Grade Level Standards: What Should Kids Learn in Each Grade/Course?
(High School)
American History I
AMERICAN HISTORY I: THE FOUNDING PRINCIPLES
(NCDPI American History I Unpacking Documents, PDF)
AH1.H.1 Apply the hour interconnected dimensions of historical thinking to the American History Essential Standards in order to understand the creation and development of the United States over time.
- AH1.H.1.1 Use chronological thinking to:
- Identify the structure of a historical narrative or story: (its beginning, middle, and end).
- Interpret data presented in time lines and create time lines.
- AH1.H.1.2 Use historical comprehension to:
- Reconstruct the literal meaning of a
historical passage. - Differentiate between historical facts and
historical interpretations. - Analyze data in historical maps.
- Analyze visual, literary and musical
sources.
- AH1.H.1.3 Use Historical Analysis and Interpretation to:
- Identify issues and problems in the past.
- Consider multiple perspectives of various
peoples in the past. - Analyze cause-and-effect relationships and
multiple causation. - Evaluate competing historical narratives
and debates among historians. - Evaluate the influence of the past on contemporary issues.
- AH1.H.1.4 Use Historical Research to:
- Formulate historical questions.
- Obtain historical data from a variety of
sources. - Support interpretations with historical
evidence. - Construct analytical essays using historical
evidence to support arguments.
AH1.H.2 Analyze key political, economic, and social turning points in American History using historical thinking.
- AH1.H.2.1 Analyze key political, economic, and social turning points from colonization through Reconstruction in terms of causes and effects (e.g., conflicts, legislation, elections, innovations, leadership, movements, Supreme Court decisions, etc.).
- AH1.H.2.2 Evaluate key turning points from colonization through Reconstruction in terms of their lasting impact (e.g., conflicts, legislation, elections, innovations, leadership, movements, Supreme Court decisions, etc.).
AH1.H.3 Understand the factors that led to exploration, settlement, movement, and expansion and their impact on United States development over time.
- AH1.H.3.1 Analyze how economic, political, social, military and religious factors influenced European exploration and American colonial settlement (e.g., Reformation, mercantilism, improvements in navigation technology, colonization, defeat of Spanish Armada, Great Awakening, etc.).
- AH1.H.3.2 Explain how environmental, cultural and economic factors influenced the patterns of migration and settlement within the U.S. before the Civil War (e.g., economic diversity of regions, mercantilism, cash crops, triangular trade, ethnic diversity, Native American Indian beliefs about land ownership, Lewis & Clark expedition, farming, Industrial Revolution, etc.).
- AH1.H.3.3 Explain the roles of various racial and ethnic groups in settlement and expansion through Reconstruction and the consequences for those groups (e.g., Germans, Scotch-Irish, Africans, Native American Indians, Irish, Chinese, etc.).
- AH1.H.3.4 Analyze voluntary and involuntary immigration trends through Reconstruction in
terms of causes, regions of origin and destination, cultural contributions, and public
and governmental response (e.g., Puritans, Pilgrims, American Indians, Quakers, Scotch-Irish, Chinese, Africans, indentured servants, slavery, Middle Passage, farming, ideas of the
Enlightenment, etc.).
AH1.H.4 Analyze how conflict and compromise have shaped politics, economics, and culture in the United States.
- AH1.H.4.1 Analyze the political issues and conflicts that impacted the United States through Reconstruction and the compromises that resulted (e.g., American Revolution, Constitutional Convention, Bill of Rights, development of political parties, nullification, slavery, states’ rights, Civil War).
- AH1.H.4.2 Analyze the economic issues and conflicts that impacted the United States through Reconstruction and the compromises that resulted (e.g., mercantilism, Revolutionary era taxation, National Bank, taxes, tariffs, territorial expansion, Economic “Panics”, Civil War).
- AH1.H.4.3 Analyze the social and religious conflicts, movements and reforms that affected the United States from colonization through Reconstruction in terms of participants, strategies, opposition, and results (e.g., Second Great Awakening, Transcendentalism, abolition, temperance, mental illness, prisons, education, etc.)
- AH1.H.4.4 Analyze the cultural conflicts that impacted the United States through Reconstruction and the compromises that resulted (e.g., displacement of American Indians, manifest destiny, slavery, assimilation, nativism).
AH1.H.5 Understand how tensions between freedom, equality and power have shaped
the political, economic and social development of the United States.
- AH1.H.5.1 Summarize how the philosophical, ideological and/or religious views on freedom and equality contributed to the development of American political and economic systems through Reconstruction (e.g., natural rights, First Great Awakening, Declaration of Independence, transcendentalism, suffrage, abolition, “ slavery as a peculiar institution”, etc.).
- AH1.H.5.2 Explain how judicial, legislative and executive actions have affected the distribution of power between levels of government from colonization through Reconstruction (e.g., the Marshall Court, Jacksonian era, nullification, secession, etc.).
AH1.H.6 Understand how and why the role of the United States in the world has changed over time.
- AH1.H.6.1 Explain how national economic and political interests helped set the direction of United States foreign policy from independence through Reconstruction (e.g., treaties, embargo, tariffs, Proclamation of Neutrality, Monroe Doctrine, etc.).
- AH1.H.6.2 Explain the reasons for involvement in wars prior to Reconstruction and the influence each involvement had on international affairs (e.g., French and Indian War, War of 1812, Mexican War, Civil War).
AH1.H.7 Understand the impact of war on American politics, economics, society and culture.
- AH1.H.7.1 Explain the impact of wars on American politics through Reconstruction (e.g., Issues of taxation without representation, Proclamation of 1763, Proclamation of Neutrality, XYZ Affair, Alien & Sedition Acts, War Hawks, Hartford Convention, Slavery Compromises, scalawags, carpetbaggers, etc.).
- AH1.H.7.2 Explain the impact of wars on the American economy through Reconstruction (e.g., colonial debts, salutary neglect, protective tariffs, inflation, profiteering, Hamilton’s
economic plan, embargo, American System, Homesteaders, etc.).
- AH1.H.7.3 Explain the impact of wars on American society and culture through Reconstruction (e.g., salutary neglect, slavery, breakup of the plantation system, carpetbaggers, scalawags, KKK, and relocation of American Indians, etc.).
AH1.H.8 Analyze the relationship between progress, crisis and the “American Dream” within the United States.
- AH1.H.8.1 Analyze the relationship between innovation, economic development, progress and various perceptions of the “American Dream” through Reconstruction (e.g., inventions, Industrial Revolution, American System, etc.).
- AH1.H.8.2 Explain how opportunity and mobility impacted various groups within American society through Reconstruction (e.g., City on a Hill, Lowell and other “mill towns”, Manifest Destiny, immigrants/migrants, Gold Rush, Homestead Act, Morrill Act, Exodusters, women, various ethnic groups, etc.).
- AH1.H.8.3 Evaluate the extent to which a variety of groups and individuals have had opportunity to
attain their perception of the “American Dream” through Reconstruction (e.g., various ethnic, religious, racial, socio-economic groups of people; plantation society; transcendentalism; 49ers; etc.). - AH1.H.8.4 Analyze multiple perceptions of the “American Dream” in times of prosperity and crisis through Reconstruction (e.g., Hamilton’s Financial Plan; Embargo of 1807; Manifest Destiny, phases of Reconstruction; various ethnic, religious, racial, socio-economic groups of people, etc.).
American History I Worksheet Activities
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