Word Cloud for Wounded Knee

Since we're reading Sherman Alexie next, I wanted to do some background readings on the history of Native Americans in North America. We read this short "glimpse" and then read two chapters of the comic book based on the work of Howard Zinn. As we read, I asked students to write down the words they felt were the most important or powerful. At the end of the class, I took up the lists and made a word cloud out of them. The bigger words mean that more people wrote down those words. The underscores are what I (think I) had to do to keep two-word entries together.

Here it is.

Today, I asked students to take a look at it and see if any words should be bigger than they are. Quite a few added "unfair" and "colonialism." Next, we'll read a section from the Young People's History of the U.S. that discusses Wounded Knee, the occupation of Alcatraz, and the American Indian Movement. Then we start The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian!