Appendix on Implementing District Standards
Richmond Public Schools uses the Virginia Standards of Learning. The standards start broad and then become more refined with the sub-standards.
USII.4. The student will apply social science skills to understand how life changed after the Civil War by examining the reasons for westward expansion, including its impact on American Indians; explaining the reasons for the increase in immigration, growth of cities, and challenges arising from this expansion; and describing racial segregation, the rise of “Jim Crow,” and other constraints faced by. African Americans and other groups in the post-Reconstruction South. This theme is constantly addressed throughout the unit because Jim Crow is ever present in American history. There are a few interactions with Native Americans that are discussed in this standard and Braiding Sweetgrass helps to explain the interactions of Americans with Native Americans and why assimilation was not successful.
USII.6. The student will apply social science skills to understand social, economic, and technological changes of the early twentieth century by describing the social and economic changes that took place, including prohibition and the Great Migration north and west. Students will address this theme when reading through Esperanza Rising.
USII.7. The student will apply social science skills to understand the major causes and effects of American involvement in World War II by explaining the causes and events that led to American involvement in the war, including the attack on Pearl Harbor; and explaining the impact of the war on the home front. The first sub-standard directly discusses the attack on Pearl Harbor. The second sub-standard discusses the impact of that attack. Including the treatment of Japanese Americans and African Americans.
USII.8. The student will apply social science skills to understand the economic, social, and political transformation of the United States and the world between the end of World War II and the present by describing the changing patterns of society, including expanded educational and economic opportunities for military veterans, women, and minorities. Throughout the novel Brown Girl Dreaming the author discusses the ever-changing role of women throughout society. Braiding Sweetgrass also addresses the changes in treatment to the American Indian population.
USII.9. The student will apply social science skills to understand the key domestic and international issues during the second half of the twentieth century and early twenty-first centuries by examining the impact of the Civil Rights Movement, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the changing role of women on all Americans; and evaluating and explaining American foreign policy, immigration, the global environment, and other emerging issues. This unit will focus more on the Civil Rights Movement as well as immigration and other emerging issues, which would cover xenophobia as it arises following the attacks on September 11, 2001. Many of the books listed in the bibliography would fall under this standard.
Comments: