8th Grade Social Science Syllabus Mr



7th Grade Social Studies Syllabus Mr. Gasper

Objective: Students will develop their thinking, writing, reading, creativity, computer skills, and their ability to work as a team (a.k.a. historical skills) while developing a better understanding of US History and the world in which they live.

Beliefs:

1. Students need to learn to think. Thinking has learnable components that can be taught and the process of clear thinking should not be a mystery to students

2. Learning to think requires practice.

3. Thinking is hard work. Students and teachers must confront that fact and put in effort to work through it.

4. Thinking is for everyone. It is not the preserve of just the quick. It takes time to develop ideas and “aha Moments” cannot be forced but develop over time through deep reading, writing, and discussion.

5. Thinking is clarified by writing, respectful honest open discussion, debate, and art.

Subject: The focus for 7th Grade Social Studies is American History from Exploration through to Reconstruction. Units of study will include:

➢ Exploration and Colonization/ The World in 1500/ Colonization- Development of the Thirteen Colonies

➢ Independence and the New Nation: The American Revolution, the Events leading up to it; Early Republic: Whiskey Rebellion, French Revolution, and the Louisiana Purchase, and Lewis and Clark

➢ US Constitution

➢ Manifest Destiny: Westward Expansion/ War of 1812/ Indian Removal/ Trail of Tears/ Texas Revolution/ Mexican War/ Gold Rush/ Oregon Trail

➢ North and South Differences leading up to the American Civil War

➢ The American Civil War and Reconstruction

Texts:

- Creating America: Beginnings through Reconstruction (A digital CD- ROM version is available to copy) Students will be issued a book to keep at home for work outside of class while a class set will be here in school. The book is on our class page in the folder marked 7th grade book.

- Nystrom Atlas of United States History (In Class)

- Nextext books: Series of Primary documents on a variety of issues in US History (In Class)

- Primary Sources- One and two page excerpts of important documents from the period.

Class Activities:

➢ Bell Work/ Exit Ticket: Students have Bellwork at the beginning of class everyday that they answer on a sheet I give them as well as an exit ticket to reflect on what we did today.

➢ Study Guides: Study Guides will be given for each unit that will include:

o Objectives for the Unit

o KWL – What you KNOW? / What you WANT to know? / What you LEARNED?

o Vocabulary for the Unit including People, Places, Concepts. Students rate their words 1-4, define/ explain why important, and add pictures.

o Reading Assignments for the Unit

o Maps

➢ DBQs/ Document Based Questions: Students will be asked an open ended question, read a background page including timeline, analyze 3-6 primary and/or secondary Students are required to do three a year.

o Early Jamestown: Why Did so Many Colonists Die?

o Valley Forge: Would You Have Quit? (Optional, if we have time.)

o Was the US Justified in Going to War With Mexico?

o How Free Were Blacks in the North?

➢ Primary Source Documents: One to three page excerpts of documents that were influential to the time period. Here is a list of possible titles that we may use this year:

o The Discourses by Niccolo Machiavelli

o The Declaration of Independence

o Common Sense, by Thomas Paine

o The Lewis and Clark Journals

o Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville

o The Monroe Doctrine by James Monroe

➢ Critical Thinking Activities: Using Primary and Secondary to develop logic skills, debating, and writing skills to understand mysteries and unclear issues in our past. Here is a list of possible titles we may use this year:

o What happened to Roanoke?

o Did Pocahontas Really Rescue Captain John Smith?

o What Caused the Salem Witch Hysteria?

o Colonial Character creation/ Response Journal to Events

o What Caused the American Revolution?

o Was the Stamp Act Justified or Were the Colonists Justified in Not Paying It?

o Lewis and Clark Journals

o You Decide the Case: Supreme Court cases regarding the Bill of Rights

o Was Andrew Jackson a Representative of the Common People?

o What Was It Like to Be a Slave?

o What Were the Causes of the Civil War?

o Which Side Caused the Firing on Fort Sumter?

➢ Stanford Reading Like a Historian

To support the Common core standards for reading we will be using some of Stanford University’s activities that ask an open ended question that students will have to answer using a variety of a view points. Students will be working on skills that historians use on a regular basis: such as Contextualizing, Using Corroborating Evidence, Evaluating Sources, and Close reading.

o What caused King Philip’s War?

o Puritans: Selfish or Selfless?

o Why was George Whitefield so popular? (The Great Awakening)

o Why were the colonists so upset about the Stamp Act?

o What happened at the Battle of Lexington?

o Why did some colonists stay loyal during the American Revolution?

o How did Americans react to Shays Rebellion?

o Why was slavery kept in the US Constitution?

o What was the difference between Hamilton and Jefferson? Federalism vs. Anti

o Why was Indian Removal Supported?

o Why did Federalists oppose the Louisiana Purchase?

o Was Nat Turner a Hero or a Madman?

o How did Americans justify Westward Expansion?

o Were the Irish considered “white” in the 19th century?

o Was John Brown a misguided fanatic?

o Did Lincoln Free the Slaves or did they free themselves?

o How did Northern attitudes towards freed African-Americans change during Reconstruction?

o What was “radical” about the Radical Republicans plan for Reconstruction?

➢ History Workshop: Every semester students will be expected to complete one independent project about a more specific topic within the units we have been studying. Students will be given a list of suggested topics, but others are possible as long as approval is given. The purpose of History workshop is to have students develop their historical skills and allow them to present them in ways that they are comfortable in. Though, students will be expected to choose a variety of projects and forms to work on throughout the year.

Steps in the process:

1. Pick a topic, a form, and get it approved.

2. begin research and complete a pre-write sheet, get it approved

3. Rough draft

4. Peer Review of the Draft (signed by another)

5. Make revisions based on peer review

6. Turn in for teacher review

7. Make corrections based on teacher feedback written and/ or verbal

8. Turn in final, with copies of all of the steps.

|Types of Projects |Form of Project (The way in which it will be presented) |

|Biography (if working on a newspaper with another person, you do a few obituaries|- PowerPoint |

|of important people from the period.) | |

|- influential Parallel Lives, events, movements, or things |- Moviemaker |

|(In this activity you will investigate an important person, event, thing, or | |

|movement in the unit we are studying and compare it to a similar person, place, |- period newspaper (a compilation of more than one type of project|

|thing, or movement from another time or region of the world. Examples could be |that may be done with another student. Other relevant Pictures/ |

|comparing George Washington and Alexander the Great, comparing the Battle of |cartoons or advertisements may be added.) |

|Gettysburg to the Battle of Stalingrad, comparing the treat of Jews in Nazi | |

|Germany with the experience of African Americans in the South) |- series of political cartoons/ comic strips/ or allegorical |

| |pictures |

|- in depth investigation of an event, thing, or movement |- Scrapbook |

| |- Paper |

| |- Poster |

| |- video recorded skit with paper/ |

|- primary document analysis (Library of Congress slave narratives ) | |

Tests: Tests (Summative Assessments) will be given at the end of a given unit and may take various forms (90%) grade. Formative Assessments (10%) will be given daily in class.

Other: Other class projects and assignments will be given for the class as a whole. One of the goals will to have all students be able to use Inspiration, create a PowerPoint, and create a Microsoft Moviemaker project. As a result students may want to have a jump drive/ thumb drive to save their electronic projects on.

Retake: The school retake policy will be in effect according to the district handbook.

**Any questions please feel free to email me: gasperl@ (email is the best form of communication)

[pic]

................
................

In order to avoid copyright disputes, this page is only a partial summary.

Google Online Preview   Download