Social Studies

Sixth Grade Social Studies Curriculum

Our Focus this year...

 In the study of Geography and Indigenous Peoples of the Western Hemisphere, sixth grade students explore the characteristics and development of several cultural regions. They work on finding connections between the natural world and the ways that indigenous cultures took shape historically and how they change over time.  Students learn that indigenous people have and still do contribute to society in meaningful ways. In the Three Cultures Connect unit of study, sixth grade students examine African and Eurasian cultures in Medieval times leading up to the Age of Exploration.  They work to uncover the interconnectedness between civilizations impacted by vast trading networks where goods, people, and ideas moved from place to place, and studied the effect of such movement from multiple perspectives.  They examine the effects of the growth of trade, commerce, religion, art, and learning on society.  Students consider the factors that compelled Europeans to engage in extended explorations of the globe, as well as the impacts on indigenous cultures they encountered in both the western hemisphere and Africa.

Benchmark Understandings:

Student explains accurately and/or represents clearly an understanding of the relationship between environmental factors in a certain place and the culture of the people who live in it.

Learning Targets: Students will be able to...

• explain ways that the environment has caused indigenous people to modify and adapt their cultures

• explain how environmental changes impact positively and negatively the way of life for indigenous people in society today

• Use questions to analyze events to describe how they are historically significant

Forces (push and/or pull) influenced the movement of people, ideas, and organisms around the globe. Interactions between cultures resulted from the movement of people, ideas, and organisms. 

Learning Targets: Students will be able to…

• Name several forces that pushed or pulled people to explore beyond their homeland. 

• Explain how these forces led certain goods and ideas to be created and shared between one location and another or compelled people to move around the globe. 

• Explain the relationship between where humans choose to explore and settle and the natural resources that exist in those places.

• Identify ways human exploration both helps and hurts different groups and the environment they encounter. 

• Describe an important historical event that affected people differently including multiple perspectives.