Woodland Indian Educational Programs (WIEP): Our mission is to contribute to Native American historic preservation by utilizing resources put forth by the academic and Native communities to develop and conduct public programs that present Native culture and history in a way that targeted audiences will best receive it.
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We focus on major historic Native communities of the Northeastern cultural area, including but not limited to Abenaki (including Penobscot), Chippewa (Ojibwa), Delaware (Lenape), Fox (Mesquaki), Huron (Wyandot), Illinois, Iroquois (Haudenosaunee including Mohawk, Oneida, Onondaga, Cayuga, and Seneca), Kickapoo, Mahican, Menominee, Miami (including Piankeshaw and Wea), Nanticoke, Ottawa, Passamaquoddy, Pequot, Potawatomi, Sauk, Shawnee, Susquehannock, Winnebago (Ho-Chunk), as well as Late Mississippian communities and Virginia Peoples.
| We offer educational services to museums, cultural centers, schools, powwows, historical and cultural events in most areas in the Northeast including but not limited to Indiana, Illinois, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, and Connecticut.
We welcome you to browse our website and learn more.
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Coming This September: Traveling Education Kits for SchoolsTwo education kits teachers can reserve for a week long duration - choose from:"Historic Culture of the Woodland Indian Peoples" "Historic Northeastern Native American Foods"Great for all schools in the Northeast - Receive the Education Kit by mail! Fee & Deposit Required - Contact for More Details Reserving Now! Contact Us at schools@woodlandindianedu.com
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Featured Video: Native American Maple Sugaring at Waterloo Jessica Diemer-Eaton of Woodland Indian Educational Programs (www.WoodlandIndianEDU.com) gives a presentation on historic Native American Maple sugar making at Winakung at Waterloo, Inc. - Waterloo Village, New Jersey. Young Winakung volunteer, Molly, assists Jessica by keeping the fire burning, handing utensils to her as needed, and showing the audience up-close the fresh Maple sap collected from a tree tapped just hours before. The longhouse in the background represents the homes the Northern Lenape (Munsee-Delaware) resided in during the Late Woodland Era and upon contact with the Dutch - the bark is simulated and the size of the longhouse is average and based on archaeological excavations. This re-created Lenape village was installed over 20 years ago under the direction of Mr. John Kraft (of Lenape Lifeways, Inc), and its interpretation of Lenape daily culture was partly based on the Lenape People of the Minisink site on the Delaware River. While tapping trees and processing sap was a practice of many Native communities since aboriginal times, we don't know if the Lenape were sugar makers upon European contact (1600s). Indeed, Northern New Jersey and the Tri-State area had sufficient highlands containing native Maple trees and the weather pattern to support sugar production (about 6 weeks of thawing days and freezing nights in late winter), so the ability for Northern Lenape to process sap is possible (not to mention a strong sharing of material and social culture with their neighbors to the north, many of them Maple sugar makers). None the less, we do know the Lenape were fluent sugar makers by the 1700's. This program highlighted the aboriginal origins and general historic practice of Maple sugaring (originally 90 minutes edited to 22 minutes for this video).
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Late Winter - Spring 2012 Featured Photo Below: WIEP's hearth area in their Maple sugaring camp at the National Maple Syrup Festival, 2010. This method of suspending the pots over the fire (in double-pole fashion) is directly taken from an early 20th century photo of an Ojibwe sugar camp. The tree at the left is tapped, and a shade shelter stands to the right.
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| Children listen as the presenter talks about Native American sugar making at the National Maple Syrup Festival. |
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| Visitors at Historic Prophetstown's Woodland Indian Village learn about native storage foods. |
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| Children learn to use a pumpdrill at the Northern Lakes Traditional Powwow. |
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