Dover Sherborn Middle School Curriculum Road Maps

 

 

Course Title:                 U.S. History                             Grade:              8         

 

Unit:                             Sectionalism                                        

Month Presented:         April                                      Unit Length (in weeks):    4         

 

Essential Question (s):

 

·          What or who is more important, the group or the individual? 

·          What rights are “inalienable?”

 

Learning Objectives:

1.                    Identify and classify issues that contributed to tensions between the three different regions of the United States.

 

2.                   Compare and contrast differing views on slavery.

 

3.                   Identify the events that led up to the secession of the South from the United States.  

 

Skills:               Primary Document analysis, Mapmaking and analysis, Presentation and speaking                        skills, Cooperative Group work, Organizing and framing written responses

 

Instructional Strategies & Activities

 

·          Features of a Young Nation  Graphic Organizer Activity

·          Uncle Tom’s Cabin segment- its message then, stereotypes now

·          Dred Scott Case:      dramatic reading

·          The Geography of Sectionalism: statehood, representation and slavery in the United States- math and mapping activity

·          Debate:       Political Solutions for Slavery:    moderate and conservative

·          Radical Solutions for Slavery:            John Brown in Bleeding KS

·          Primary Sources:

                                    Republican Party Platform

                                    Dred Scott Decision

                                    John Brown’s Letter

                                    John Brown’s Body (poem/song)

                                    Fugitive Slave Law

                                    Frederick Douglass Speech 1852

·          Video/Multimedia:

The American Experience:            John Brown’s Holy War

“Ride with the Devil” (segment)

                                    “Gone with the Wind” (segment)

 

Materials Utilized:         Primary Sources, Political cartoons, Graphic organizers, Rubrics, CD-                                     Roms, Video, Overhead Projector, Art

 

Assessment Strategies:  tests, quizzes, essays, daily preparation, oral presentations, mapmaking