Social Studies

In this unit, we will learn about the sophisticated communities of people who inhabited the North and South American continents before the age of colonization. Students will focus on identifying how these people used the environment around them to shape their lives; how does where you live affect how you live. Students will work in small groups to research and study the food, shelter, clothing, tools and environment of one Native American cultural group, collaborating to create a Google Docs Presentation. Students will have the opportunity to learn about more cultural groups from their classmates' presentations.

Students will be taught reading strategies for informational texts (both online and paper-based books and articles) and practice various types of note-taking skills in this unit, which will be carried over throughout the school year.

In our second social studies unit, students will see how North America begins to change with the expeditions of various European explorers. We will investigate why people decided to explore new land and what happened when they landed. Students will study both sides of the Native American and European peoples encounter, noting that point of view and perspective can change the story significantly. Students will again practice informational text reading with a mini research project on one explorer and like the Native American unit, students will learn from their other classmates about some other explorers.

The Colonial America unit is taught in conjunction with the Informational Writing unit. During this unit, students begin to see the makings of our country and how it is shaped today. As a class, we learn about who, what, where, when and why of colonization and briefly look at the specifics of the New England, Middle and Southern colonies. After we have the background of colonization in North America, students are off to conduct small group or independent research, investigating one specific topic of their choosing. This topic will help to guide our Informational Writing unit, as each student will work hard to research, note take, draft, revise and publish an impressive essay.

The timeline of the founding of our nation as we know it today is explored in this unit. Through texts, character perspective, multimedia presentations and an engaging field trip, students will experience the many events that lead up to the colonies declaring their independence from Great Britain and the founding of the government.

To better understand the various points of view of this monumental time in American history, students are assigned "families" with varying perspectives; from those loyal to the British throne to rebelling Patriots to freed Black slaves to farm families. Students see each event through the eyes of their persona and recognize that each event has a cause and an effect that may or may not be favorable to their families. Students' creativity is showcased in character perspective journal assignments.

In the final social studies unit, students will study the writing of the Constitution and Bill of Rights, two documents that established the first form of government in the United States of America. Students will also learn how the current United States government is organized, looking at the three branches: legislative, judicial and executive.