Voices of the Revolution
This is one my favorite units to teach in fifth grade. We actually begin this unit by going all the way back to exploration. We spend time in our social studies text understanding where those explorers came from, what they were looking for, and where they ended up. To build even more background knowledge, we also look at the 13 original British colonies. From there, we delve into the causes of the Revolution in our social studies text. But we don't stop there! We also study how the American Revolution shaped our society and the Declaration of Independence. Once we have sufficient background knowledge, we read three stories in our reading anthology. Each story is focused on one person - each with a different perspective about the Revolutionary War.
"And Then What Happened, Paul Revere..." by Jean Fritz: A Patriot's perspective
"Katie's Trunk" by Ann Turner: A Loyalist perspective
"James Forten" by Walter Dean Myers: An African American sailmaker that fought at sea
Where are we?
January 2nd: learning the states and their capitals (there will be random "pop" assessments so make sure you study!
January 3rd: summarizing the movement of the Ancient Americans to understand who was here first
January 4th-11th: Age of Exploration (very brief overview); who were the nations/people exploring, what were they looking for, where did they go, what did they find when they got there?
January 15th: Begin the study of the colonies (map the original 13 British colonies); gather information to build understanding of the colonial regions (New England, Middle, and Souther colonies); summarize understanding of colonies
January 18th: Test of states and capitals (East Coast region to Louisiana)
January 24th: Causes of the French and Indian War
January 29th: Effects the French and Indian War had on the colonists
January 30th/31st: Synthesizing information in order to understand why governments tax their citizens
Week of February 4th: Introducing the SQ3R (Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review) strategy for reading non-fiction. Reading "Early Conflicts with Britain" chapter in social studies text; using an outline for main ideas and details; writing summary from the outline.
Week of February 11th: Outdoor School preparations and Outdoor School trip
Week of February 19th: Focus on understanding the causes of the Revolutionary War (creating a timeline; creating a T chart outlining the differences of opinion between the Loyalists and the Patriots)
Week of February 25th: MSA review
March 4th: MSA review
March 5th-6th: Reading MSA
March 14th: Students will be meeting with their debate teams during reading. Students must have written notes ready to share with their team. Those notes should contain evidence supporting their viewpoint (either Patriot or Loyalist). See below for more information.
March 15th: Debate
Reading Skills Covered:
Summarizing - 2 organizers were shared:
- 5W's (who, what, when, where, why)
Summary of the first peoples in the Americas:
Who: paleo-indians
What: crossed the Beringia Land Bridge
When: during the ice age
Where: from Asia to the Americas
Why: hunters following migrating animal herds
Summary: The Pale-Indians crossed the Beringia Land Bridge during the Ice Age. These hunters traveled from
Asia to the Americas because they were following the migrating animal herds.
- Somebody, Wanted, But, Then, So (Summary of the explorers)
Somebody: European Explorers
Wanted: independent trade routes to the East (China)
But: they ended up discovering two new continents
Then: they explored this new land
So: they gained power, wealth, and land
Summary: The European explorers wanted an independent trade route to the East. But, they ended up
discovering two new continents. They explored these continents and so they gained power, wealth, and new land.
Identifying main idea and important details - we used an outline as well as just point out the main idea and underlining the important details in text:
- When reading nonfiction text, many times the title and/or headings will be the main idea. Then we find the important details by asking who, what, when, where, why, and how about the main idea. If those questions can't be answered, we find important details by constantly referring back to the main idea and asking ourselves "Does this tell about the main idea?"
- We also were able to write a summary using an outline of the main idea and important details
Debate Information:
Debate team meeting - March 14th (students meet with others in class that share the same viewpoint to compare notes and prepare for the debate.
Debate - March 15th
A letter was sent home on March 4th along with the scoring rubric (see rubric at bottom of page).
Students will be required to have written notes and a list of sources. The notes should contain information about the disagreements and/or viewpoints between the Patriots and Loyalists, such as: taxes (Sugar Act, Stamp Act, Townshend Acts, Coercive/Intolerable Acts), Boston Tea Party, Boston Massacre, Sons of Liberty, Olive Branch Petition, etc. All of these things (and more) can be found in the Social Studies text (pages were given to students on March 4th). Students can also refer to their reading textbook. The two stories that will help the most are: And Then What Happened, Paul Revere; Katie's Trunk.
During the viewing of "John Adams" (in class), students created a T chart (2 column chart) that compared the Patriot perspective, actions, etc. to the Loyalist perspective, actions, etc. Students should continue to use this and add to it as they find information that will support one side or the other. Students can also do more research with other sources. I have offered books from my classroom library as well. The gathering of information and creation of notes is to be done independently (at home). Students should be finished with information gathering and note taking by Wednesday, March 13th so that they can share information with their team on Thursday, March 14th in class.
