This IDM inquiry leads students through an investigation of the decision by the United States to use atomic weapons on Japan at the end of World War II.

The compelling question “Was the Dropping of Atomic Weapons on Japan an Appropriate Use of Force?” asks students to identify and weigh evidence from multiple primary and secondary sources supplied as well as others found by the student.

This unit of study consisits of 5 activities to investigate the effects of Native American Boarding Schools on the individual, the family, and the community. Students will analyze before and after pictures of indigenous students, primary source comments given by boarding school survivors, and historic newspapers to asertain attitudes towards Native Americans during this time period. Middle school students will conclude with a short writing assignment. Secondary students will prepare an essay that relates the attitudes of the time to the practices in Native American Boarding Schools. This is an emotionally difficult subject and special care should be taken if you have Native students in your classrooms, as this topic is traumatic for families who have survived this experience. See Multicultural Considerations before beginning.

Educational videos, documentaries, book club sessions, conversations, and a podcast produced by the Minidoka Pilgrimage that cover a variety of topics on the Japanese American WWII incarceration. Image of Minidoka Internment Camp by Dave Horalek, courtesy of Pixabay

This unit begins by asking students to consider life in Africa before colonization and the forced enslavement of Africans. Students read Omar ibn Said’s autobiography to understand the Islamic scholar’s experiences before he was captured in West Africa and after he was enslaved in America. Excerpts from Olaudah Equiano’s autobiography provide a detailed glimpse of his childhood in Africa before he was kidnapped and sold into slavery. Students examine these two stories and others for evidence of resistance, liberation, connection to culture, and shared humanity as they develop a response to the question: How can we better understand America’s past and present by listening to often omitted and unheard voices from the slave trade? Working in teams, students create a podcast about an unheard story in order to start a conversation about the lasting effects of the Transatlantic slave trade and the importance of Black history in America.

In this activity, students will analyze a primary source document to find relevant historical data and measure the degree of agreement and disagreement during the Constitutional Convention.

The WSCSS K-8 Conference was about culturally responsive teaching in Social Studies classrooms. Listen to recorded sessions from Washington educators.

These resources are available for free online viewing.

These 5 posters celebrate influential Americans of Chinese Descent in the state of Washington! 

Use this rubric to review lessons and units with respect to the Washington State Social Studies Learning Standards and the Washington ELA and Literacy in History/Social Studies Standards. 

Highlights from the past and present of the state of Washington, from the rich online collections of the Library of Congress.

Black Washington is the Washington State Historical Society’s ongoing initiative to commemorate the presence, contributions, and evolving impact of local Black communities..Read, watch, and listen to stories about community organizing, engaging in labor and operating business, striving for civil rights, achieving education, pursuing the arts, and overcoming adversity and racism.

Social studies is a vital component of education in Washington state. The Office of Superintend¬ent of Public Instruction (OSPI) envisions “all students prepared for post-secondary pathways, careers, and civic engagement.” Additionally, the National Council for the Social Studies states, “The primary purpose of social studies is to help young people make informed and reasoned decisions for the public good as citizens of a culturally diverse, democratic society in an inter¬dependent world.”

Students who receive quality instruction in social studies are engaged in learning that promotes inquiry and thoughtful civic participation. With this in mind, we are pleased to introduce OSPI’s updated Washington State K–12 Learning Standards for Social Studies. Our hope is that you will find these standards to be rigorous, thoughtful, inquiry-driven, and organized for easy accessibility.

This is a seven-day unit that explores how people create, interact, and change structures of power and authority over time by answering these essential questions/key ideas:
• Why is the right to vote the most important right?
• Who was Emma Smith Devoe?
• Why did she work so hard to get women the right to vote?
• Why were the Western States more open to women voting than the East?
• What arguments did men and institutions use to keep women from voting?

In this lesson to accompany an online exhibit, students will:
• Review the different roles of government on the federal, state, tribal, and local level.
• Predict roles women have played in the government of Washington state and at the federal level.
• Analyze the growing impact women have had on Washington state governments.
• Engage in small and large-group discussions that use evidence-based arguments.

Water rights are a big deal for many reasons. In this lesson, students learn where water comes from, what water rights are, and how a variety of competing interests factor into managing water resources in Washington State.

Got a 1:1 classroom? Find fillable PDF versions of this lesson’s materials below.

LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Identify key factors involved in Washington’s water resource management
Explain the basics of water rights and the prior appropriation doctrine
Analyze how competing interests affect water resources
Predict how impacts on a water source could affect competing interests

The goal of this inquiry is for students to gain an informed, critical perspective on the Great Migration of African Americans from the South to the North and West from 1915-1970.  By investigating the movement, including the injustice of Jim Crow in the South, and the racism migrants continued to face in the North and West, students will examine how the migration changed the social fabric of the United States.  Through taking a critical look at the documents, students should understand the extent to which this movement was “great,” and determine if the title Great Migration is fitting. Photo: Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Jean Blackwell Hutson Research and Reference Division, The New York Public Library (1168439), CC BY 4.0 

In this activity, students will examine the original and final drafts of the Constitution and evaluate the significance of the selection of the words "We the People."

The first ten amendments to the U.S. Constitution are known as our Bill of Rights, which serve as a guarantee for our freedoms. But these amendments almost didn’t happen. Join a group of middle schoolers on a tour of Washington, D.C. as they learn about the Constitution and what it means to be “We the People.” The “We the People” videos are produced in collaboration with the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.

Once a vision for the United States of America, crafted by our founding fathers, the Declaration of Independence is preserved as living proof of our history at the National Archives and Records Administration. Join a group of middle schoolers on a tour of Washington, D.C. as they learn about this document and others and what it means to be “We the People.” The “We the People” videos are produced in collaboration with the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.

The president of the United States serves as the chief executive and commander of the armed forces, all defined in Article II of the Constitution as the executive branch. Join a group of middle schoolers on a tour of Washington, D.C. as they learn about the Constitution and what it means to be "We the People." The "We the People" videos are produced in collaboration with the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.

Of the three branches of our government, many believe that the most important is the one directly elected by "We the People": the legislative branch, represented by the two houses of the U.S. Congress at the Capitol building. Join a group of middle schoolers on a tour of Washington, D.C. as they learn about the Constitution and what it means to be "We the People." The "We the People" videos are produced in collaboration with the U.S. Capitol Historical Society.