Essential Questions

Knowledge/Content

Methods/Skills

Purpose

Forms

Performance of Understanding/Assessment

Resources/Materials

Founding the New Nation
(Week 1, 3 Weeks)

1. How important were political, social, and economic factors in motivating the English to arrive in America?
2. How were the thirteen colonies similar and different politically, economically, and socially?
3. Why did the conditions in the colonies lead to separation from England?
4. Why did the rebels win?
5. To what extent was the revolution a civil war?

1. Founding of Jamestown, Plymouth, Boston "City upon a Hill," Philadelphia, New York
2. Colonial features: South, New England, Middle
3. Puritan migration
4. Relations with Native-Americans
5. Evolution of slavery
6. Features of colonial society: roles of men and women, tolerance and intolerance
7. Religion: the Great Awakening
8. French and Indian War
9. Events leading to rebellion.
10. Reasons for American victory

1. Identify the reasons for success of the English colonies.
2. Explain similarities and differences among the colonies.
3. Explain the causes and effects of the French and Indian War.
4. Evaluate the imperial policies and the colonial reactions.
5. Evaluate interpretations of the period.
6. Analyze historical documents.
7. Construct timeliness

1. To understand the reasons Europeans arrived along the eastern seaboard.
2. To recognize the difficulties in establishing viable settlements.
3. To recognize the forces that led to eruption of war and independence.
4. To understand the meaning of different documents and interpretations of the colonial events.
5. To read a contemporary historical account.

1. Note taking
2. Discussion
3. Analysis of documents
4. Study guides: The Path to Revolution 1763-76
5. Map work
6. Socratic seminar (1776)

Other written assessments (DBQ "Democracy in Colonial Wethersfield, CT")
Written Test (To what extent had the roots of the future US been laid in colonial
North America by the end of the French and Indian War?)
Other written assessments (Summary of evidence: Declaration of Independence; Compare the
masterpieces "Washington Crossing the Delaware" (Leutze
vs.Colescott); correspondence between Abigail and John Adams;
Foreign assistance to the American cause)
Written Test (Multiple-Choice: 1. "Colonial Era" & 2. "Independence")

1. Kennedy chapters 2-8 (summer reading 2 & 3)
2. David McCullough. 1776 (summer reading)
3. David McCullough "What the Fog Wrought: The Revolution's Dunkirk, August 29, 1776"
4. Documents: Mayflower Compact; Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God; Common Sense; American Crisis, Number 1; Declaration of Independence; Letters between Abigail and John Adams.
5. J. Franklin Jameson. "The Effects of the American Revolution"
6. Outline maps

Building the New Nation
(Week 4, 6 Weeks)

1. Why did the new republic survive?
2. How did Jefferson and Jackson views on democracy shape American political tradition?
3. Why did federal policies result in the expulsion of Native-Americans from their traditional lands?
4. Why did the American political culture become more democratic?
5. How did the second religious revival resemble and differ from the first?
6. Why is the war of 1812 considered the second war of independence?
7. Why is there a monument in the capital to Thomas Jefferson but not John Adams, James Madison, or Andrew Jackson?

1. Articles of Confederation & the Constitution
2. Hamilton vs. Jefferson
3. Problems and solutions for the new republic
4. Territorial expansion: Louisiana Purchase, implications for the nation
5. War of 1812
6. Era of good feelings: MO Compromise; Monroe doctrine
7. John Quincy Adams: corrupt bargain
8. Andrew Jackson: banks, Indian removal, tariffs, nullification
9. Whigs in the White House
10. Economic depression
11. Two party system

1. Compare the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution
2. Evaluate Jefferson's presidency
3. Identify the legacies of the Presidents from Madison to Jackson.
4. Recognize key Supreme Court decisions.
5. Research key players of the reform movement
6. Identify the reasons for expanding democracy.
6. Understand the debate over slavery
7. Realize the economic conditions in the North, South and West during the ante bellum period.
8. Construct timelines

1. To understand the dilemmas that confronted the new republic.
2. To recognize the conditions of slavery.
3. To compare the second religious revival with the first.
5. To judge the impact of the reform movements on the social structure.
6. To determine the importance of earliest political leaders in shaping the new government.
7. To understand the horrors of the international slave trade.
8. To spell out Jeffersonian and Jacksonian democracy.

