Reconstruction: Reunifying the nation brought many challenges. While freed African Americans created new lives for themselves in the absence of slavery, constitutional amendments and federal legislation sought to expand rights and protect the citizenship of African Americans. These federal initiatives begun during Reconstruction were challenged on many levels impacting the lives of all Americans.
Students will study the civil rights movement and the Great Society and they were attempts by people and the government to address major social, legal, economic, and environmental problems. Additionally, students will investigate how the subsequent economic recession called for a new economic program.
Students will investigate how industrialization and immigration contributed to the urbanization of America. Students will study industrialization and the increased demand for labor leading to migration to cities and increased immigration to the United States. Students will investigate challenges and progressions that came with this industrialization period including population density, diversity, poor working conditions as well as social, cultural, and economic lives of people and conflicts over immigration. In addition, students will also have the opportunity to investigate women’s rights and the suffrage movement that spurred the creation of government reform policies.
Beginning in the second half of the 19th century, economic, political, and cultural factors contributed to a push for westward expansion and more aggressive United States foreign policy. In this unit, students will explore continued conflicts with Native Americans and the effect the Spanish-American war had on the rise of the United States as an imperial power. In addition, students will study Pacific trade and increased United States foreign interactions.
Students will study the various diplomatic, economic, and ideological factors contributed to the United States decision to enter World War I. Students will investigate how involvement in the war significantly altered the lives of Americans, and how postwar America was characterized by economic prosperity, technological innovations, and changes in the workplace.
Students will study how economic and environmental disasters in the 1930s created hardships for many Americans. In addition, students will investigate, despite much debate about the appropriate role of government, how President Franklin D. Roosevelt helped to create intensive government interventions in the United States economy and society.
Students will study the aggression of the Axis powers that threatened United States security and led to its entry into World War II. Students will explore the nature and consequences of warfare during World War II and how it transformed the United States and the global community. In addition, students will investigate the damage from total warfare and atrocities such as the Holocaust and how they led to a call for international efforts to protect human rights and prevent future wars.
Students will study the period after World War II and how it has been characterized by an ideological and political struggle, first between the United States and communism during the Cold War, then between the United States and forces of instability in the Middle East. In addition, students will investigate increased economic interdependence and competition, as well as environmental concerns, as just a few of the challenges faced by the United States.
After World War II, the population of the United States rose sharply as a result of both natural increases and immigration. Population movements have resulted in changes to the American landscape and shifting political power. An aging population is affecting the economy and straining public resources. In this unit students will examine the impact of the war on shifts in the population, demographics and infrastructure of America.