"And Then What Happened, Paul Revere..." by Jean Fritz: A Patriot's perspective
"Katie's Trunk" by Ann Turner: A Loyalist perspective
"James Forten" by Walter Dean Myers: An African American sailmaker that fought at sea
Where are we?
January 2nd: learning the states and their capitals (there will be random "pop" assessments so make sure you study!
January 3rd: summarizing the movement of the Ancient Americans to understand who was here first
January 4th-11th: Age of Exploration (very brief overview); who were the nations/people exploring, what were they looking for, where did they go, what did they find when they got there?
January 15th: Begin the study of the colonies (map the original 13 British colonies); gather information to build understanding of the colonial regions (New England, Middle, and Souther colonies); summarize understanding of colonies
January 18th: Test of states and capitals (East Coast region to Louisiana)
January 24th: Causes of the French and Indian War
January 29th: Effects the French and Indian War had on the colonists
January 30th/31st: Synthesizing information in order to understand why governments tax their citizens
Week of February 4th: Introducing the SQ3R (Survey, Question, Read, Recite, Review) strategy for reading non-fiction. Reading "Early Conflicts with Britain" chapter in social studies text; using an outline for main ideas and details; writing summary from the outline.
Week of February 11th: Outdoor School preparations and Outdoor School trip
Week of February 19th: Focus on understanding the causes of the Revolutionary War (creating a timeline; creating a T chart outlining the differences of opinion between the Loyalists and the Patriots)
Week of February 25th: MSA review
March 4th: MSA review
March 5th-6th: Reading MSA
March 14th: Students will be meeting with their debate teams during reading. Students must have written notes ready to share with their team. Those notes should contain evidence supporting their viewpoint (either Patriot or Loyalist). See below for more information.
March 15th: Debate
Reading Skills Covered:
Summarizing - 2 organizers were shared:
- 5W's (who, what, when, where, why)
Summary of the first peoples in the Americas:
Who: paleo-indians
What: crossed the Beringia Land Bridge
When: during the ice age
Where: from Asia to the Americas
Why: hunters following migrating animal herds
Summary: The Pale-Indians crossed the Beringia Land Bridge during the Ice Age. These hunters traveled from
Asia to the Americas because they were following the migrating animal herds.
- Somebody, Wanted, But, Then, So (Summary of the explorers)
Somebody: European Explorers
Wanted: independent trade routes to the East (China)
But: they ended up discovering two new continents
Then: they explored this new land
So: they gained power, wealth, and land
Summary: The European explorers wanted an independent trade route to the East. But, they ended up
discovering two new continents. They explored these continents and so they gained power, wealth, and new land.
Identifying main idea and important details - we used an outline as well as just point out the main idea and underlining the important details in text:
- When reading nonfiction text, many times the title and/or headings will be the main idea. Then we find the important details by asking who, what, when, where, why, and how about the main idea. If those questions can't be answered, we find important details by constantly referring back to the main idea and asking ourselves "Does this tell about the main idea?"
- We also were able to write a summary using an outline of the main idea and important details
Debate Information:
Debate team meeting - March 14th (students meet with others in class that share the same viewpoint to compare notes and prepare for the debate.
Debate - March 15th
A letter was sent home on March 4th along with the scoring rubric (see rubric at bottom of page).
Students will be required to have written notes and a list of sources. The notes should contain information about the disagreements and/or viewpoints between the Patriots and Loyalists, such as: taxes (Sugar Act, Stamp Act, Townshend Acts, Coercive/Intolerable Acts), Boston Tea Party, Boston Massacre, Sons of Liberty, Olive Branch Petition, etc. All of these things (and more) can be found in the Social Studies text (pages were given to students on March 4th). Students can also refer to their reading textbook. The two stories that will help the most are: And Then What Happened, Paul Revere; Katie's Trunk.
During the viewing of "John Adams" (in class), students created a T chart (2 column chart) that compared the Patriot perspective, actions, etc. to the Loyalist perspective, actions, etc. Students should continue to use this and add to it as they find information that will support one side or the other. Students can also do more research with other sources. I have offered books from my classroom library as well. The gathering of information and creation of notes is to be done independently (at home). Students should be finished with information gathering and note taking by Wednesday, March 13th so that they can share information with their team on Thursday, March 14th in class.
debate_rubric.doc | |
File Size: | 40 kb |
File Type: | doc |