Lewis & Clark for Grades PreK-2

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The focus for younger students in Lewis & Clark is on exploration and discovery. Students will get a brief overview of the Lewis and Clark adventure, the significance of six selected discoveries, and write a description of each object.

OBJECTIVE

Students will:

1. Investigate change over time to gain perspective on the successes of the Lewis and Clark journey
2. Demonstrates comprehension through experiential response

MATERIALS

1. Lewis & Clark Activities
2. Several copies of the box labels
3. Timeline (PDF) for assessment activity

SET UP AND PREPARE

1. As homework the night before, have students bring in a box from home. Any small box made of cardboard like a shoebox will do. Print out several copies of the box labels so students can pick their character.
2. Print the background article The Journey Begins and introduce the Lewis & Clark adventure to your students by reading the article aloud.

REPRODUCIBLES

1. Timeline (PDF)
   

DIRECTIONS

Discuss the The Journey Begins article with students. Ask students why people want to discover new lands and why is it still exciting today. Introduce the idea that Lewis & Clark sent back discoveries to President Thomas Jefferson, and explain that they will be making their own discoveries and sending them back to their parents. (See Discussion Starters below.)

Ask students to take out the boxes they have brought from home, and spend the rest of the class decorating their boxes with their box labels and any other art material available.

For the second class period, print out the six objects available for collection:
Prairie Dog
Grizzly Bear
Map
Native American Shirt
Corn
Buffalo

Either print out these objects on a transparency for the class to do as a whole or make a print of each object to pass out to students.

Go through each of the objects either on the transparency or with the handouts, explain to students what the object is and why it was new for Lewis & Clark. As a class, have students come up with one sentence to describe the object and write that sentence on the board. Have students copy that sentence onto their printouts and put their printouts into their boxes. For older students, you may want to allow students to each write their own sentence about each object following your whole-class discussion.

SUPPORTING ALL LEARNERS

Lewis & Clark for Grades PreK-2 helps students meet the following standards Sponsored by the National Council of Teachers of English (NCTE) and the International Reading Association (IRA).

• Students read a wide range of print and non-print texts to build an understanding of texts, of themselves, and of the cultures of the United States and the world. (1)
• Students conduct research on issues and interests by generating ideas and questions (7).
• Students participate as knowledgeable, reflective, creative, and critical members of a variety of literacy communities (11)
•  Students use spoken, written, and visual language for learning, persuasion, and exchange of information (12).

National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS):

Lewis & Clark for Grades PreK-2 meets the standards of the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), which promote the development of students as good citizens in a culturally diverse, interdependent world. The content and activities of this project are especially appropriate for the themes of:

• Culture: Students learn how to understand multiple perspectives that derive from different cultural vantage points.
• Time, Continuity, and Change: Students focus on how the world has changed in order to gain perspective on the present and the future.
• Individual Development and Identity: Students learn to ask questions such as "What influences how people learn, perceive, and grow?"
• People, Places, and Environments: Students utilize technological advances to connect to the world beyond their personal locations. The study of people, places, and human-environment interactions assists learners as they create their spatial views and geographic perspectives of the world.
• Civic Ideals and Practices: Students gain an understanding of the ideals, principles, and practices of citizenship in a democratic republic.

LESSON EXTENSION
Are there Lewis and Clark activities happening in your neighborhood? Look online at LewisandClarkEvents.com to find out if you can go as a class to learn more about Lewis & Clark in real life.

Discussion starters:

• How has the United States changed since Lewis and Clark's time? Why do people like to discover new things? What are some of the differences in how people travel today compared to 200 years ago?
• What do you know about the land in the west?
• Does it have rivers, lakes, mountains, etc?
• How could these landscapes affect Lewis and Clark?
• Describe what Lewis and Clark would have seen as they crossed the United States.

ASSESS STUDENTS

Project Assessment Ideas: 

Specimen Box of the Lewis & Clark Expedition

Have students add to their specimen box by collecting more objects. Using their completed timeline graphic organizer (PDF), have students research and find more discoveries made by Lewis and Clark. As they find images, they should print out the images and write descriptions, just as they did for the six objects provided in the online activity. Students will collect these objects in their box for a complete overview of the Lewis & Clark discoveries.

When students complete their boxes, you can publish your students' work posting them onto your class homepage.

Writing Rubric

Use the writing rubric as a way to assess your students' writing skills. This rubric can also serve as a model for a modified version that might include your state's writing standards.

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