Texas Native American Tribes

Fourth Grade Social Studies Research Project

To view team tribe rules and checklists click on the evaluation portion of this lesson

Click on image above to view our class website for this lesson

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Texas Native American Research Project

Rationale:

             Technology in the social studies classroom provides authentic and unique teaching opportunities for student exploration and academic development. When instruction is supported by technology: student interest, involvement and motivation towards learning increase.  Teaching with technology is an extremely powerful tool in the classroom when used appropriately. Innovative lessons through technology integration can stimulate student’s ability to use technology for comprehension. Lessons with technology support help teachers to present and visualize content in better ways to enhance instruction.

I decided to design a class website for my students that provided Texas Native American information for an upcoming research project. Although most fourth graders learn about Texas Native Americans early on in the school year, I felt that there are many interesting aspects of the Texas Indian culture for the students to focus on. I wanted to provide a social studies lesson that guides students to a greater appreciation and understanding of one of the first known civilizations on American soil. The website was designed for students to assess and research about the myths, legends, early civilization way of life, agriculture, and economy of Texas Native Americans. I knew a class website would be something different and fun for the students to use to explore and find information. I wanted to design a special website that is both meaningful and relevant to the students. I took special consideration in putting the students into their tribe groups and making them feel important to the research project by providing each student’s name, their role and responsibility on the website. Overall I found the topic of Texas Native Americans interesting and fun to incorporate in the fourth grade classroom. 

            The Texas Native American website lesson encompasses many of the ten thematic stands necessary in building the appropriate framework for a successful elementary social studies curriculum. The thematic strands within the lesson include “Culture” in which the students research and discover important Texas Native American traditions and way of life, “Time and Change”, in which the students identify and explain the impact of time and change in the Texas Indian civilization, “People, Places, and Environments” in which the students compare and contrast the natural surroundings and people during the early 1500’s and the present time, and “Science, Technology, and Society” in which the students use a personal class social studies content website to enhance research skills and important content information. 

            Texas essential knowledge and skills require all fourth grade students to explain how early Native Americans in Texas lived to met their basic economic needs.  I decided to use the topic of Texas Native Americans and provide a research site for our fourth grade students to discover interesting facts on Texas Indians. The Texas Native Americans website lesson is age appropriate and enables our fourth grade students to explore many academic resources in learning about Texas Native Americans. 

TEKS: (note that each TEK was met through a length of time during student research)

(4.1) History: The student understands the similarities and differences of Native-American groups in Texas and the Western Hemisphere before European exploration. The student is expected to:

(A) Identify Native-American groups in Texas and the Western Hemisphere before European exploration and describe the regions in which they lived; and

(B) Compare the ways of life of Native-American groups in Texas and the Western Hemisphere before European exploration.

(4.9) Geography: The student understands how people adapt to and modify their environment. The student is expected to:

(A) Describe ways people have adapted to and modified their environment in Texas, past and present;

(B) identify reasons why people have adapted to and modified their environment in Texas, past and present, such as the use of natural resources to meet basic needs; and

(4.10) Economics: The student understands the basic economic patterns of early societies in Texas and the Western Hemisphere. The student is expected to:

            (A) Explain the economic patterns of various early Native-American groups in Texas and the Western Hemisphere; and

(4.15) Government: The student understands how people organized governments in different ways during the early development of Texas. The student is expected to:

(A) Compare how selected Native-American groups governed themselves;

(4.20) Culture: The student understands the contributions of people of various racial, ethnic, and religious groups to Texas. The student is expected to:

(B) Identify customs, celebrations, and traditions of various culture groups in Texas; and

(4.22) Social studies skills: The student applies critical-thinking skills to organize and use information acquired from a variety of sources including electronic technology. The student is expected to:

(C) Organize and interpret information in outlines, reports, databases, and visuals including graphs, charts, timelines, and maps;

(4.23) Social studies skills: The student communicates in written, oral, and visual forms. The student is expected to:

(B) Incorporate main and supporting ideas in verbal and written communication;

(E) Use standard grammar, spelling, sentence structure, and punctuation.

