whole day with adults who spoke nothing but to
get to them. They were maybe ten or twenty minutes
in the beginning of the school day where it was
like they were kind of looking at us from person
to person, like what are they saying? But from then on,
it's like, if you get at their level and smile
at them and have fun and play, they don't care
what language you talk to them, and their minds are

(01:14:04):
just so open. They're just having fun and they're like,
they look happy to be here. So it was kind
of a good reminder for me to have an open mind. Yeah. Wow,
A lot of people want to thank and recognize. UM.
You're being one of the biggest proponents in UM, you know,
kind of pushing me into this job. So I want
to thank you for for doing that and for the

(01:14:25):
footwork in there and UM uh you know a lot
of the folks from Hawaii UH that helped us. UM.
They let me go observe in their classrooms. They also
came here and and sat with us for hours and
did exactly what Kune said, told us, well that's gonna
work or that's not gonna work. UM, So that was
That's always really helpful. UM. President Peterson, I want to

(01:14:47):
thank for being so supportive of our languages and and
just pushing forward with us doing this work here and
also on show at k are UM my supervisor Sarah
Divdal UM she's got at just as our supervisor. She
just lets us do what we need to do. She
encourages us and supports us and UM does not micromanage us.

(01:15:09):
And I think that when you're looking at language programs,
one of the key things that I can say is that, um,
nobody knows better the work that needs to be done
than the people who are doing the work. And so
if administrators can just hear us out on that, you know,
hear us and listen to us. Sarah does that very well,
and I really appreciate it. And I just want to

(01:15:29):
thank my team, like, um, you know all of us
that are sitting here today and yet two ten and
my family, because sometimes, you know, it feels like we
sacrifice our family at times for the work that we do.
And yeah, yeah, away gonna cheech, getaway and yeah, yeah,

(01:15:59):
how you can tongue e teenstatch and get That's how
we're gonna wrap up this episode. Folks were so grateful
for all those who contribute. How you could find the
language nest. You can support this language nest. You can

(01:16:22):
support language revitalization efforts in your area. If you are
involved in any sort of community leadership, you could change
your community. You can start using Indigenous place names. You
can start helping to get Indigenous languages back onto the land,
back into community spaces. You can change education so that
Indigenous languages are part of the standard and are also

(01:16:45):
just part of the operational practices of everything. If you've
got money in your pockets, you can give money to
places that are supporting efforts like this. It's grant funded.
A lot of this stuff is grant funded. But it
shouldn't be scratching around trying to find money everywhere. There
should be sustainable funding for things like this. So if
you're running for some big public office, he put signs

(01:17:07):
up in the community, your work should be finding sustainable
funding for language programs like this. Because Ao to each
stood up one time, Herman Davis. He said, we didn't
do this to ourselves. Why are we the only ones
that are doing all the work to get ourselves out
of it? So pitch in, find a way, help out,
do good things. Be strong with your language, have courage.

(01:17:32):
Chee rks, you're on. I'm so happy you listen to them.
Our language Next Teachers. This has been the Tongue Unbroken.
It's a project that's borne out of the Next Up initiative,

(01:17:52):
which is the brain baby of Anna Hoste, Joel Monique Y,
Senia Medeia. It's been produced by Daniel Goodman. We're so
happy that you're here, so happy that you're doing work
in languages thinking about languages, helping out, getting ready to
help out, Get off your but do something. Check out

(01:18:13):
other Next Up Initiative podcasts. Black Fat Fem Beauty translated
partition I'm gonna cheech. Catch you next time.