ADMINISTRATION FOR NATIVE AMERICANS
OBJECTIVE PROGRESS REPORT
REPORT PERIOD ENDING: 12/31/02 FISCAL YEAR: 2002
1.) GRANTEE NAME:
Kaw Nation
Drawer 50
Kaw City, OK 74641
Guy Munroe, Chairperson/CEO
2.) GRANT NUMBER: 90NL0197/02
3.) BUDGET PERIOD ENDING: 06/30/03
4.) GRANT AWARD: $105,132
FEDERAL SHARE: $84,106
NON-FEDERAL SHARE: $21,026
5.) REPORT PREPARED BY:
TYPED NAME: Justin McBride
TITLE: Language Coordinator
DATE: January 6, 2003
SIGNATURE:
6.) REPORT APPROVED BY AUTHORIZED GRANTEE OFFICIAL:
TYPED NAME: Guy Munroe, Chairperson/CEO
SINGNATURE:
ITEMS 7 - 22 ARE LISTED ON THE FOLLOWING PAGES
(EACH ITEM IS LISTED SEPARATELY):
7.) GRANTEE OBJECTIVE NUMBER: Year 2-Objective 1 (Henceforth just 2-1)
8.) ANA GOAL: Language II -Implementation
9.) STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVE:
By the end of the twelfth month, all Kaw tribal members living in Kay County will be able to access Kaw language lessons either from their home or within 10 miles of their home. The project coordinator will have investigated alternatives to "live" instruction and offered a menu of audio or video lessons, enhanced by periodic visits from Dr. Rankin and "live" lessons from Kelly Test.
10.) EXPLANATION OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
See next page for details.
STATED ACTIVITIES
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Task 1: The Project Coordinator will contract for a web site to publicize the program and provide home access to language lessons.
The Kaw Nation has completed this task.
* It was discovered in January of 2002 that the official Kaw Nation web site (www.kawnation.com) was large enough to fully integrate Kaw language on-line resources as part of its Culture section. Since that time, the Language Office has maintained an extensive homepage at the web site, accessible either from the main entry page under the Culture banner or directly at www.kawnation.com/langhome.html. This homepage is used for the following purposes:
* Introduce the Kaw language and the language program.
* House two sets of Kaw language multimedia lessons for home use.
* Announce new Kaw language developments and projects.
* Promote useful links.
* To supplement the language homepage on the Kaw Nation site, additional discussion board space was obtained from ezboard in July 2002. This space was developed to assist those wishing to learn the language by providing the following:
* A fully self-guided eight-week Beginning Kanza course for adults, with regularly scheduled lessons and supplementary materials (such as visual aids and practice exercises) designed to walk the learner through key grammatical topics and translation techniques, as well as introduce important conversation strategies.
* An opportunity for real teacher/student interaction via the discussion board for questions and answers relating to the course.
* A public forum for all manners of Kaw language questions and answers, including those unrelated to the course.
Because of the way it was designed, the ezboard page is known as the Kanza Electronic Classroom. It can be accessed either through the Kaw Nation site or directly (http://pub44.ezboard.com/bkanzaelectronicclassroom). The site is flexible enough to expand with increased demand, and powerful enough to track all registered users who have posted questions or comments.
* To assist with the planning and design of the Kaw language homepage and the ezboard content, fifteen extra Megabytes of free web space was obtained in late 2001 from Yahoo!(r) GeoCities. From time to time, new language pages are posted there to test their accessibility and overall effect. Although the index page (www.geocities.com/kansalang) at the GeoCities site appears to outsiders most often as little more than a link to the Kaw Nation site, the size of server space combined with rapid upload times and onsite page-editing applications make this a crucial element of our web presence. We also use the space to house several of our larger files for access through our other sites.
Task 2: The Project Coordinator will obtain cost estimates and specs on teleconferencing equipment to connect education centers in all tribal facilities.
The Kaw Nation is currently in the process of completing this task.
* Beginning in December 2002, we began obtaining different estimates and specs relating to our teleconferencing needs. So far, we have personally spoken to two telecommunications companies, C3 and Glyphics Communications, and have a pending query posted on Buyerzone describing our telecom needs to potential vendors.
