10/18 and 10/19 lesson plan

SOLs USI.4 a) The student will demonstrate knowledge of European Exploration in North America and
West Africa by describing the motivations for, obstacles to, and accomplishments of the Spanish, French,
Portuguese, and English explorations.

Objectives
Understand- European explorers connected societies that had previously been isolated
Know- the name, nationality, and route of important explorers
John Cabot
Samuel de Champlain
Robert La Salle
Fransisco Coronado
Be able to- analyze and interpret maps to explain relationships between geographic features and
historical events
- interpret ideas and events from different historical perspectives
Assessments
Diagnostic: The Do-now activity will have students identify the routes of the explorers we are
studying. This is the material we covered on Monday. Since they will continue learning about
those explorers today, it will be important that the students know the basic information about
them from Mondays class. This question will be on the projector, and students will answer on
paper I will provide as they come in. We will check them as a group, but not grade them. If they
seem to be especially weak in one or more explorers, I will review yesterdays powerpoint and
maps.
Formative: As students read more about the explorers, they will create historical head where
they show important information about an explorer, such as their destination, what country they
sailed for, the year of their exploration, and other accomplishments as thoughts drawn inside or
around a template of a head. This will be the main activity of the class, and it will give me a good
opportunity to gauge how well they understand the material as they are processing it.
Summative: Todays lesson will be tested during the American Indians and Exploration Unit test,
which will take place on October 26.
Materials
Textbooks- we will be using p 55
Map of explorers routes drawn on the board (this will be left over from Mondays lesson)

Historical Head Templates and instructions

Paper for do now
Markers, Crayons, colored pencils

Procedures
Do Now: There will be a map on the board showing the routes of explorers, which we began to
study during the short class on Monday. Each route will be labled with a letter. The do now will
be to match the name of each explorer with the letter of their route. About 5-10 minutes
Historical Heads:
Students will have a packet with four blank outlines of heads, one to represent each explorer. For
each one, they will have time to read and take notes about them, and then draw and/or write what
they learn about that explorer in and around the head as thoughts they might be having. I
anticipate spending about five minutes explaining this activity before we begin. They will have
ten minutes to read and take notes about each explorer, and then ten minutes to represent that
information on their head. Students should use the textbook, and may supplement it with our
class notes sheet from Monday. If they finish representing all of the required information on their
head and still have time, they may use their chromebook to find other relevant, interesting
information to include, but this should only come after they have included all required
information.
Required information for historical heads of Coronado, Cabot, Le Salle, and Champlain
Name
Year
Country this explorer explored for
Goal for exploration
Region of North America they explored
Bodies of water they traveled on
How they interacted with Indians they met
(five minutes for instructions, then 10 minutes for reading, notes, and planning, 10 minutes for
drawing/ filling in explorers head. About 85 minutes total.)
Gallery walk: We will take one or two minutes to clean up and put away markers, crayons, etc.
Then I will tell the class to pick one of their heads that they are most proud of to share with their
classmates. I will divide the class in half into a 1 group and 2 group. We will spend five
minutes or less allowing the 1 group to display they head they are most proud of, during this
time, 2 group will be able to move around the room seeing their peers work. Then we will

switch and 2 group will display their work. After I have split the class but before they begin
displaying their work, we will have a short discussion about appropriate behavior during this
activity. I will ask students to suggest what types of questions might be appropriate so that they
can learn from each others work, and I will ask them to have one observer and no more for each
piece of work so that this does not turn into social hour.
(Between directions, transitions, and both groups displaying their work, this should take about 15
minutes, which will bring us to the end of class.)

Differentiation
Differentiation by readiness: Students who have different readiness levels have may be
challenged by completing this assignment in different ways. For some students, this may mean
that they put one or two word phrases in or around the head, such as place names. Other students
may end up integrating the different information about each explorer in one longer sentence or
more complex picture. In addition, some students may have time to do additional research on one
or more of the explorers to include.
Differentiation by interest: As long as students include all of the information for each explorer,
they may represent it however they like using the materials in the classroom. For some, this may
mean writing, for others, it will likely be drawing. Either way, if they can point out their answers,
it will be acceptable.