1. Simulated cabinet meeting with Washington, Jefferson and Hamilton.
2. Note taking
3. Seminar reports on reformers
4. DVD: Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery, Amistad

Other written assessments (DBQ 1985 "From 1781-1789 the Articles of Confederation
provided the US with an effective government." 1990 "Jacksonian
Democrats viewed themselves as the guardians of the US
Constitution …")
Written Test (1. To what extent did Jacksonian Democracy reflect social
and economic development in the nation?

2. In what manner did the Jacksonian Revolution mark the
establishment of democracy in America whereas the
Jeffersonian Revolution merely marked the arrival of a new
party in political power?)

1. Kennedy chapters 9-15
2. Outline maps
3. Organization for simulated cabinet meeting
4. Documents: Washington's Farewell Address; Jefferson--First Inuagural Address; Marbury v. Madison; J.Q. Adams "Reflections on the Missouri Compromise"; McCulloch v. Maryland; Worcester v. Georgia; Indian Removal Act; Thoreau "Resistance to Civil Government"; Margaret Fuller "Women in the 19th Century"; Seneca Falls "Declaration of Sentiments and Resoltions"; Soujerner Truth "Address to the Women's Rights Convention"
5. DVD Lewis and Clark Corps of Discovery
6. DVD Amistad
7. Selection from Krakauer "Under the Banner of Heaven"
8. Selected readings: immigration, Trail of Tears
9. Outline maps

Testing the New Nation
(Week 10, 9 Weeks)

1. How justified were Americans in moving across the Mississippi?
2. What impact did the settlers have upon the environment, and upon the people inhabiting the region?
3. How did the government negotiate with foreign powers regarding the expansion?
4. Was slavery the cause for the fracturing of the Union or did other causes push states to secession?
5. Why was Lincoln such an effective president for this crisis?
6. Why would there be lingering resentments from the conflict?

1. Manifest Destiny
2. Reasons Texas, Oregon, California became states
3. War with Mexico: causes; "spot resolutions"; Treaty of Guadeloupe Hidalgo; Wilmot Proviso
4. The "peculiar institution"
5. Popular sovereignty
6. Sectional tensions: Compromise 1850 (Fugitive Slave Law); Kansas-Nebraska; Bloody Kansas; Lincoln-Douglas debates; Dred Scott; John Brown; 1860 elections.
7. Outbreak of war
8. North & South war making potential
9. Reactions to war: domestic & foreign
10. Turning points of war: Antietam, Gettysburg, Vicksburg
11. War ends: Sherman's march, Grant's advances, Appomatox Courthouse

1. Evaluate westward expansion.
2. Determine the causes and effects of the Civil War.
4. Understand the turning points of the war.

1. To assess the factors of westward expansion and their impact on the the region, Mexico, and the national government.
2. To weigh the institution of slavery in light of American principles and sectional beliefs.
3. To determine the causes for war in 1861.
4. To examine the reasons for the Union's victory.
5. To assess President Lincoln's leadership.

1. Socratic seminar: A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
2. Note taking
3. Student instructional groups

Written Test (The outbreak of war in 1861 was inevitable. Discuss.)
Other written assessments (DBQ 1985 The Constitution failed in its goal to keep national
unity.)
Other oral assessments (Socratic seminar "Life of Frederick Douglass")
Other written assessments (Objective test)

1. Kennedy chapters 16-21
2. Frederick Douglass "A Narrative Life of Frederick Douglass"
3. Ken Burns "Civil War" (selected episodes)
4. Reading selections: Stowe "Uncle Tom's Cabin"
5. Documents: W.L. Garrison "Declaration of Sentiments of the American Anti-Slavery Society"; Lincoln "A House Divided"; Gettysburg Address, Emancipation Proclamation
6. Recommended reading: Goodwin "A Team of Rivals", Shaara "Killer Angels"
7. Outline maps

Reconstruction
(Week 19, 1 Week)

1. What was the situation in the South following the war?
2. Why did the plans for Reconstruction become radical?
3. Why did the legislative and executive branches fail to cooperate?
4. What were the consequences for the South and the North of Reconstruction policies?
5. What was the situation for African-Americans?
6. How have views of Reconstruction changed?