* From the information we have received thus far, it seems that estimates do not vary wildly, and the overall cost will not be great. A single hour-long conference call will cost somewhere between $15 and $20 per site. This includes scheduling and connection fees where appropriate. No special equipment is needed other than a standard telephone with a hands-free function. All ancillary services (such as audiotape/compact disc recordings of the proceedings, transcription services, site polling, and the like) are calculated over and above the per site costs, but are reasonable and competitive.
* Using the upward ends of these estimates, we can calculate the average cost of an eight-week course. Assumed here is a three-site situation, including the language office (the site from which the sessions will be conducted) and two satellite learning sites (perhaps one in Newkirk and one in Ponca City). For eight one-hour lessons from these three sites, we can assume the total costs are as follows:
3 sites (@ $20/site/hour)
for 8 1-hour sessions = $480
(3 x 20 x 8 = 480)
8 session recording CD's
(@ $10/CD) = $80
Materials and miscellaneous
service fees = $40
GRAND TOTAL = $600
* These costs could be recovered by charging the participants for the service. Ten students could be charged $60 apiece for all materials and classroom instruction to fully recover the costs, or six students for $100, twelve students for $50, etc.
* As more companies answer the standing Buyerzone query, it could be that these estimates will decrease, but it is unlikely that they will increase.
Task 3: The Kaw Nation will provide teleconferencing and email instruction from its main offices.
Due to the fact that teleconferencing instruction has not yet begun, this task has not been completed at this time.
* As far as the communication solutions are concerned, teleconferencing instruction is still in the exploratory phase (see above). An eight-week adult and community-oriented curriculum is under development, with a little more than half of the lessons and related materials fully realized and half still in the planning phase. These will be supplemented by at-home study of the adult multimedia lessons, all of which are completed at this time.
* Some progress has been made with email instruction, but a few critical issues have come to light.
o Email based Kanza instruction must be accomplished with either (1.) an adapted writing system that can be fully represented by standard ASCII or ANSI character sets via common email programs, or (2.) applications-intensive attachments sent with small email messages describing their installation and use. There are advantages and disadvantages to both.
o Most of our materials available in print or otherwise use an alphabet with characters that cannot be readily represented in most email programs. This is due to the large and unique sound inventory of the Kanza language. Adapting the writing system to account for email communication, while very simple to accomplish, is somewhat detrimental to the overall push for an orthographic standard, and places an abundance of language materials out of reach of the new learner. Understanding orthographic variation with respect to environmental conditions can be easy with expanded linguistic context, but is wrong to expect of the beginning student. To the credit of this method, we are currently using an email-ready writing system in our Kanza Electronic Classroom (complete with several specially designed course materials), but there are too few students at this time to gauge its impact on them.
o Email attachments of the sort required for effective language lessons may or may not adhere to various incoming mail size standards set by the ISP or specific email server. At the very least, attachments must include an alphabetically correct document (preferably of a Rich Text Format) and a pronunciation file (such as a .wav or .mp3 file). These two things alone can create attachments of greater than one Megabyte, a frequent upper bound of email servers. Providing that the size of the attachments is sufficient to allow delivery, there is also an issue of standardizing formats for use in a variety of households with a wide range of application programs and platforms. Furthermore, many email users are extremely avoidant of attachments because of increased exposure to potential viruses.
Despite the drawbacks, we are currently experimenting with both forms of email lessons. We have approximately four of the adapted orthographic type and one of the attachment type.
11.) GRANTEE OBJECTIVE NUMBER: 2-2
12.) ANA GOAL: Language II -Implementation
13.) STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVE:
By the end of the twelfth month, a Kaw language resource library of at least 20 lessons and mixed media resources will be available either on-line or in the Language Office at tribal headquarters.
14.) EXPLANATION OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
See next page for details.
STATED ACTIVITIES
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Task 1: All persons involved with the language program will meet to discuss and select resource materials.
Personnel affiliated with the language program have met several times in the first six months of this fiscal year.
