In this portion of the tour Miss Mae goes over O'odham basket weaving. Includes discussion questions.

What materials do the O’odham use to make baskets? 

Draw a design for a basket. Before you start, consider:  

What will you use your basket for when it is finished? 

What plant or man-made materials will you use to weave your basket? 

What designs will you weave into the basket?  

What colors will you use for your design?

Now you are ready to draw your basket design.

Tohono O’odham No:ligk Traditional Singers and Dancers perform the basket dance at the Southwest Indian Art Show, Arizona State Museum, Tucson, AZ. Julie Luchetta, photographer, 2005.

Award-winning Tohono O'odham basketmaker Terrol Dew Johnson states  that it can take up to a year to complete a basket. To do so, he must  harvest and prepare fibers that are used to weave the basket.

Some of his baskets include traditional Tohono O'odham designs. He uses 

to create the designs. Other baskets like the one in this photograph use materials like wood veneer and sweet grass.

Friends of Collections Purchase, 2007. Catalog number 2007-130-1 Photo by Jannelle Weakly.

Master basketmaker Terrol Johnson demonstrates how to prepare yucca for a  basket. Tohono O’odham Nation, Arizona, photographer, Michelle Dillon,  2018

Pauline Antone at the Tohono O’odham Community Action Gallery shares a  basket she is weaving. Sells, Tohono O’odham Nation,  Arizona, photographer,  Jannelle Weakly, 2016

Standards for Basket Weaving

College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework