Edison School District

Developing a desire for lifelong learning

United States History

and Geography: Making a New Nation

Students describe the major        pre-Columbian settlements, including the cliff dwellers and pueblo people of the desert Southwest, the American Indians of the Pacific Northwest, the nomadic nations of the Great Plains, and the woodland peoples east of the Mississippi River.

Þ Describe how geography and        climate influenced the way various nations lived and adjusted to the natural environment, including   locations of villages, the distinct structures that they built, and how they obtained food, clothing, tools, and utensils.

Þ Describe their varied customs and folklore traditions.

Þ Explain their varied economies and systems of government.

Students trace the routes of early explorers and describe the early explorations of the Americas.

Þ Describe the entrepreneurial characteristics of early explorers and the technological developments that made sea exploration by latitude and longitude possible

Þ Explain the aims, obstacles, and accomplishments of the explorers, sponsors, and leaders of key  European expeditions and the  reasons Europeans chose to  explore and colonize the world.

Þ Trace the routes of the major land explorers of the United

Þ States, the distances traveled by explorers, and the Atlantic trade routes that linked Africa, the West Indies, the British colonies, and Europe.

Þ Locate on maps of North and South America land claimed by Spain, France, England, Portugal, the      Netherlands, Sweden, and Russia.

Students describe the cooperation and conflict that existed among the        American Indians and between the      Indian nations and the new settlers.

Þ Describe the competition among the English, French, Spanish, Dutch, and Indian nations for control of North America.

Þ Describe the cooperation that existed between the colonists and Indians during the 1600s and 1700s.

Þ Examine the conflicts before the Revolutionary War.

Þ Discuss the role of broken treaties and massacres and the factors that led to the Indians’ defeat, including the resistance of Indian nations to encroachments and assimilation.

Þ Describe the internecine Indian conflicts, including the competing claims for control of lands.

Þ Explain the influence and   achievements of significant leaders of the time.

Students understand the political, religious, social, & economic institutions that evolved in the colonial era.

Þ Understand the influence of location and physical setting on the founding of the original 13 colonies, and identify on a map the locations of the colonies and of the American Indian nations already inhabiting these areas.

Þ Identify the major individuals and groups responsible for the founding of the various colonies and the reasons for their founding.

Þ Describe the religious aspects of the earliest colonies.

Þ Identify the significance and leaders of the First Great Awakening, which marked a shift in religious ideas,  practices, and allegiances in the  colonial period, the growth of religious toleration, and free exercise of      

Þ religion.

Þ Understand how the British        colonial period created the basis for the development of political self-government and a free-market economic system and the differences between the British, Spanish, and French colonial      systems.

Þ Describe the introduction of  slavery into America, the           responses of slave families to their condition, the ongoing struggle between proponents and opponents of slavery, and the gradual institutionalization of slavery in the South.

Þ Explain the early democratic ideas and practices that emerged during the colonial period,        including the significance of      representative assemblies and town meetings.

Students explain the causes of the American Revolution.

Þ Understand how political,        religious, and economic ideas and interests brought about the Revolution

Þ Know the significance of the first and second Continental  Congresses and of the  Committees of Correspondence.

Þ Understand the people and events associated with the drafting and signing of the Declaration of     Independence and the document’s significance, including the key political concepts it embodies, the origins of those concepts, and its role in severing ties with Great Britain.

Þ Describe the views, lives, and    impact of key individuals during this period.

Students understand the course and consequences of the American Revolution.

Þ Identify and map the major     military battles, campaigns, and  turning points of the Revolutionary War, the roles of the  American and British