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Utah's Regional Competitiveness for Non-resident Higher Education Students
Students study how government decisions need to account for competitive forces. They examine Utah's higher education system as an example. They describe how Utah compares to other western states in attracting out-of-state students. They...
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Athabaskan Migration & Bering Strait
Students study Athabaskan migration patterns and the Bering Strait Land Bridge theory. They investigate the importance of the expansion of trade and compare the differences between American Indian oral tradition accounts of origin and...
National First Ladies' Library
Michigan vs. Ohio State: A Serious Rivalry!
Middle schoolers discuss and research the pros and cons of school rivalries. In particular, they study the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry. Through their research, they think about how media accounts of college football games can be shaped...
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The Red Badge of Courage: A New Kind of Realism
Students research the Civil War and make connections between the war and the interpretation of the war in the novel The Red Badge of Courage to help them understand realism. In this Civil War recounting lesson, students complete several...
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Industrial Revolution
Seventh graders research how the Industrial Revolution impacted people. In this Industrial Revolution lesson, 7th graders examine how the change from shop or cottage industry to the factory affected people, how the railroad affected...
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Scoring a Financial Education
Students explore the concept of money management. In this money management lesson, students read an article about students taking a finance course in high school and college. Students discuss the importance of money management. Students...
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Why did the Homestead Strike turn violent?
Fifth graders practice reading skills while looking at different accounts of The Homestead Strike. In this reading skills lesson, 5th graders practice sourcing, close reading, and corroboration through reading a timeline and...
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Visions in the Dust: A Child's Perspective of the Dust Bowl
Middle schoolers examine primary source material of the Depression to correlate the fictional text "Out of the Dust" with actual visual, auditory, and manuscript accounts as found in the American Memory collections.
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Design Your Own Suburb
Students view and discuss urban and suburban scenes; and list the features of their ideal town and discuss whether these features can be found in cities and suburbs. They draw mental maps of a city and a suburb and brainstorm and list...
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Art Auction
Students participate in a variety of activities that present art history. They arrange an art auction where each student serves as auctioneer to present a favorite piece. Students keep track of their accounts and bid to buy desired...
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Is It There?
Students participate in a lesson designed to illustrate these concepts using simple materials. They use Science process skills to observe, measure, predict, make inferences, and communicate while completing the activity. Proper safety...
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Organizing Main Ideas and Supporting Details
Students read given information and identify the main ideas and specific detail of the story. In groups, they read a historical title and create a "book talk" for each one, summarizing the story. In addition, students create a...
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Life Science: DNA Whodunit?
Students role play an honorary detective to assist in solving a crime committed. They investigate by a bank robbery and interview eyewitnesses using their Crime Investigation Notebook and clues from an eyewitness account from the...
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In Their Own Words: Slave Narratives
Students identify primary sources, explain the strengths and weaknesses of personal accounts in history, and negotiate the Library of Congress Database. They also analyze documents and write a summary that compares and contrasts the...
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Bovine Oversteps Boundaries
Seventh graders read a newspaper account of "Grady the Silo Cow" and complete news-writing activities. In this news-writing lesson plan, 7th graders read the newspaper account about the cow. Students examine newspapers and work in groups...
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Slavery in the United States
Students investigate the personal accounts of slaves in the United States. They participate in various activities according to grade level to examine the role of slavery in the South.
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History by Heroes
Young scholars role play one of the Presidents between 1877 and today. Individually, they use the internet to research the President through official documents, political cartoons and various editorials. Throughout the year, they are...
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Slavery
Students trace the routes of escaping slaves on their journey north by calculating the mileage each one walked and define and use accurately the term Underground Railroad. They read The Drinking Gourd by Jeanetter Winter.
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Explorers
Students work together to examine Dutch, French, Spanish and English explorers. They create a poster of the information they collected and write about one explore they find most interesting. They share their information with the class.
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Spreadsheet Budget Project
Eighth graders record all the food they eat for one week, compute the costs for all of this food, and display the different categories on a spreadsheet and then convert to a chart.
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Plastic Wrap
Learners compare the price and quality of different kinds of plastic kitchen wraps and then rank them from best to worst. They take into account how well it comes out of the roll, if it seals well, it is tangles, how much weight it...
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How the Light Bulb Gets Switched On - The Evolution of Ideas
Young scholars discuss how people are influenced by their cultures and backgrounds, make artwork that documents creative process, write character sketch of Colonel Massey from different points of view, examine issue from different...
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A Day in the Life of a Veteran: Oral History
Seventh graders conduct an interview with a veteran of a recent war to provide an account of military conflicts. In this oral history lesson, 7th graders research a recent war and write interview questions for their research. Students...
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Journal Entry: What You Want To Buy!
Third graders write a one page paper about what they would like to purchase given the savings techniques. They write down what the object is that they are going to buy, how they are going to earn money to purchase this object, and what...