night. It was an ongoing educational process about religion, life, hunting, and so on,’ recalled John Snow, chief of the Stoney in the foothills of the Rockies. With the arrival of adolescence, the teaching of necessary knowledge and skills became more overt and didactic among most Aboriginals groups. Girls, for example, had to have the nature and significance of their first menses, the beginning of their fertile phase that was signaled by menstruation, explained and marked by the other woman of the community.

      For the young males of many communities, a common religious rite of passage into adolescence was the vision quest. Also significant among some of the Plains people was a ceremony involving tearing of the flesh of the chest and inflicting pain as part of the Sun Dance or Thirst Dance. Even more widespread was the youth’s isolation in search of a sign from the spirits that would provide guidance for the future.

      Not surprisingly, the educational system of the aboriginal peoples of the northern portion of North America was admirably suited to the structures and values of those indigenous communities. It operated in a largely non-coercive way, relying on the use of models, illustrations, stories, and warnings to convey the information that was considered essential. This approach reflected the high value that most Native societies placed on individual autonomy and avoidance of the use of force with members of the community. The heavy reliance on storytelling by elders was a manifestation of the fact that the oldest people generally had the most knowledge, and also of the social reality that age was respected and accommodated in most of these communities.