Necessary Changes in the Classroom Instruction on the Realities of California Missions Jacqueline Firestone History 007-1 Professor Crispin-Peralta 3 December 2010
Firestone 1 Jacqueline Firestone History 007-1 Professor Crispin-Peralta 3 December 2010 Necessary Changes in the Classroom Instruction on the Realities of California Missions As children all across the state of California enter into the fourth grade there are many feelings that will fill their hearts and minds. One such emotion regularly is anticipation for building a replica of one of the California missions. Though this project may seem appealing to many children this is not the case for all students. Regularly in fact parents become the ones completing the mission building projects, while their students get the credit. Nevertheless, there are many flaws with the way California, and even American History is taught. The instruction that many students receive about the California mission is incorrect and gives a false interpretation of the truth of life in the California missions. One of the main flaws with the instruction about the California missions is the building of the missions. This project does not aid students in their learning process but rather detracts from valuable class time that could be used for further instruction on the truth of actual mission life. These projects also tend to require a significant amount of funds for families well, considerable amount of time to complete and notable parent involvement if the student is to receive a good grade. This money and family time would be much better spent actually visiting a mission rather than simply building one. Therefore I would purpose that all students be required to visit a mission. The money that their families would traditionally spend on these projects
Firestone 2 could very easily be transferred to pay for costs of the field trips and the involved parents would still have a role chaperoning. Overall, by visiting missions children across the state would get a more educationally beneficial taste of missions with the same financial stresses and parental participation. The issue with instruction regarding missions is not exclusive to the engagement outside of the classroom though. Throughout California teachers are painting a pretty and extremely watered down interpretation of the realities of mission life. Many students walk away from their California history course believing that the California missions were one of the best thing that could have happened for the people living here, that the missions were wonderful places and sanctuaries for natives where catholic priests grew crops and shared the love of God(Hackel). Father Junipero Serra the father of the California missions is even regarded as a saint by the Catholic church (Foner 160). Despite the fact that there was a Spanish decree forbidding natives suppression and ensuring their treatment as free subjects, who were to paid for their work, this was regularly not the case. Pope Alexander VI endorsed the conquest of the Americas for the Spaniards because arrangements made for conversion of natives to Christianity. Therefore, the California missions were more of a requirement on the Spaniards part than a true desire to care for the natives. They needed the natives as a work force and the Pope had mandated that natives be converted, hence the missions became places of necessity rather than true compassions as they are presented to students (Kleber). Though all of the realities of the California missions many be a bit extreme for this age group, the truths of the mission system should not be this idealized.
Firestone 3 One large adjustment that should be made is the fairy tale belief the Indians lived happily and willingly in the missions. A.L. Kroeber says it as bluntly when he says, missionisation, in spite of its kindly flavor and humanitarian root, was only one thing, death. Though in actuality the death rate decreased drastically at al missions and from 1,520 natives in 1804 at Mission La Purisima Conception to 200 in 1824, death is still a hard subject to address with most fourth grade students. In light of this, teachers should carefully present the concept that perhaps missions were not always the best places for their inhabitants and that many of the natives suffered dearly from living in them (Kleber). One major example of suffering that should be more regularly addresses is presence of disease. The natives resistance to Europeans was poor much like that of the natives on the east coast meaning that disease lead to an extreme amount of death for the native peoples from things such as smallpox and even lesser diseases. Their living conditions in many cases increased the effects that these diseases had, since most natives lived in cold damp huts and the sick and well were all crammed in the same space. Though the harsh realities of overwhelming disease can be a bit extreme they could be toned down and made age appropriate but never the less they are a vital piece of mission life of mission life that is being lost in our education system (Kleber). Though the missions were not always a happy and vibrant place they were originally indented to be. When the mission system began the Indians had a great deal of freedom and leisure time but as the system progressed and the natives began to live very restricted lives similar to that of slavery. In some cased Indians even tried to overturn the suppressive fathers. One example of this was at Mission Santa Inez in 1824. Here natives burned several building of
Firestone 4 the mission in protest of punishments being administered. The new of this revolt only further encouraged other oppressed other native groups at Missions such as La Purisima, where held a handful of soldiers hostage for three weeks until reinforcements from the Monterey presidio arrived and overtook the native forces in just two hours (Kleber). Some teachers may find these stories slightly unpleasant or too violent for nine to ten year old students, but our school systems are teaching similar stories about slavery and slave rebellions. Why then are the realities of the California missions being disregarded? Another interesting and regularly un-discussed detail about the California missions is their connection with presidios, Spanish military forts, and pueblos, small Spanish communities (Foner 160). Though missions were heavily populated by natives they were expected to support these other Spanish communities and become good Spaniards themselves. There was an extreme air of assimilation that was passed from the Father s of the missions to the Indians. Native people were expected to become Spanish, speaking the language and practicing the customs, while submitting to the authority of the few ruling Spaniards (Hackle). Overall, the California missions did not make a notable or weighty impact on the Spanish empire, as very few Spaniards ever came to California, but they decimated the California Indian tribes. When asked to recall the horrors of the mission on their inhabitants Tony Pinto, the tribal chairman for the Kumeyaay tribe said, I am now 73 years old. My grandfather and grandmother told me what happened at the missions The Indians were slaves. They did all the work, and after a day s work, the priests would lock them up They fed them actually as little as possible. They beat them
Firestone 5 and killed them if they were sick, or couldn t work, or didn t agree to do certain work (Hackel). The truth of these horrors should not seem so foreign to the teaching system and lessons plans as they fill are in many ways similar to the stories of the countless African slaves that inhabited the east coast. As a whole the teaching plans and instruction about California missions needs to be altered and reworked so that children receive a more accurate and realistic interpretation of the reality of mission life. Teachers need to focus more on the realities of missions and less on the idealistic picture of the intention of missions. The history of the California missions needs to be taught more from the native s perspective and less from the Spanish point of view. Though many teachers may not want to address the realities of the California missions due to their students age group, the horrors of the California mission is not far from those that many slaves faced. The realities are as Louis Kleber describes when talking about the Santa Barbara mission, the Santa Barbara setting could not be more beautiful, with the mission nestled in the foothills overlooking the Pacific Ocean Its appearance today would no doubt please the first padres. Only one thing is missing - the Indians are gone.
Firestone 6 Works Cited Foner, Eric. Give Me Liberty! an American History. New York: W.W.Norton, 2008. Print. Hackel, S. W. "Sources of Rebellion: Indian Testimony and the Mission San Gabriel Uprising of 1785." Ethnohistory 50.4 (2003): 643-69. Project Muse. Web. 28 Nov. 2010. <http://muse.jhu.edu/journals/ethnohistory/v050/50.4hackel.html>. Kleber, Louis Charles. California s Spanish Missions. History Today 42.9 (1992): 42 Academic Search Elite. EBSCO. Web. 29 Nov. 2010. <http://ezproxy.westmont.edu:2048/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?dir ect=true&db=afh&an=9209140999&site=ehost-live>.