Salish Weaving

Earlier this week, we were once again fortunate enough to have Aboriginal cultural worker Debra Merrier visit our class. If you have read our blog before, you know that we are really lucky to have wonderful Aboriginal workers in our district. They regularly come into our classroom to share different aspects of Aboriginal culture.

During this visit, Ms. Merrier introduced us to Salish weaving. First, she spoke a little bit about how weavings were made and what they were used for. We learned that mountain goat and wooly dog hair were spun into wool for weaving, and that weaving was done on wooden looms. We also found out that Aboriginal groups traditionally used things from nature to dye their wool. For example, red came from berries and animal blood, yellow came from dandelions, and black came from charcoal. After her introduction, we were eager to give it a try ourselves! It was a little tricky in the beginning, but by the end we all had the hang of it. Check out the photos below to see us hard at work.