* The Kaw Cultural Committee, or some collection of its members, has convened twice to discuss language-related issues, including materials and material development (among other things on the agenda). The first of these was in July of 2002, and the second was in late August of 2002.
* The language program staff has met twice with Dr. Robert L. Rankin to discuss language issues and material development. The first of these two meetings was in July of 2002, and the second was in December of 2002.
Task 2: Available materials will be listed on the web site, as well as cataloged in the Language Office.
This is an ongoing task, with updates made as materials become available.
* Our current holdings on the web site are listed by medium. Headings include Audiotape and CD, Email, Internet, and Other resources. Each of these resource groups is composed of one or more individual learning materials.
The language office catalog is primarily a virtual index. Very few of our newer materials exist in hardcopy, but are stored as reproducible computer files, cataloged logically and regularly backed-up on CD. These back-ups exist as the primary hard-copy catalog. Exceptions to this are our organic curriculum and grammar documents, both of which include many visual aids and supplements existing outside of the digital world. Both are expanded as material is generated or as new Siouan research comes to light.
15.) GRANTEE OBJECTIVE NUMBER: 2-3
16.) ANA GOAL: Language II -Implementation
17.) STATEMENT OF OBJECTIVE:
By the end of the twelfth month, there will be at least twenty additional Kaw speakers as defined by the Cultural Committee. This Committee, including elders and those interested in tribal history, is best equipped to define what constitutes being a Kaw speaker.
18.) EXPLANATION OF ACCOMPLISHMENTS:
See next page for details.
STATED ACTIVITIES
ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Task 1: Project Coordinator will work with Language Teacher to develop advanced lessons to target older children and adults.
The Kaw Nation is currently in the process of completing this task.
* Starting in July of 2002, the language program began an evening course called Kanza Language for Families and Communities. The short course was advertised around the tribal complex in Kaw City, and lasted for approximately four weeks. During this time, efforts were made to develop specific lessons for adults and/or older children, based on a minimal reliance on formal grammar and a stronger conversational component. These two factors were notably absent from the teacher's aides accelerated training program in the spring of 2002, with the result of low speaker confidence.
* Lessons developed for the Kanza Language for Families and Communities course were then converted to the modified email-ready orthography and posted on the ezboard site. They now form the basis for the Kanza Electronic Classroom lessons. These lessons make strong use of other materials, including visual aids, practice exercises, and the existing multimedia lessons.
* In addition to these lessons, efforts have been underway since November 2002 to develop a new series of multimedia lessons to bridge the gap between the English-intensive grammatical analysis of the existing adult lessons and the clearly youth-targeted children's lessons. The first of these is the Kanza-only translation of a popular story, supplemented with auditory pronunciations and visual aids. It has taken much time to develop the images needed for the telling of the story, and the translation of the text has yet to be completed. Nevertheless, the lesson should be finished by mid-spring at the latest. Due to its great size, it will most likely not be posted on the web site, but will be available through in-office distribution and on disc by request.
Task 2: New teaching aides will be recruited and trained to accommodate increased student load.
The Kaw Nation is still in the recruiting phase of this task.
* Despite several public notices (including posted sign-up sheets and an announcement at a General Council meeting), since July of 2002 only two tribal members have shown interest in the teaching opportunities offered through the language program. Of these two, one became unavailable shortly after expressing interest, and the other lived too far outside of our service area to attend training or to effectively meet the travel requirements for the position.
* To bolster the flagging interest, a new announcement was made in the most recent tribal newsletter, Kanza News, as part of a large language program feature describing the resources and opportunities for the student of Kanza. The newsletter will be distributed to all tribal members in early January 2003. In the meantime, the announcement was also posted on the language homepage at the Kaw Nation web site. Hopefully, the announcement will attract several interested tribal members living within the service area.
ANA/OPR FISCAL YEAR 2002
KAW NATION INTER-GENERATIONAL LANGUAGE IMPLEMENTATION PROGRAM
GRANT # 90NL0197/02 REPORTING PERIOD ENDING 12/30/02