Wind River Reservation Education: Tribal Resources for Wyoming Homeschool and Microschool

Families living on or near Wyoming's Wind River Reservation who are building a homeschool or microschool program face a curriculum question that no generic national guide addresses: how do you integrate the history, language, and culture of the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho peoples into a sequentially progressive academic program? The resources exist. Most families just do not know where to find them, and the organizations that develop them rarely market to homeschool or pod audiences.

This post is specifically about curriculum resources and tribal education programs — not about the legal framework for withdrawing from school or registering as a home educator. If you need that information, the withdrawal process for Fremont County families is covered in a separate guide.

Why This Matters Beyond Cultural Preference

Wyoming law mandates a basic academic educational program covering seven core subjects, including history and civics. The state's educational standards, following the passage of House Bill 76 in 2017, explicitly require instruction in tribal history, traditional culture, and the contemporary contributions of Wyoming's tribal nations. This is not optional enrichment — it is a statutory component of what constitutes an adequate Wyoming education.

For families on or near the Wind River Reservation, this requirement creates a natural alignment. The resources developed to meet the HB 76 standards are precisely the materials that allow a microschool or pod to deliver culturally grounded, academically rigorous instruction in history, social studies, and language arts.

The Wind River Education Project

The most comprehensive free resource available is the Wind River Education Project, developed by Wyoming PBS in partnership with educators and members of both tribal communities. The project provides 76 standards-aligned lesson plans and accompanying video content covering the history of the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho peoples.

The lesson plans are designed for classroom use but are highly adaptable for small-group and home settings. They cover:

• The history of the Great Plains and Rocky Mountain region from indigenous perspectives
• The establishment of the Wind River Reservation and the 1868 Fort Bridger Treaty
• Seasonal and subsistence practices of both tribes
• Contemporary tribal governance and economic development
• Cultural practices including ceremony, art, and oral tradition

For a microschool serving mixed ages, the video components allow you to anchor discussion across grade levels while differentiating the written and analytical work. Younger students can engage with the narrative and visual content; older students can work with primary source documents and analytical questions.

The Wind River Education Project is available through Wyoming PBS and the Wyoming Department of Education's curriculum resource library at no cost.

Language Resources: Newe Daygwap and Arapaho Language Tools

Language preservation is a priority for both the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho communities, and digital resources have made language learning significantly more accessible for families outside formal tribal schools.

Newe Daygwap is a Shoshone language learning application developed in collaboration with tribal elders and language educators. The app provides vocabulary, pronunciation audio, and interactive exercises. For a microschool integrating Shoshone language study — whether as a world language elective for Hathaway Scholarship purposes or simply as part of a culturally grounded curriculum — Newe Daygwap provides structured instruction that does not require a fluent speaker on site.

The Northern Arapaho language is taught at St. Stephen's Indian School and through language programs coordinated by the Northern Arapaho Tribe's Department of Education. The tribe's language program has produced teaching materials and recordings; families interested in incorporating Arapaho language study should contact the Northern Arapaho Department of Education directly to inquire about access to those materials for home and community use.

For Hathaway Scholarship eligibility, two sequenced years of a world language count toward the Honors tier curriculum. A documented sequence combining Newe Daygwap application work with supplementary materials and a language portfolio would qualify as a world language sequence if the microschool maintains accurate transcript records showing progressive skill development.

Tribal Education Departments as Community Partners

Both tribes maintain formal education departments that provide services beyond their own tribal schools.

Eastern Shoshone Tribe: The Eastern Shoshone Tribe's education programs include tutoring support, scholarship resources, and connections to cultural education programming. The tribe coordinates with the Bureau of Indian Education (BIE) schools on the reservation and maintains relationships with Fremont County school districts.

Northern Arapaho Tribe: The Northern Arapaho Tribe exercises sovereign authority over education through its Department of Education and the Tribal Education Code (Title 8). The tribe operates the Wyoming Indian Schools and maintains a range of educational support programs. The Northern Arapaho Education Department can be a valuable partner for microschool founders seeking to build culturally authentic programming — particularly for curriculum review, cultural advisors, and connections to tribal elders who participate in educational settings.

For non-Native families building a microschool in the Wind River area, reaching out to these departments is both a sign of respect and a practical step toward building accurate, non-appropriative curriculum content.

TravelStorysGPS Cultural Tours

TravelStorysGPS has developed audio tour content for the Wind River region that integrates tribal history, geography, and contemporary context. These GPS-triggered audio narratives can be used as the foundation for field-based learning experiences — essentially turning a drive through the reservation into a structured history and social studies lesson.

For microschool field trips, this format is highly practical. The content is research-based and developed with tribal input, which addresses the quality control problem that arises when trying to teach indigenous history from generic textbooks.

Integrating These Resources Into a Sequentially Progressive Curriculum

Wyoming's legal requirement for a "sequentially progressive" curriculum means your instruction needs to build logically over time, not deliver disconnected cultural snapshots. Here is how these resources fit into a coherent multi-year sequence:

Grades 2-5: Wyo Wonders (Wyoming Agriculture in the Classroom) provides a free, standards-aligned curriculum that includes indigenous land use, agriculture, and natural resource stewardship in a developmentally appropriate format. This pairs naturally with Wind River Education Project video content at this age range.

Grades 6-8: Wind River Education Project lesson plans move into treaty history, tribal governance, and contemporary issues. Language study through Newe Daygwap or Northern Arapaho materials can begin here as a formal elective sequence.

Grades 9-12: Dual enrollment at Central Wyoming College in Riverton offers courses in regional history and occasionally tribal studies topics. A documented world language sequence through tribal language study, combined with Wind River Education Project primary source work, covers multiple Hathaway Success Curriculum requirements simultaneously.

Building a Pod Near the Reservation

The Wind River area includes families from both tribes, non-Native ranching and agricultural families, energy sector workers, and reservation community members. A microschool or pod in this region can be a genuinely diverse educational community if the founding families are intentional about it.

The legal framework for pod formation near the reservation follows standard Wyoming law — the one-family-unit threshold, the requirement for a sequentially progressive curriculum in seven core subjects, and the private school licensing rules if you cross into multi-family instruction. The cultural dimension adds complexity to curriculum planning but does not change the legal structure.

The Wyoming Micro-School & Pod Kit covers the full legal and operational framework for starting a pod anywhere in Wyoming, including guidance on structuring cooperative agreements, navigating the homeschool-versus-private-school legal threshold, and building a transcript system that supports Hathaway Scholarship eligibility. The curriculum choices — including tribal language and history — are yours to make within that framework.

If you are building a program specifically for or with the Wind River community, the resources listed here give you a starting point for curriculum content that meets state standards, reflects the actual history of the region, and engages students in ways that purely textbook-based approaches cannot replicate.

See more United States homeschool guides →