1. Freedmen's Bureau
2. Black Codes
3. Civil Rights bill
4. War Amendments
5. Military Reconstruction
6. Scalawags, carpetbaggers
7. Racism: KKK, Colfax Massacre, redeemer governments
8. Black Reconstruction
9. Union League
10. Compromise 1877
11. Jim Crow: Plessy v. Ferguson

1. Identify the proposals for re-unifying the nation.
2. Evaluate the conditions affecting policies adopted by the North and the South.
3. Recognize the evolution of one nation but separate societies.

1. To identify the post-war conditions.
2. To understand options and choices for readmitting rebellious states.
3. To recognize the situation for African-Americans.
4. To evaluate the interpretations of the era.

1. Discusion
2. Seminar presentations
3. Document analysis

Written Test (1. The North won the Civil War but the South won
Reconstruction. Evaluate this statement.
2. Describe two problems that were important causes of the
Civil War and explain how the Civil War and Reconstruction
provided solutions to the problems.
3. How do you account for the failure of Reconstruction to
bring social and economic equality of opportunity to the former
slaves?)

1. Kennedy chapter 22
2. Eric Foner. "A Short History of Reconstruction" (vacation reading)
3. Documents: "Black Codes of Mississippi"; Organization and principles of the KKK"; "Klan terrorism in South Carolina"
4. DVD "The End of Jim Crow " (episode 1)

Forging an Industrial Society
(Week 20, 3 Weeks)

1. How did the growth of industry affect business, labor, and politics?
2. What problems did cities experience in the period of rapid development; and how were the problems addressed?
3. How did political parties and the government address the most pressing social and economic problems?
4. Who were the most important individuals in business, agriculture, and government?

1. Westward expansion: reasons, impact
2. Growth of cities and the impact on America
3. Organizations of business structures
4. Industrialists/financiers: Carnegie, Rockefeller, Morgan, Stanford, Vanderbilt
5. labor strife: Railroad strike, Pullman strike, Homestead, Haymarket
6. Labor organizes: National Union, Knights of Labor, AFL; Samuel Gompers, Eugene Debs
6. Farming protests: the Grange, Populist Party, Mary Lease
7. Presidential policies: Hayes; Cleveland
8. Turner thesis
9.19th century artists of the west & in Paris.

1. Synthesize documentary evidence for a research essay.
2. Evaluate the role of government, business, and labor in the growth of the American economy.
3. Explain the impact of American growth on different groups: Indians, workers, African-Americans, women, captains of industry.
4. Recgonize American artists and their works.

1. To determine the causes for the dynamic growth of American society.
2. To weigh the efforts undertaken by labor, African-Americans, women, and immigrants toward achieving justice and equality.
3. To recognize injustices that existed and the ways in which they were addressed.

1. Note taking.
2. Writing a research essay. (notes, organization, essay, bibliography)
3. Seminar presentation.
4. PowerPoint presentations: art, labor protests
5. Document analysis
6.

Lecture/seminar (Student seminar presentation on research topic)
Extended Essay (In three to four pages, students defend a thesis of their choosing on the assigned topic . They had to provide a works cited page.)
Written Test (An objective test with 75 questions pertaining to the unit. Test items include a variety of illustrations.)
Other written assessments (The student notes for the seminar report and for the extended essay.)
Other written assessments (Outline each student prepares for the seminar.)

1. Kennedy chapters 24-27.
2. Student selections from the internet.
3. Student selections from printed sources.
4. Readings: Iron Hawk "The Battle of Little Big Horn"; John Tebble & Keith Jennison "The Battle at Wounded Knee"; Carnegie "Capitalism and Social Darwinism"; Anonymous "The Chinese Exclusion Act"; B.T. Washington "The Atlanta Compromise"; W.J. Bryan "Cross of Gold"; Turner Thesis
5. DVD Seven Industrial Wonders of the World--"The Transcontinental Railroad" and/or "The Brooklyn Bridge"
6. PowerPoint (teacher created): "American Artists of the Nineteenth Century"

Struggling for Justice
(Week 23, 6 Weeks)

1. How did the government respond to the social, economic, and political issues at the turn of the century and in the 1930s?
2. What inequities existed for women, workers, African-Americans? How were these addressed?
3. Who were the intellectuals of period?
4. Why did the United States go to war in 1917 and in 1941?
5. How did the American role in world affairs change following these wars?
6. How did economic factors shape American society?
7. How did the environment affect American society?

