November is Native American Heritage Month, and two Bronx parks open it this weekend with free, hands-on programs for families: an afternoon of traditional crafts led by the North American Indigenous Center of New York at Starlight Park on the Bronx River, and a ranger program on how Indigenous communities have used local plants for food and medicine at the Crotona Nature Center. A third program at Crotona on Sunday has children making their own field guides to what they find in the park.

All three are free and none requires registration.

Saturday, Nov. 7: Indigenous Art Workshop at Starlight Park

Noon to 4 p.m. Bronx River House, 1490 Sheridan Boulevard. Free, first come, first served.

The North American Indigenous Center of New York (NAIC-NY) and the Bronx River Alliance are hosting a four-hour drop-in workshop where children and families can learn traditional Indigenous crafts and learn about contemporary Indigenous cultures. Parks lists it as a family and kid-friendly event.

The program is paid for through the Statewide Community Regrants Program of the New York State Council on the Arts, administered in the borough by the Bronx Council on the Arts.

Saturday, Nov. 7: Indigenous Plant Practices at Crotona Park

1 to 2:30 p.m. Crotona Nature Center, Crotona Park East and Charlotte Street. Free.

The Urban Park Rangers lead a 90-minute look at how Indigenous peoples have traditionally used the plants that grow in this region, for food, for medicine and in daily life, and at how that knowledge still informs ecology today. It is one of the rangers' programs for Native American Heritage Month. Rangers at Crotona can be reached at 646-808-7621.

Sunday, Nov. 8: Create Your Own Nature Field Guide

1 to 2 p.m. Crotona Nature Center. Free.

The next afternoon, the rangers return to the nature center for a workshop on how field guides help people identify plants, animals, insects and rocks. Then each participant makes a guide of their own, filled with whatever they found in the park that interested them most.

Getting there

Starlight Park runs along the Bronx River in West Farms, and the workshop is at the Bronx River House, 1490 Sheridan Boulevard. The Crotona Nature Center is on the east side of Crotona Park, at Crotona Park East and Charlotte Street. Saturday's two programs overlap, so a family can start at the craft workshop at noon and head to Crotona for the 1 p.m. plant program, or do the plant program first and reach Starlight Park before the workshop ends at 4. Each program's NYC Parks page carries any weather or schedule changes.

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