The Reasons for Expansion

This week has been impacted by a variety of different events. We had our last two days of MISA testing and the school play performance of "Sleeping Beauty".  Despite the multiple impacts, we have continued to explore the impacts of Westward Expansion on the United States and its population.

On Monday and Tuesday, we discussed events that might motivate someone to go West. We began with the Lewis and Clark expedition and its impact in opening the West through mapping and samples/information about over two hundred types of plants and animals. We discussed the power of knowing what lay beyond the Northwest Territory. Not being afraid of Woolly Mammoths, giant lions, and mountains of salt made several students willing to pack their bags. We then moved to the Homestead Act. This piece of legislation offered 160 acres of land to men, women, former enslaved people, and newly made citizens in a time when that would have often been either difficult or impossible.

We then learned about the most "exciting" part of the Homestead Act, land rushes. Watching the land rush scene from "Far and Away" was the highlight of the lesson. Finally, we ended with the California Gold Rush where the kids were shocked to discover that the real way to make your fortune was not mining but selling goods and services to the miners.

On Wednesday and Thursday we learned about how the resources, gained with our expansion westward, were utilized. Students were divided into one of four groups (logging, mining, cattle, or bison) in which they were expected to become an expert. They worked with peers on the same topic to read text and identify costs and benefits for their resource use. Then, they returned to their table groups and shared their knowledge with their tablemates. Finally, based on the information shared, the kids were asked to decide whether our use of resources supported our expansion into the west. 

We ended the week with a focus on innovations that made surviving in the West possible. We looked at the telegraph, steamboats and steamships, railroads, barbed wire, windmills, the steel plow, and the mechanical reaper - just to name a few.  To demonstrate their understanding, students were asked to create an advertisement for one of the innovations to encourage pioneers to move west to buy and use their product.