1. Spanish American War: causes, results
2. Foreign policy: Open Door, Roosevelt Corollary, Dollar Diplomacy, neutrality, isolationism.
3. Progressives: Roosevelt, Taft, Wilson (New Nationalism vs. New Freedom)
4. Progressive reforms: muckrakers, political democratization.
5. Election of 1912: a turning point
6. Violence: antracite strike, Ludlow--CO coalfield war; lynching of Leo Frank
7. World War I: the old order and the new world order
8. Roaring Twenties: Red Scare; Sacco-Vanzetti; Scopes Trial; 3 Republican presidents; isolationism.
9. Environmental crises: Galveston (1900); San Francisco (1911); Influeza (1918); Mississippi flood (1927); the Dust Bowl (1930s)
10. Great Migration: Harlem Renaissance--art, literature
11. Great Depression: causes, Hoover, hardships, solutions
12. FDR and the New Deal

1. Evaluate the causes and effects of American imperialism.
2. Identify the issues and key players of the Progressive movement.
3. Evaluate America's role in the First World and its aftermath.
4. Understand the cultural features of the 1920s.
5. Recognize the strengths and weaknesses of the economy.
5. Evaluate the effectivenes of the government in creating a more just society.

1. To recognize American imperialism.
2. To identify the excesses that characterized American society.
2. To evaluate the role of government in providing for national security, economic growth, and social justice.
3. To recognize the contributions made by the T. Roosevelt, W. Wilson, FDR.
4. To appreciate the economic hardships encountered by workers, toward women, and African-Americans.
5. To determine the role of men and women who supported greater justice.

1. Study guide for Kenndy chapters
2. Seminar presentations on Progressives
3. PowerPoint presentations
4. DVDs: Panama Canal; Jim Crow

Other written assessments (DBQ 1994. American expansionism: continuation or departure of
American policy)
Other written assessments (DBQ 1991. Defeat of the Treaty of Versailles)
Written Test (How effectively did Roosevelt deal with the economic crisis of the
Great Depression?)

1. Kennedy. 28-34
2. Chart: Causes of Spanish American War
3. Documents: The Progressive Era--Jane Addams; Upton Sinclair; Muller v. Oregon; Ida B. Wells; Niagara Movement; Report of the Industrial Commision; TR "Message to Congress"; Wilson "The New Freedom"; Jacob Riis; Barton "The Man Nobody Knows"; Truman "The Atomic Bombing of Hiroshima--the Public Explanation"; Eisenhower "Farewell Address"
4. PowerPoints (teacher created): "American Imperialsim" and "The Progressive Era"; "1920's"; Black Migration"; "Dust Bowl"
5. DVD 7 Industrial Wonders of the World "Panama Canal"
6. VC "Guns of August"
7. DVDs: "The End of Jim Crow" (episode 2); The Scopes Trial

World War II & the Cold War
(Week 29, 3 Weeks)

1. Why did peace collapse twenty years after Versailles?
2. What role did the United States play in defeating Germany and Japan?
3. What tensions led to the collapse of the wartime alliance?
4. Why did Truman take action in Korea? What were the results?
5. How did the United States become involved in Vietnam?
6. How effectively did American policies deal with crises in the Middle East?
7. Who was to blame for the Cold War?
8. How did foreign policy decisions cause war yet preserve peace?

1. Roosevelt's foreign policy
2. International gangsterism: Mussolini, Stalin, Hitler
3. Spanish Civil War
4. Responses to aggression in Europe and Asia
5. Steps to War, 1936-1939
6. US: Arsenal for democracy
7. War in Europe & in the Pacific
8. Cold War: Yalta, Potsdam, Containment, Germany
7. Truman: Doctrine, Marshall Plan, NATO, NSC-68
8. Balance of terror
9. Korea: causes, course, MacArthur, armistice
10.Vietnam: Commitments by 5 Presidents; course of the war; protest; peace.
11. Cuban missile crisis: Kenned vs Khrushchev
11. Middle East: 1948, 1956, 1967, 1973
12. Detente and "peaceful coexistence"
13. The end of the Cold War.

