All lesson plan units may be downloaded, copied and shared.

4th Grade Lesson Units

• Life Changing During Reconstruction (Part I): 4.5.P, 4.5.CX, 4.5.E

Unit Overview: The students will be able to demonstrate an understanding of how the lives of individuals changed or stayed the same during Reconstruction of the United States and South Carolina in the period of 1860–1880. The students will also explore how those changes or continuities affected Mary McLeod Bethune and her family, in particular. Students will analyze and evaluate primary and secondary sources from Sumter County African American Historic Sites tour to formulate evidence-based responses.

• Reconstruction Leading to Civil Rights (Part II): 4.5.CC, 4.5.E

Unit Overview: The students will be able to demonstrate an understanding of the contributions that different groups made to impact the economic, political, and social developments during Reconstruction of the United States and South Carolina in the period of 1860–1880. The students will also explore how those impacts resulted in the foundation for the struggle for civil rights. Students will analyze and evaluate primary and secondary sources from the Sumter County African American Historic Sites tour to formulate evidence-based responses.

5th Grade Lesson Units

• Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune’s Impact and Contributions on the United States and South Carolina during the 1920s & 1930s: 5.2.CO, 5.2.CX, 5.2.E

Unit Overview: The students will be able to demonstrate an understanding of how Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune’s life and legacy impacted African Americans in South Carolina during a number of historic events that took place in the United States between the 1920s and the 1930s.

• Impact of the Civil Rights Movement on the education system in South Carolina and the United States during the Jim Crow Era: 5.4.CE, 5.4.CC

Unit Overview: The students will be able to demonstrate an understanding of the Civil Rights Movement in South Carolina, how schools were different for Southern Whites and African Americans during the Jim Crow Era, and the role of Rosenwald schools in African American communities.

8th Grade Lesson Units

• Political, Social, and Economic Shifts (Part I): 8.5.CO, 8.5.CC, 8.5.E

Unit Overview: In this unit, students will demonstrate an understanding of the impact of world events on South Carolina and the United States from 1929 to 1960. By analyzing primary and secondary sources, from Sumter County, SC, students will explain how, Black South Carolinians during and following World War II up to the 1960s, contributed to state, national, and global communities. In addition, students will demonstrate understanding of how Black South Carolinians’ civic participation and social change altered South Carolina’s social standing and political alignment during this time.

• Political, Social, and Economic Shifts (Part II): 8.5.CX, 8.5.E

Unit Overview: In this unit, students will demonstrate an understanding of the impact of world events on South Carolina and the United States from 1929 to 1960. By analyzing primary and secondary sources, from Sumter County, SC, students will explain how, Black South Carolinians during and following World War II up to the 1960s, contributed to state, national, and global communities. In addition, students will demonstrate understanding of how Black South Carolinians’ civic participation and social change altered South Carolina’s social standing and political alignment during this time.

• Progress Gained, Progress Lost: 8.4 CC, 8.4 E

Unit Overview: In this unit, students will examine the political changes that occurred in South Carolina between 1865-1898. The Constitution of 1868 included relatively progressive provisions and many African Americans became elected state officials for the first time in history. These changes were met with discrimination and intimidation tactics aimed at diminishing and eliminating the rights of formerly enslaved individuals. By the end of Reconstruction, political power in South Carolina was led by former Confederates who further destroyed the rights of African Americans through the ratification of the Constitution of 1895 and the Jim Crow Laws that resulted from Plessy v. Ferguson.

• “Unalienable Rights”: 8.4 CX, 8.4 E

Unit Overview: Students will understand the African American fight to obtain their unalienable right-those natural rights given by God that can’t be restrained or replaced by human laws. They will understand the inequity of the equalization schools and how the life of Dr. Bethune was spent in the pursuit of unalienable rights for the African American community. Students will understand how they can apply aspects of Dr. Bethune’s life to their own lives and use their voices to become advocates for the acquisition of unalienable rights for all.

• Jim Crow & Progressive America: 8.4 CO, 8.4 P, 8.4 E

Unit Overview: Throughout this unit, the students will demonstrate an understanding of South Carolina’s role in and response to the dynamic economic, political, and social developments in the United States and around the world during the period 1862–1929, specifically their effects on African American citizens.

High School Lesson Units

• Mary McLeod Bethune: USHC.4.CX, USHC.4.CC, USHC.4.E

Unit Overview: The students will investigate how Mary McLeod Bethune impacted many different aspects of African American life. In this unit, they will explore the changes that African Americans experienced due to her contributions to Civil Rights during the Jim Crow Era. Students will interpret how Mary McLeod Bethune impacted life for minority groups of her time. While analyzing and evaluating primary and secondary sources from Sumter County African American Historic Sites tour to formulate evidence-based responses.

• Rosenwald Schools: USHC.4.CX, USHC.4.E, USHC.5.CC, USHC.5.E

Unit Overview: This unit consists of lessons and activities that correspond with students' ability to demonstrate an understanding of the contextualized changes in American culture within new migration patterns, participation in global conflict, and capitalist business cycles. Inquiry will include shaping the African American culture and arts movements, continued discrimination against marginalized groups, and economic hardships on American culture during the 1920s and 1930s, and thematic continuities and changes into how marginalized groups sought and won legal rights during the Civil Rights Movement.