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Sunday, January 1, 2012

SUGGESTED SOCIAL STUDIES, HISTORY, AND POLITICAL SCIENCE CURRICULUMS FOR K-12

GRADE-LEVEL-APPROPRIATE CURRICULUM FOR THE STUDY OF SOCIAL STUDIES, HISTORY, GOVERNMENT, AND POLITICAL SCIENCE MUST INCLUDE TEXTBOOKS WHICH FOCUS UPON:
• The founding fathers, the Constitution, Bill of Rights, Federalist Papers, Northwest Ordinance of 1787, Declaration of Independence, Constitutional Convention, Ruler’s Law v People’s Law v no law and the 28 basic principles identified in the Federalist papers that are appropriate for each grade level
• Presentation of America as a Constitutional Republic and a detailed analysis of the differences between a republic and other forms of government
• Studies of the struggles and sacrifices made in the development of the American republic
• Writings of persons who participated in the establishment of our government and its major institutions
• Texts of at least one dozen Federalist Papers and/or documents created by the founders in which our founding fathers warned citizens about the danger of devolving into any form of democracy
• Writings by the founders, the philosophers, and the economists whose ideas influenced the development of the United States government and its documents including Cicero, Sir William Blackstone, and Alex de Tocqueville.
• Historical analysis of slavery as it has existed around the world, which countries eliminated the practice from their social structure and why, and which countries continue to practice slavery and why
• Recognition of the influence that America’s First Ladies had upon the social and political issues of their day
• Recognition of the basic principles found in the Bible, Koran, Torah, and the Sutras by the masters of Buddhism and the historical role each religion played in the social and political aspects of American society
• History of Black-American founding fathers, political leaders, entrepreneurs, inventors, scientists, etc. from the 1600s to the present
• History of influential minority women in American History. Some examples: Pocahontas who is the Powhatan princess who saved the life of Captain John Smith; Sojourner Truth who is a lecturer, an escaped slave, and abolitionist; and Bell Hooks a black author, educator and activist
• Writings of Alex de Tocqueville, a French jurist and historian in the 1800s whose historical analysis of America’s educational and political system should be compared with the approach used by current American historians
• Analysis of Amendments to the Constitution and the impact they have had on the American economic, political, and social systems
• Opportunities to analyze the advantages and disadvantages of a republic, a democracy, socialism, communism, fascism, Marxism, or any other form of government
• Analysis of the history of taxation in America and its relationship to fiscal accountability and fiscal responsibility
• Analysis of the economic standards of Adam Smith, F.A. Hayek, Milton Friedman, and John M. Keynes while analyzing the impact each economic philosophy has had on the American economic system and on the global economic system
• Analysis of the contributions made by American women such as: Elizabeth Blackwell who was the first woman to receive a medical degree; Mary Katherine Goddard who was the first woman publisher , first woman postmaster, publisher of the Providence Gazette, and the individual who provided the first copies of the Declaration of Independence; Marian Wright Edelman who was a lawyer, educator and founder of the Children’s Defense Fund; and Regina Anderson, a black librarian and playwright
• Historical factors involved in the formation of the Ku Klux Klan in America
• History of the 13, 14,and 15th Amendments to the Constitution
• History of the development of the 1965 Civil Rights Act
• Dred Scott Decision and its history
• The Jim Crow Laws and their history

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