A Real Thanksgiving: Butchering Day

Tuesday was a hard day down here at Battle Rock. It was time to butcher one of our Heritage Turkeys for our Thanksgiving Feast on Thursday. The kids had been raising some of Miss Moqui's ( Head Teacher) birds from the beginning of the school year, watering them and giving them scrapes

from lunch.

Since a wild animal had already killed some of the turkeys and they are such a rare breed, click above, Miss Moqui decided to only butcher one Tom this year. The children who decided to watch, walked with Miss Moqui from the turkey pen, like all poultry, once the turkey was hanging upside down, he became very docile. Everyone made sure to be very quiet so we did not scare him.

The children who decided not to watch, stayed in the teacheridge, where the Battle Rock teacher lived many years ago when it was too far to go back to town everyday. Now it is our cafeteria and my Art and Music classroom.

I love the Indian corn wreath the 1st and 2nd graders made for the door!

Miss Moqui took a moment and let the children say "thank you" to the turkey. All agreed he was a nice turkey and hoped he was going somewhere nice and that they were sorry we were going to eat him.

Big Alex swiftly slit the turkey's throat and held his head down while he bled out. the most hard part for me, hearing his wings flapping hard against the chain link fence.

Disturbing to listen to, but I think Tom Turkey had a pretty good life and death down here at Battle Rock. You could tell this was not Miss Moqui's first turkey butchering. She actually was a student down at Battle Rock before she was a teacher here!

See how his head is all white now, the blood underneath was what made it look red...

Big Alex first cut off his feet...

and then his wings.......

and then skinned him. We did not pluck him because it is a messy job, takes hours and it is hard to pull out all the feathers, besides turkeys are so fat, we were sure he would be nice and moist roasted with out the skin....

We were very careful not to touch the tail feathers...

because we were going to give them to a medicine man to use in ceremonies.

Of course there was an impromptu science lesson on the internal organs, including what he had recently eaten, still left in his gizzard.

Lastly we rinsed the turkey well and all the surfaces and cleaned knifes and children's hands. Pretty busy day, but the next would be even busier!

A Real Thanksgiving: Sharing Cultures

Whether in the United States or in Canada, Thanksgiving commemorates the first harvest after a brutal winter and the friendship between the Pilgrims ( Puritans) and the native tribes along the East Coast.
Usually the holiday is celebrated in school cafeteria across the continent, with children in pilgrim hats and feather headdresses sitting eating turkey, potatoes, corn and rolls on plastic trays. Here at Battle Rock Charter School, in Southwest Colorado, literally across from the Ute Mountain Ute Reservation and just up the road from the Navajo Reservation, we celebrate this "Holiday of Friendship" a little differently......

To start the week off, we had a treat when T's parents came in and sang some songs of "thanksgiving". Her father is Navajo and her mother is Ute.

The drum he is using is called a kettle drum, or water drum. The water inside changes the tone depending on how he tilts it, it also reminds us that all living things come from water and no matter how you tilt the drum, the water is always level, a good reminder. By pressing into the deer skin top he can can also change the tone, until he finds a pleasing sound. You can see knobs around the rim of the drum, wrapped in the deer skin are scared peddles from each of the mountains that surround the Navajo's land, the rope is wrapped around the bundled peddles and lashed down to make the top of the drum tight. Today the kettle bottom, is made out of many metals, this one is brass, but they are also made from the steel pipes used in road construction, which are cut and feet are welded to the bottom. Before modern time,since the Navajo could not make the kettle pots they would trade for them through trading post or by going down to Mexico.
A deer hide is thin compared to cow hide and make a different sound, today to prepare the hide they are tanned, scrapped of their hair, smoked and have charcoal rubbed into them, washed and stretched across the drums.

Where Navajos are known for their woven blankets and silver work, Utes are known for their pottery and beautiful bead work. Women are expected to be modest while singing and T's mother wrapped herself with a wonderful blanket, sitting down on her knees.

Song's are usually song in groups of four, with the drum, T's mother also shook a rattle, made from a dried out gourd, filled with tiny rocks. Enjoy! And come back, this is just the first posting of a very, very busy week down in McElmo Canyon

A Halloween Celebration

On Halloween, a truck load of pumpkins came to Battle Rock School. So, much carving and decorating happened outside....

and inside the teacheridge...

 a "witch's brew" was concocted!

and after a little clean up... 

The celebration could begin!

A Walk in the Sand

We go on a lot of hikes down at Battle Rock, with the weather so mild down in McElmo Canyon.

A little over a mile, down a dirt road from the school there is a shady spot in the cottonwoods, a perfect place to play in the sand on a hot fall day....