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This article presents the first psychometric validation of the Culturally Responsive Assessment of Indigenous Schooling (CRAIS) tool, alongside a call for methodological complexity when engaged in research with and in Indigenous contexts. We examined the 23 culturally responsive schooling (CRS) principles underlying the newly created CRAIS tool in independent samples of curriculum units produced by teachers. Of these, 22 principles loaded into two factors. We further investigated the rationale for all 23 items through a review of the literature and robust discussions about the lived experiences of the authors and the Indigenous teachers with whom we work. We suggest that this both/and approach of quantitative and qualitative analysis results in a richer and more nuanced tool, as compared to what one single method would have rendered. Embracing this methodological complexity allows us to both center Indigenous lived experiences and maintain fidelity to the statistical implications of our work. 

Seven teachers share the challenges and possibilities of developing culturally responsive approaches that highlight how Language Arts curriculum makes a diversity of impacts. 

This paper describes a particular teacher professional development model offered in schools on and bordering the Navajo Nation in the southwestern United States. The Diné Institute for Navajo Nation Educators (DINÉ) offers professional development across all content areas and grade levels, but here we focus specifically on our work in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) content areas. Our work is situated explicitly within the literatures on Indigenous education, Native Nation Building, and culturally responsive schooling, but we also draw broadly on research in STEM education and teacher professional development. The research question explored in this paper is: To what extent and in what ways do teachers in the DINÉ develop STEM curriculum units that evidence culturally responsive principles and STEM education best practices? We share findings from three cohorts of teachers in the DINÉ’s STEM-focused professional development seminars. Teacher-authored curriculum units developed in the DINÉ were analyzed with two specific protocols: the CRAIS Tool, and the SCOOP notebook. Finally, we look closely at the curriculum units written by a single teacher in the DINÉ across the three years in order to get a clearer understanding of the nuances and richness of the findings and themes reported from the aggregate data. 

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