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On May 9, 2025, Governor Gianforte signed Senate Bill 224 into law, making Indigenous Peoples Day an official state holiday, alongside Columbus Day, on the second Monday in October.
During the same session, the legislature also passed HB 591, which requires schools to engage in “commemorative exercises” on days designated by the legislature or governor as legal holidays.
In my first post on SB 224, I promised I'd continue to share resources around recognizing holidays.
Indigenous Peoples Day and Columbus Day
OPI's Indian Education Department has created this lesson for Grades 4-8 on Critical Thinking About the Arrival of Columbus. Their high school lesson, The Colonization Era – An Interview with Dr. James Loewen and Textbook Analysis, asks students to examine myths and challenges them to think about historical events (including Columbus Day and Thanksgiving) from multiple perspectives (Essential Understanding 6).
Everyday Native has resources for grades 4-12 to dispel stereotypes and teach about contemporary American Indian life.
Edsitement has an elementary lesson called "What Was Columbus Thinking?" that has asks students to identify the stated aims of Columbus's voyages, characterize changes in Columbus's purposes, describe the indigenous people Europeans encountered and the results of their contact, compare the goals of early European exploration with the results, and evaluate the impact of Columbus on the indigenous people of the Americas and his legacy.
Veterans Day
I listed several resources for recognizing Veterans Day in my first post about Freedom Week, including one of my favorite MTHS lesson plans, Reader's Theater: Letters Home from Montanans at War.
Our friends in the OPI Indian Education Program pulled together this list of resources for teaching about American Indians in the Military.
The Library of Congress has interesting primary source sets, which include oral histories, and ideas for using them in the classroom.
And, if you are interested in having your students collect oral histories from veterans, they have information on how to participate in their ongoing Veterans History Project. If you do decide to do an oral history project, the User Guide for our Oral History in the Classroom Mini Footlocker has some really good exercises and useful advice on how to prepare your students.
Thanksgiving
Last year Mike Jetty wrote a guest post for Teaching Montana History on Demythologizing Thanksgiving. It's still relevant. Here are some other OPI resources and/or links that Mike shared with me:
One of my favorite historical questions is "What's changed and what's remained the same?" It makes a great research question around the holidays. Here's a post I wrote with suggestions on how to engage your students in examining Thanksgiving traditions.
StoryCorps annually puts on the Great Thanksgiving Listen. Consider having your students participate or listen to some of the stories that have been recorded over the years.
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