A Social Studies Resource Unit for Fourth Grade Students
Submitted as Partial Requirement for CRIN E05
Elementary and Middle Social Studies Curriculum and Instruction
Professor Gail McEachron
Fall 2012
Prepared By:
CailyBridgeland
Introduction
While segregation and Massive Resistance were major national issues in the United States during the 1950s, these subjects had special relevance to the state of Virginia. Several important people and key political events occurred in Virginia that triggered desegregation and the ensuing Massive Resistance that temporarily banned equal rights and education. According to Gilliam (2000,) “the political compulsions for Massive Resistance lay in the southside of Virginia” (p. 453). It is important for students to be informed about the history surrounding the Civil Rights movement, desegregation, and Massive Resistance in order to understand the value of the U.S. Constitution, the need to protect it, and the negative consequences that result when it is not upheld.
This narrative covers information required by the Virginia Department of Education Standards of Learning and the National Standards for History (see Appendix A for standard correlations) in order to portray how this topic was highly important on both a state and national level. Corresponding with the Virginia SOLs, students will gain knowledge of twentieth-century Virginia by identifying the social and political events linked to desegregation and Massive Resistance and their relationship to national history (VS 9C). Students will also study how this period in history was significant to their state and helped forge its unique identity(NSH 3E) by analyzing historical figures whoexemplified or disobeyed values and principles of American democracy in their local community (NSH 4B-C). While this narrative primarily focuses the state’s contributions to this movement, it also shows how the landmarks, people, and accomplishments in Virginia during this timewere relevant on a national scale. Students will analyze how over the last 200 years, individuals and groups in American society have struggled to achieve the liberties and equality promised in the principles of American democracy (NSH 4A).They will use the knowledge they have gained from this historical period to protect one another’s rights and prevent future discrimination. Students will learn, in the words of Martin Luther King, that “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere” (Ling, 74).
Key Ideas and Events:
In order to understand the movement toward desegregation, students need to be aware of important laws preceding it, such as the 1896‘Plessy vs. Ferguson’Supreme Court decision to have ‘separate but equal’ facilities, schools, restaurants, and hotels. This lawessentially prevented African Americans from being protected by the Fourteenth Amendment, which was supposed to ensure “equal protection of the laws” (Hakim, 69). ‘Plessy vs. Ferguson’ensured that African Americans remain at a forced distance from their Caucasian neighbors for the next fifty-eight years, relegating them to decrepitliving conditions. In 1954, the Supreme Court ruled through Brown vs. Board of Educationthat “separate but equal” facilities were ‘unconstitutional’—a decision that created an era of both opportunities and obstacles for African Americans.
Brown vs. Board of Educationwas actually a conglomeration of five courtcases from all different states, one of which took place in Virginia. The conflict began at Moton High School in Farmville, Virginia, where students wereangered by the conditions of their school: 450 students were crammed into a building that had a capacity for 200, and they had no access to a cafeteria or gym. Student engaged in a school-wide ‘walk-out’ and appealed to a member of the NAACP to sue the state of Virginia and demand for the abolition of segregated schools (Hakim, 69). This case was called Davis vs. County School Board of Prince Edward County.
After theBrown vs. Board of Education decision was passed, Virginia became the center of a Massive Resistance. In 1956, Virginian Senator Byrd proposed a ‘Southern Manifesto,’ which claimed that “the Supreme Court had no authority to stop school segregation” (Masoff, 69). He and 100 members of Congress, (mostly from former Confederate states) “pledged to find legal ways to prevent schools from opening their doors to both black and white students” (Masoff, 147). Warren County, Charlottesville, and Norfolk closed their public schools for a year, while Prince Edward County closed its schools for five(Sweeney, 215). While “many white children were educated in ‘private’ white academies funded with tax money [paid by white and black taxpayers,] black children were denied any schooling at all” (Hakim, 72). For the years following 1956, there were tensions between the Virginia state and National courts. When the United States courts ruled that schools had to reopen, the “Virginia legislature passed new laws telling local governments they no longer had to have a public school system” (Masoff, 147). African American children who wanted to attend school had to do so outside the county until 1964, when the U.S. Supreme Court passed the Civil Rights Act, forcing all schools to reopen.
Men, Women, Youth, and Children
There were several individuals from Virginia that played a key role in the movement surrounding desegregation. Senator Harry F. Byrd, who became the Virginia governor in 1926, “fabricated Massive Resistance and designed the Southern Manifesto,” hoping to “repel the federal court’s civil rights initiatives and sustain his white allies in counties heavily populated by blacks” (Ferrell, 177). Byrd’s decision influenced leaders in a number of other southern states, “including North Carolina, Florida, Mississippi, and Alabama, who were in the process of creating their own antidesegregation legislation” (Eskridge, 247). According to Lechner, (1998) “Massive Resistance was born, bred, and nurtured by the senior United States senator from Virginia,” although he was heavily assisted by Attorney General Lindsay Almond and Virginia’s Governor, Tom Stanley (p. 74).
