Lesson Plan Westward Migration: Opportunities and Dangers K, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Click here to download this four-lesson unit.
Lesson Plan Native American Cultures and the Impact of the Boarding Schools 3, 4, 5 Click to download this four-lesson unit.
Lesson Plan Norwegian Immigration in the Nineteenth Century Geography, Literature 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 Background For most Norwegians in the nineteenth century, America remained a remote and exotic place until the first immigrants began to write home. These "American letters," which traveled from the immigrants back to former neighbors...
Lesson Plan Celebrating Labor Day Government and Civics 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 Essential Question To what extent have the conditions of American workers improved over the past 100 years? Background After the Civil War, the United States witnessed an accelerating movement of people westward, a rapidly increasing...
Lesson Plan The Pony Express: The Fastest Delivery of a Message across America Science, Technology, Engineering and Math 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Background The inauguration of a new service, the Pony Express, on April 3, 1860, promised the fastest communication ever from the Missouri River to California. How long did a Pony Express message take to go from its starting point in...
Lesson Plan Nineteenth-Century Technology in Twenty-First-Century America Economics, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 Introduction The nineteenth century was marked by a period of innovation, invention, and a huge spurt of growth known as the industrial revolution. Many inventions from the nineteenth century never caught on or have become obsolete,...
Lesson Plan The Great Chicago Fire of 1871: A Story of Human Tragedy and Triumph 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 Background Ask anyone what the greatest disaster in Chicago was and probably no one will say, "The Great Iroquois Theatre Fire of December 30, 1903." Six hundred three souls perished in that fire. They probably won’t say, "The sinking...
Lesson Plan The Preamble to the US Constitution, the Pledge of Allegiance, and the Declaration of Independence Government and Civics K, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 Unit Objective This unit is part of Gilder Lehrman’s series of Common Core State Standards–based teaching resources. These units were developed to enable students to understand, summarize, and analyze original texts of historical...
Lesson Plan The Transcontinental Railroad in Images and Poetry Art, Literature, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math 4, 5, 6 Unit Objectives Students will analyze a variety of primary sources related to the completion of the transcontinental railroad. investigate celebratory images and a poem to discover some of the key outcomes that arose from the ability...
Lesson Plan All Aboard: Making Connections with the Transcontinental Railroad 5, 6, 7, 8 LESSON 1 Objectives Students will Read and understand primary source writings from two key documents that encouraged settlers to go west and that established congressional support of what would eventually become the transcontinental...