1. Explain the federal governments reactions to the rise of Nazism, and fascism.
2. Investigate America's role in victory over the Axis.
3. Evaluate the causes of the Cold War.
4. Analyze American actions in Korea and Vietnam.
5. Evaluate the role the United States played in the Middle East.
6. Explain the causes and results the Cuban missile crisis
7. Realize the factors ending the Cold War.

1. To identify the events leading to war in 1939.
2. To recognize the strategies for winning.
3. To identify the reasons for antagonisms with the Soviet Union.
4. To evaluate documents defining the American post-war strategy.
5. To appreciate American policy toward Europe and Asia.
6. To understand American involvement in Korea.

1. Student notes for seminar presentations
2. Documents with study questions.
3. PowerPoint presentation
4. Teacher prepared notes for the students.

Written Test (Multiple-choice test: mock AP exam)
Other written assessments (Summary essay on Presidential involvement in Vietnam)
Other oral assessments (Simulation: Press conference with Presidential Chiefs-of-Staff)
Other oral assessments (Debate: The United States was justified in fighting in Vietnam.)

1. Kennedy chapters 35-37
2. Maps: War in Europe; War in the Pacific
3. Documents: Chruchill "Iron Curtain"; Truman Doctrine; Kennan "Sources of Soviet Conduct", Marshall Plan
3. Stoessinger "Why Nations Go to War" (a) Korea; (b) A Greek Tragedy in Five Acts: Vietnam
4. Timeline of the Vietnam War.
5. Pete Seeger "Where have all the flowers gone?"
6. PowerPoint (teacher created): "War in Vietnam"

Making Modern America
(Week 32, 4 Weeks)

1. What measures did the government take to assure equality and prosperity for Americans?
2. How did music and art reflect cultural changes?

1. Post-war prosperity
2. McCarthyism
3.Civil Rights: Brown v. Board of Edu; Emmit Till; Rosa Parks; M.L. King, Jr.; Little Rock, "freedom riders"; black power;
4. Great Society
5. Culture: Rock 'n Roll; consumerism; hippies
6. Nixon: Watergate
7. Feminist movement
8. Resurgent conservatism
9. 20th century American art

1. Identify the economic conditions from 1950s to 1980s.
2. Understand the causes and directions of the civil rights movement.
3. Appreciate the messages in music and art.

1. To weigh the forces of liberalism and conservatism in American domestic and foreign policy.
2. To determine the factors affecting American foreign policy decisions in Asia and the Middle East.
3. To explain the forces that led to the civil rights and feminist movements.
4. To scrutinize the events surrounding the Cuban missile crisis.
5. To appreciate the factors that prevented war between the superpowers.

1. Seminar reports: presidential involvement in Vietnam
2. Teacher notes
3. PowerPoint presentation

Oral Report (Seminar presentation on presidential decisions leading to the war
in Vietnam)

1. Kennedy 38-40
2. DVD: The End of Jim Crow (episode 4)
3. PowerPoint (teacher created): "American Artists of the Twentieth Century"
4. Documents: JFK "Inaugural Address"; Martin Luther King "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" Stokely Carmichael "Black Power"
5. Speech: King "I have a dream"
6. President Timeline

Post Exam
(Week 36, 3 Weeks)

1. What actions did the US government take regarding the Nazi genocide?
2. What prevented nuclear war from erupting in 1962?
3. How did the Nixon Presidency lead to a Constitutional crisis?

1. Holocaust
2. Nuremburg Trials
3. Cuban Revolution
4. Kennedy-Khrushchev summit
5. Cuba: chess moves; end of game
6. Watergate: Investigative press; Congressional oversight; Constitutional issues.

1. Compare Hollywood vs. history.
2. Explain a point of view.

1. To understand the extent of the Holocaust and American policy regarding the genocide.
2. To appreciate the danger of superpower confrontation over Cuba.
3. To evaluate the conditions that led to President Nixon's resignation.

Socratic seminars

Oral Report (PowerPoint presentation)

DVD Schindler's List
DVD Thirteen Days
DVD All the President's Men
What Ifs? of American History: "The Cuban Missile Crisis: Second Holocaust"

Updated: Tuesday, May 15, 2007