Inquiries

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: Grades K-2, 9-12

Community Helpers

This inquiry leads students through an investigation of the various roles of professionals who work in the community. While the focus of this inquiry is limited primarily to first responders, teachers could expand the discussion to include other community helpers or “school helpers” such as the custodial staff, cafeteria staff, librarians, etc. By focusing on […]

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: Grades 3-5, Tennessee

Indian Removal

This 4th and 5th grade inquiry expands students’ understandings of Indian removal in the early 1800s by centering Cherokee resistance to removal policies. The compelling question—“How did the Cherokee resist removal?”—engages students in an examination of the Cherokee, whose ancestral homelands include parts of present day Tennessee, and the efforts they took to resist removal […]

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: 4th Grade, New York

Government and Citizens

This inquiry is an exploration into government that begins by looking at the historical roots of democracy in the United States and then focuses on state government. The inquiry features a case study of a piece of legislation, initiated by a class of New York State elementary school students that resulted in yogurt becoming the […]

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: 2nd Grade, New York

Urban, Suburban, and Rural

This inquiry leads students through an investigation of their communities as a way to deepen their understandings of the importance of place in general and the similarities and differences between different kinds of communities in particular. By investigating the compelling question “How would our lives be different if we lived in a different kind of […]

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: 3rd Grade, New York

Geography

This inquiry engages third-grade students in exploring world geography through the compelling question “Where are we?” This question sparks students’ intellectual curiosity through the study of geographic location and the impact of humans on their environment. Working with evidence from sources, students should understand that, although we can be in different “places,” our impact on […]

Featured Inquiry

Filed Under: Kindergarten, New York

Needs and Wants

This annotated kindergarten inquiry focuses on the economics concept of scarcity by developing an understanding of needs and wants and goods and services through the compelling question, “Can we get everything we need and want?” The distinctions between these constructs serve as the necessary components of an examination of the choices people must make when […]

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Community Helpers

Indian Removal

Government and Citizens

Urban, Suburban, and Rural

Geography

Needs and Wants