Curated OER
Social Studies Review for Grade 4 (4.1)
In this social studies review for grade 4 (4.1) worksheet, 4th graders answer 25 multiple choice questions in standardized test format about U.S. history.
Curated OER
Social Studies Quiz B-Grade 4
In this grade 4 social studies quiz instructional activity, 4th graders complete a 15 question multiple choice quiz covering a variety of grade 4 concepts.
Annenberg Foundation
Annenberg Learner: America's History in the Making: Taming the American West
Comprehensive teaching unit that explores the settling of the American West in the late 1800s and the challenges these settlers faced. Contains video and text materials, web interactives, student oriented activities, and a timeline of...
The Newberry Library
Newberry Library: Imagining the American West in the Late Nineteenth Century
Learning modules with primary resources explores how the West has been imagined as both America's manifest destiny and a wild frontier and examines the ways American Indian art and literature challenge these popular narratives.
PBS
Pbs: New Perspectives on the West
This in-depth resource presents a history of the American West from pre-Columbian times until World War I with profiles, documents, and images. It encourages visitors to link these into patterns of historical meaning for themselves....
US National Archives
Docsteach: The Settlement of the American West
Young scholars will analyze primary sources with an eye for cause-and-effect relationships.They will identify the roles of government policy and technological improvements in the settlement of the West, and explain their impact on Native...
PBS
Wnet: Thirteen: Texas Ranch House
What was it like to be a cowboy in 1867? Visit the Cooke Ranch and explore a cowboy's working and dwelling quarters. Play the interactive games to learn about the many aspects of daily life in the American West. (Click "Interactive...
Curated OER
National Park Service: Adeline Hornbeck and the Homestead Act
This Teaching with Historic Places lesson effectively depicts the life of a pioneer woman and ways in which the Homestead Act impacted her life. The site includes lesson plans, inquiry questions, and photos that may be used in covering...
US National Archives
Docsteach: Lewis & Clark's Expedition to the Complex West
This activity can be used as an introduction or for a closer study of the Lewis & Clark Expedition. Students will learn that the United States purchased the Louisiana Territory in 1803 and President Thomas Jefferson sent Lewis and...
OpenStax
Open Stax: The Impact of Expansion on Chinese Immigrants and Hispanic Citizens
As white populations moved westward in the 19th century, Chinese immigrants and Hispanic Americans faced racism and discrimination and were unable to compete on an equal basis for land. Eventually, both groups settled into urban areas...
Calisphere: University of California Libraries
University of California: Calisphere: 1870 1900: Preservation of the West
Primary source images looking at the settling of the West between 1870 and 1900 and the push by some to protect and preserve the natural beauty.
Nebraska Studies
Nebraska Studies: African American Settlers
This presents an overview of African Americans moving and settling in the West.
Curated OER
Cbc.ca: Taking the West Pioneers Head West
After Confederation, Canada focused on settling the vast lands to the West. They hoped to avoid the problems already faced by the Americans in western expansion by establishing peace and law before the settlers arrived.
Canadian Museum of History
Cmc: The Last Best West: Advertising for Immigrants to Western Canada
Government claims to lands in Western Canada was one matter but maintaining sovereignty over these lands was quite another. Sir John A Macdonald's approach to maintaining sovereignty in western Canada by not losing the land to American...
Library of Congress
Loc: Teachers: Journeys West
A series of lessons utilizing primary texts, including narratives, photographs, and maps, through which students explore the following question: "What motivated thousands of people to journey west during the 1800s?"
University of Groningen
American History: Essays: The Iron Horse: Land Departments and Immigration
From a lengthy essay on the history of the railroad in the United States. This section describes what the Land Department and the Bureau of Immigration did in order to attract new immigrants to settle along the railroad line. The...
Other
Images of the American West: Oklahoma
This is a photo gallery of white homeseekers known as Boomers and other homesteaders settling the Oklahoma Territory in the late 1800's.
PBS
Pbs the West: Exodusters
Contains a description of the Exodusters and their impact on the American West through their immigration.
Alabama Learning Exchange
Alex: Settling the West: Westward Expansion
During this lesson plan, students will have the opportunity to experience the westward expansion through literature and the Internet. By creating a brochure and a slideshow presentation, students will become aware of the difficulties...
University of Groningen
American History: Essays: u.s. & the Netherlands
This resource is an overview of the relationship of the Dutch West India Company and the settling of New Netherlands under the "patroon" system, which brought many Dutch colonists to the New World.
University of Groningen
American History: Outlines: The Last Frontier
Describes the various forces and events that shaped the expansion of the western frontier in the mid- to late 1800s.
PBS
Pbs the West: Fight No More Forever (1874 1877)
From the PBS critically acclaimed series, "The West" comes this introduction to the Indian Wars that were waged in the course of settling the frontier.
Other
Postbellum African American Society and Culture: Black Migration
From the Encyclopedia of American Social History. Read about the black migration to the West, primarily Kansas and Oklahoma after the end of Reconstruction and the institution of black codes in the South.
Library of Congress
Loc: African American Mosaic: Western Migration and Homesteading
Contains text and photos on the African-American exodus to the West. Includes primary source documents and maps from the era.