Introduction
This is an introductory science and social studies unit for 4th-grade students. This unit will be a brief inquiry, though also aiming for depth and breadth, into the history of treating infectious respiratory diseases by vaccination. Therefore, students will first explore what viruses are and how they operate. Students will also examine the structures of viruses and how they infect organisms. Students will then study when and where the first ideas of inoculation emerged in treating diseases caused by viruses, and how these ideas of inoculation were further developed into the first forms of vaccination to treat smallpox. Ultimately, this inquiry will lead students towards studying the COVID-19 pandemic and how, like smallpox pandemics before, the COVID-19 pandemic motivated the development of further innovations in vaccinations. These different historical eras will be tied together by a unifying theme, “the search for knowledge.” For example, students will explore this theme as they study the history of formative individuals who searched for the cures to infectious diseases. They will study how these individuals, when met by great challenges put forth by infectious diseases, inquired into the nature of the diseases to discover new forms of prophylaxis.
Within the unit, there will be four main sections. The first section will be a deep history that shows the evolutionary origins and functions of viruses. Here the curriculum will first explore the biological structures of viruses. For example, the curriculum will show how the structures of viruses, as well as the cellular anatomy of host viruses, facilitate the replication and propagation of viruses. Additionally, the curriculum will also show the evolutionary history of viruses, a history that perhaps spans billions of years into the past. Importantly, this history will also show that viruses have had a long and symbiotic relationship with many different forms of life throughout Earth’s epochs. The objective of this perspective is to show students that viruses have an immensely long history on the planet and a history that is intimately intertwined with nearly all forms of life, including ours.
Then, the curriculum will take a rather significant jump forward into history landing on the first written accounts of prophylaxis, specifically inoculation. This will provide students with the understanding of when and where these formative ideas first emerged. It will also bring forth a global perspective as the earliest forms of inoculation were developed and then recorded in the East, specifically: China, India, and the Middle East. These histories will not only show the first accounts of the intimate and destructive danger infectious respiratory diseases posed to civilizations, but also how these civilizations persevered by developing the first treatments, and then recording these treatments for posterity. Ultimately, this section of the curriculum will show how these early civilizations laid the foundational pillars for prophylaxis, foundations that later civilizations built would upon.
Next the curriculum will leap through history once again and land roughly in the late renaissance/early colonial period. Here the curriculum will reveal how other civilizations, namely European civilizations, built upon knowledge of prophylaxis that had been adopted from Eastern traditions and cultures. The curriculum will focus on smallpox in particular and how the disease inspired individuals, two prominent figures in particular: Lady Wortley Montagu and Edward Jenner, to innovate theories and tools such as inoculation and vaccination. Moreover, this section will examine how these early and formative innovations were paired with other interventions such as social distancing. Interestingly, the curriculum will also reveal how societies were passionately divided over scientific/medical interventions in the treatment of this disease and the critical reasoning opponents used in their arguments.
Finally, the curriculum will follow this historical theme, i.e., the pursuit of knowledge to treat infectious diseases to the COVID-19 pandemic. Similar to the previous section on smallpox, the curriculum will explore how the COVID-19 pandemic motivated new developments in the science of vaccines. More specifically, the curriculum will explore how the pandemic motivated the expedited development of mRNA vaccines to treat the disease. This will be explored through the history of Dr. Kariko and Dr. Weissman. Dr. Kariko, an expert in bio-chemistry, and Dr. Weissman, a physician and researcher, collaborated to innovate methods necessary in the development of mRNA vaccines for COVID-19. These methods later proved to be very successful as the mRNA vaccines were 94%-95% effective in preventing COVID-19. Their collaboration and the knowledge found was so ground-breaking that Dr. Kariko and Dr. Weismann were awarded the Nobel prize in physiology and medicine.
Ultimately, the goal of the curriculum is to provide students with a brief but comprehensive introduction into the nature and history of viruses and the efficacy of treating the diseases they cause with vaccines. This perspective is intended to integrate both the deep history as well as contemporary history so as to support students with a firm foundation of knowledge that then translates into agency when confronting the challenges of infectious respiratory diseases. In other words, it is the intention of the curriculum to provide students with the knowledge and understanding necessary to form their own understanding of the nature of respiratory diseases as well as the efficacy and ethics of medical interventions into these diseases. This will lay a firm foundation where students can then look towards the future and what possible innovations can continue to help societies navigate the challenges put forth by pandemics and their long and complex history with life and humanity.
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