While Byrd hindered the desegregation movement, many Virginians helped support it. For example, the Davis vs. County School Board case that helped influence the Brown vs. Board of Education decision was led by sixteen-year-old Barbara Johns, whoencrouraged117 students to protest and petition for a better school environment (Hakim, 69). Another important Virginian involved in this case was Oliver Hill, an African American lawyer who helped Johns take it to the Supreme Court. He, along with Thurgood Marshall and Spottswood Robinson III were “part of the team that won the landmark Brown v. Board of Education decision at the Supreme Court” (Masoff, 152).
Another important figure from Virginia who helped the desegregation cause was Irene Morgan. “While Rosa Parks is famous for refusing to give up her seat on a bus in Alabama in 1955, years before, in 1944, a similar protest by Irene Morgan, a black Virginian” (Masoff, 148). Morgan was arrested and found guilty when a bus driver tried to make her move to the back of the bus, but appealed her conviction. While the state Supreme Court upheld Virginia law, the U.S. Supreme Court declared the law unfair(Masoff, 148). Another important Virginian who furthered the desegregation movement was Governor Linwood Holton, Jr., who not only “appointed more black Virginians in Virginia government than any other governor before him,” but also sent his own children to two previously all-black schools in Richmond as soon as he became governor in 1969.
In the effort to desegregate, many Virginians were inspired by the words and actions of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and engaged in nonviolent protests, marches, and sit-ins in various parts of Virginia. In 1960, students from Virginia Union University gathered at Richmond’s largest department store and held sit-ins until the store finally changed their discrimination policies weeks later (Masoff, 149). While some of these protests were successful and nonviolent, others, such as the march in Danville in 1963, resulted in students being beaten and arrested by the police (Masoff, 148).
Closing and Legacy
With the implementation of the Civil Rights Act in 1964, many African Americans were able to enjoy the benefits of desegregation:improved education and transportation opened up better opportunities in the workforce, resulting in “the number of African Americans in white-collar jobs [jumping] from 10 percent to 40 percent of all black workers [between 1950 and 1990.] Black men and women were engineers, doctors, lawyers, politicians, ballplayers, government workers, and artists,” and by 1993, there were 40 black members of Congress (Hakim, 164). The end of segregation and Massive Resistance brought a future of opportunity and equality for African Americans because of the effort, courage, and bravery of many people in Virginia and the rest of the United States. Students should learn and reflect upon the history of this era in order to shun all forms of racism and injustice, and to remember that the United States wants to be remembered as having a legacy of equality, preserving American ideals, and living in harmony with fellow citizens.
Lesson #1—Maps and GlobesPrepared by: CailyBridgeland
Grade Level: 4th Grade
Students: 26 students
Space: Whole Group Instruction
Time: 1 hour
Standards: VS.1 The student will demonstrate skills for historical and geographical analysis and responsible citizenship, including the ability to
i) analyze and interpret maps to explain relationships among landforms, water features, climatic characteristics, and historical events
VS.2. The student will demonstrate knowledge of the physical geography and native peoples, past and present, of Virginia by
d) locating three American Indian language groups (the Algonquian, the Siouan, and the Iroquoian) on a map of Virginia
Materials: Three colored pencils, Instructional Input Chart, Independent Practice map handout, brown marker to draw architectural structures
Anticipatory Set: Begin by reviewing Virginia’s Five Regions from the lesson the previous day using the “Five Finger” rule that students learned. Looking at their left hand, students will use each of their fingers to remember what size each region is and in what order each comes. Ensure that a compass rose is drawn on the board so that students can hold their hands up to orient themselves directionally so that they can mentally compare their hand to the state of Virginia. For example, the little pinky smallest and farthest on the left will represent the Appalachian Plateau, which is also the smallest and farthest left in Virginia. The middle finger’s long length will remind the student that the Blue Ridge Mountains are the longest region in Virginia, and the short broad thumb farthest to the right will remind students that the Coastal Plain is that same shape and in that same position. The students will point to each finger and recite the Five Regions in order.
Objective/Purpose: Students will match their knowledge of the characteristics of each of the five Virginia regions with the new knowledge that they have gained about the three prominent Indian tribes. Students will match the characteristics of the five Virginia regions with the characteristics and living habits of each tribe and hypothesize which regions the tribes live in, what languages are spoken in which regions, and hypothesize which form of architectural home fits their environment. Students will use colored pencils to shade in the three sections where each language is spoken, and draw pictures of each of their home structures within these regions.
Instructional Input: Project a map of Virginia on the whiteboard that shows a clear division of the Five Regions of Virginia, with the different corresponding landforms and geographical characteristics that differentiate each of them from one another. Conduct a short lecture on the characteristics of the different regions of Virginia, discussing differentiating climates, landforms, bodies of water nearby, and crops. Next, introduce the Powhatan, Monacan, and Cherokee Tribes to the class, describing characteristics of each tribe’s ways of life that differentiate each from the other.
Modeling: As the lecture is being given, create a diagram labeled “Region,” “Characteristics,” and “Food,” to emphasize the important facts to remember about each of the Five Regions of Virginia, and fill in information as bullet points. Next, create a diagram labeled “Language” “Tribe” and “Characteristics” and “Architecture” in order to differentiate the Native American Tribes from one another. Students will copy the diagram in order to remember the necessary information to later match the Tribes to an appropriate region.
Check for Understanding: Ask students a number of questions to reinforce the topics:
1)How many tribes were discussed in the lecture and what are they called?
2)How many Virginia regions are there are what are they called?
3)Which characteristics will help match each Indian tribe, language, and structure to a corresponding Virginia region?
Guided Practice: Guide students through the first section of their task. Show students how to compare charts and complete the first portion for them as an example. Show students how the characteristics of “fishing” and being near a body of water corresponded to both the Tidewater region and those who spoke the Algonquian language. Shade the Tidewater region with a green colored pencil to show that Algonquian is the predominant language spoken there.
Independent Practice: Have students complete the rest of the map assignment on their own, matching the characteristics of the language spoken with the corresponding region of Virginia. Have them write down their hypotheses for why they think materials for specific shelters will correspond to certain regions. Walk around the room and help as questions arise.
Formative Assessment: During the lecture, check the body language of students and assess whether they are paying attention. Scaffold, and during the Check for Understanding section, assess whether student engagement and responses.
Summative Assessment: Students will turn in maps at the end of class, which will be written proof as to whether they understood the concepts and content, and can apply the map skills being taught. Check the answer to the students’ multiple choice question on the reference page.
Content/Background Information:
The American Indians were the first people who lived in Virginia and they inhabited all five of its regions. They spoke three major languages—Algonquian, Siouan, and Iroquoian—and were unique tribes that lived in different climates with varying geographic features and resources. Based on the geographic features and climate in which they lived, Indians built their homes out of different materials. In order to become properly educated on the state of Virginia, it is important to be able to recognize its five distinct regions and differentiate the landforms, characteristics, and crops grown in each. Part of this “responsible citizenship” mentioned in the standards is for students to not only know the history of the different regions of Virginia and its first peoples, but to also be able to use map skills to place where they lived geographically in the corresponding regions. Maps can show the varying geographical features, the important Virginia boundaries, an the location of their architectural homes.
*Project using the Five-Finger Modeling:
Instructional Input Chart
Region / Tidewater / Piedmont / Blue Ridge Mountains / Valley and Ridge / Appalachian PlateauCharacteristics / *near water
*tides
*good farming land / *copper
*at foot of Blue Ridge mountains
*rich soil / *streams
*springs
*rounded mountains / *tree covered ridges
*Shenandoah Valley
*rich soil / *plateaus
*valleys streams
*coal
Food / *vegetable gardens
*corn
*clams, scallops, oysters / *wheat
*corn
*peach trees / *apples / *beef
*dairy / *vegetables
Tribe Characteristics
Language / Algonquian / Siouan / IroquoianTribe / Powhatan / Monacan / Cherokee
Characteristics / *fishing
*canoes
*vegetable gardens
*corn / *copper
*rich soil
*wheat / *wooded areas
*planting and harvesting
Architecture / *woven mats over bent branches / *shingles of bark or bundles of reeds tied together / *logs and woven branches filled with mud
(Guided and Independent Activity to Shade & label physical features)
Name: ______
Multiple Choice Summative Question:
1. What map skills are being utilized on the map of the Virginia regions?
a)Recognizing, locating, and drawing the boundaries of three different historical groups
b)Orienting a map and noting its directions
c)Using a scale to compute distances
d)Interpreting map symbols and visualizing what they mean
Answer: a
Resources:
Masoff, Joy. (2011). Our Virginia: Past and Present.West Palm Beach, FL: Five Ponds Press.
QuestGarden: Exploring the Five Regions of Virginia (2011). Retrieved from
Quizlet LLC: Introduction to Virginia Studies. (2012). Retrieved from
Preparer: CailyBridgelandCritical Thinking Arts Lesson Plan #2: Unifying Civil Rights Music
Context: Fourth grade Time: 1 Hour Space: Whole group instruction, 24 students
Virginia Department of Education Standards:
VS. 1g, h. The student will interpret ideas and events from different historical perspectives and evaluate and discuss issues orally and in writing
VS.8 a. The student will demonstrate knowledge of twentieth-and twenty-first-century Virginia by identifying the effects of segregation and “Jim Crow” on life for whites, African Americans, and American Indians.
SOL 4.14.1: Exhibit respect for the contributions of self and others in a music setting by participating in music activities that involve sharing, taking turns, and other ways of demonstrating good citizenship.