Kaya, American Girl: a review

This year for American History I am using the non fiction American Girl books Welcome to (insert AG name here) and their fictional counterparts. The first one we used was Welcome to Kaya's World and feel a review is in order.

First off let me point out that this particular Welcome book is different then all the other ones because it focuses on one group of Indians and their way of life and how they were affected by the white man. Some things can be said were similar to other Indian Tribes but not all, the housing, food source, travel, and whether peaceful or war like were different. From what I can tell the others in this series deal with historical time frames and not a particular set of people...well maybe Addy does, it will be focusing on the African American people mostly but does include life for the different classes (for lack of a different word). I found the focus on one Tribe to be a little troublesome since our study was on American Indians and not on just the Nez Perce people. Because of this I had to look elsewhere for information on other tribes. I used the library and a few books I had on hand to give a look into several different tribes based on where they lived. SL also had 2 general books on American Indians that we used.

Another thing different with Kaya's World was there were no accompanying food book or craft book like you find with Felicity and the others. I would have loved to make some crafts as well as typical American Indian dished even if it was all based on the Nez Perce.

Despite the limitations this particular Welcome book had I was quite impressed with the information it provided. We learned everything from their idea of how they were created to wedding rituals and what child hood was like to different ceremonies for the seasons (they had more then 4). This book also gave a glimpse into the awful treatment of the Nez Perce (and you can figure they were not the only Native American Indians (NAI) people treated this way) by the government. At the end of the book it talked about how the Nez Perce live today which Emma found very interesting.

Alongside the Welcome book we read 2 of the 6 fictional books about Kaya. These added a great deal to the study of NAI as many historical fiction tend to do with the history being studied. Emma got a feel for life in a tribe and as an Indian during that time. One thing Emma really understood by the time we finished our NAI study was how Indians were able to use nature for all their needs...even down to the poop of an animal. Waste was not thought of, everything had a use as well as being able to be recycled.

Overall I feel like we accomplished our goal...learning about NAI. I think the Welcome Books will continue to do what I want and look forward to the next in the series Welcome to Felicity's World.