A Dakota Cultural Intervention’s Influence on Native Students’ Sense of Belonging - A CBPR Case Study

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Adam

CBPR case study examining how the Dakota Wicoḣaƞ Community developed, implemented, and evaluated the Mni Sota Makoce: Dakota Homelands Curriculum to strengthen Native 6th- and 10th-grade students’ peoplehood sense of belonging. Findings show students liked the curriculum, reported greater support, and experienced less invalidation. The study also considers criticisms from some European American students and emphasizes embedding Indigenous culture, epistemologies, and pedagogies across curricula, alongside teacher preparation to address racism.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages17

Reading Time43 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Belonging, relationality, and Indigenous worldview

Problem of Eurocentric schooling

Study purpose and approach

Cultural intervention and findings

Curriculum design and evaluation

Impacts on students’ belonging

Implications and recommendations

AERA Open January-December 2024, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 1–17 DOI: 10. 1177/23328584231221793 Article reuse guidelines: [sagepub.com/journals-permissions](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)[ ](sagepub.com/journals-permissions)© The Author(s) 2024. [https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero](https://journals.sagepub.com/home/ero) A Dakota Cultural Intervention’s Influence on Native Students’ Sense of Belonging: A CBPR Case Study Heather J. Peters University of Minnesota, Morris Teresa R. Peterson University of Minnesota, Duluth The Dakota Wicoḣ aƞ Community Morton, Minnesota This community-based participatory research case study demonstrates how Dakota Wicoḣ aƞ utilized Indigenous and feminist epistemologies to create, implement, and evaluate a cultural intervention, the Mni Sota Makoce: Dakota Homelands Curriculum, to increase Native 6th-and 10th-grade social studies students’peoplehood sense of belonging (Tachine et al., 2017). Findings demonstrate Native students liked the curriculum and reported an increase in support and a decrease in invalidation of their sense of belonging. While the curriculum provided a source of racial-ethnic socialization, some European American students criticized the curriculum, which likely negatively impacted 6th-grade students psychological sense of school membership (Goodenow, 1993). Results indicate Indigenous culture, epistemologies, and pedagogies should be infused throughout all curricula, teachers need to be prepared to effectively deal with racist and discriminatory behavior, and Indian education is important to Native students’ belonging. Implications and recommendations for funders, schools, researchers, teacher education programs, and Native communities are discussed. Keywords: action research, case studies, community-based participatory research, cultural intervention, curriculum, Dakota, focus group interviews, Indian education, Indigenous education, Indigenous peoples, learning environments, mixed methods, multicultural education, qualitative research, racial-ethnic socialization, sense of belonging, teacher education/ development When those who have the power to name and to socially construct reality choose not to see you or hear you . . . there is a moment of psychic disequilibrium, as if you looked into a mirror and saw nothing. —Adrienne Rich, as cited in Maher & Tetreault, 1994, p. 1 Belonging and relationality are important to Native 1 students culturally and academically. Unfortunately, the Eurocentric focus and homogenous cultural pedagogies predominantly employed in most schools invalidate Native students’ sense of belonging. This community-based participatory research (CBPR; Minkler & Wallerstein, 2003) case study explains, demonstrates, and analyzes how an Indigenous community created, implemented, and evaluated a cultural intervention designed to increase Native students’sense of belonging by incorporating language, sacred history, ceremonial cycle, and land (Tachine et al., 2017) into a public school’s curriculum. Relationality is a central feature of Indigenous worldview (Wilson, 2008) . In fact, the very fabric of Dakota culture is based on relationality (Deloria, 1998; Friesen et al., 2014), a concept that can be summed up as mitakuye owasiŋ (all my relatives) . When a person understands mitakuye owasiŋ, they realize their significance within the tiwahe (family), tioṡpaye (extended family), oyate (nation or community), and with Ina Maka (mother earth) . Dakota sense of belonging is a relational and reciprocal concept through which each individual feels valued and is of value through an interdependent kinship system. A sense of belonging occurs when students perceive social support and feel connected, cared about, valued, respected, and important to the group or others (Strayhorn, 2012) . Research has found a student’s sense of belonging positively influences their ability to function in learning environments (Osterman, 2000) and to have mot

FAQs

What is the focus of the CBPR case study?

The study analyzes how the Dakota Wicoḣaƞ Community used Indigenous and feminist epistemologies to create, implement, and evaluate a cultural intervention aimed at increasing Native students’ sense of belonging.

What curriculum intervention was used to support students’ belonging?

The intervention was the Mni Sota Makoce: Dakota Homelands Curriculum, incorporated into public school social studies through elements such as language, sacred history, ceremonial cycles, and land.

What were the main findings about students’ belonging?

Native students reported liking the curriculum and an increase in support alongside a decrease in invalidation of their sense of belonging. The text also notes that some European American students criticized the curriculum, which may have affected younger students’ psychological sense of school membership.

Oct 15, 2026

Uploaded by Adam