Objectives: Levels of learning (Blooms Taxonomy)

The student will…

1.      Identify (knowledge) and discuss (comprehension) with the teacher what they know about Texas Native Americans. The class will create a list of information of what they do know about Texas Native Americans using a KWL chart.

2.      Use active listening skills and respect and conduct research on their assigned Texas tribes on individual laptops. The teacher leads the students through their class website to explore their research options.

3.      Use laptop computers to search for specific details and information about Texas Native Americans. After the students understand the layout of the class website the students are free to explore and look for their assigned information.

4.      Collect (Application) and relate appropriate information from the website and other resources (handouts and books) onto small note cards.

5.      Determine (Analysis) and find what information to look for by following the tribe group responsibilities checklist. The students are introduced to their roles and responsibilities in their tribe groups with easy to read checklists (found in Texas Native American folder and class website) and classroom chart.

6.      Choose (Evaluative) which information found from the website, books and handouts is appropriate and most interesting for the research assignment. After small group meetings with the teacher the student selects which information they found in their research is best to be displayed on the class bulletin board.

Multiple Intelligences:

Verbal—Linguistic: The students will read content from the class website, books, and handouts to gain information for research about their Texas tribes.

Spatial: The students will draw pictures that reflect their research findings. The students will help create a class KWL chart.

Interpersonal: The students will work in 4 different Texas tribe groups each with five students per group (every student is assigned a different role and responsibility within the groups).

Intrapersonal: The students will work along with their Texas tribe group members but are assigned a different role and responsibility within the group to research.

Activities and Procedures:

1.      Create KWL chart as a whole class to determine what they know about Texas Native Americans.

2.      Separate students into four groups of five to prepare for the research project.

3.      Introduce team tribe rules (posted on the board and printed out and put into their Native American folders) and individual role responsibilities (also posted on the board and printed out and put into the folders).

4.      Establish a team tribe scoreboard in which the teams have the opportunity to earn points if they follow the team tribe rules throughout the research project.

5.      Go over rules in reading information and then putting it into your own words. As a whole class the teacher reads aloud a passage on the overhead and then turns the overhead off to have the students write down what they remember and find the most important about the passage. This was done many times to emphasize the importance of not plagiarizing. (transparencies attached to lesson)

6.      Use laptop computers to search through the class Texas Native American website to find and collect specific information for the research project.

7.      Use additional handouts provided in the Native American folders and books to find more information about the Texas tribes.

8.      Create a picture that illustrates your research finding.

9.      Display the student’s brilliant work on a social studies bulletin board.

Evaluation: Click on evaluation to view team tribe checklists.

            Each student is given a Texas tribe role and responsibility checklist to remind them what they are looking for in terms of Texas Native American research information. Since there are five members in each group there are five separate checklists for the teacher to assess. Throughout the lesson the teachers are able to walk around and assess the students understanding, however the final display of information posted on the social studies bulletin board provides the teacher to use the checklist to assess each student’s lesson comprehension. The checklists are provided following with the bulletin board lesson.

Related Books and References:

Nath, Janice. Becoming an EC-4 Teacher in Texas. Canada, Wadsworth: 2003,

Blooms Taxonomy pgs 55-58.

Nath, Janice. Becoming an EC-4 Teacher in Texas. Canada, Wadsworth: 2003,

Howard Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences.

Lund, Bill. The Comanche Indians. Mankato, Minnesota: Bridgestone Books,

            1999.

http://viking.coe.uh.edu/~mroy/edwards (class website)

Warren, Betsy. Let’s Remember Indians of Texas. Dallas, Texas: Hendrick-Long,

1981.  (handout content)

http://www.swt.edu/~mm43838/herotwin.html (tribe role names and responsibilities)

http://www.lsjunction.com/places/indians.htm (printed handout in folder)