civil-war – Moler's Musings

The Week That Was In 234

This week was all about pulling the thread—tracing how specific events pulled the country apart and pushed us toward war. I built everything around one central theme: A Nation Divides Over Slavery. From court cases to debates, from compromises to elections, we kept the structure tight: retrieval, repetition, and real thinking. The protocols stayed familiar, the tasks stayed purposeful, and students had a chance to connect the dots, not just memorize them.

Monday – Thick Slide with Readings

Tuesday – Lincoln Douglas Debate with Clues

Wednesday – Fugitive Slave Act with Reading

Thursday – Election of 1860

Friday – Divide the Pie, Sega Game

Monday – Kicking Off “A Nation Divides Over Slavery”

We kicked off our new theme this week: A Nation Divides Over Slavery. The idea behind this theme is to help students connect key events and legal decisions that drove the wedge deeper between North and South – like the Dred Scott case, the Fugitive Slave Act, the Lincoln-Douglas Debates, and the Election of 1860.

We started with a Quizizz set that previewed these four topics – both vocabulary and content. I told the students upfront: this isn’t just about getting right answers. This is about seeing where we are before diving in and building context all week.

From there, we went straight into a Thick Slide on Dred Scott. I gave students four guiding questions:

Who was Dred Scott?
What did the court decide?
What impact did it have on the country?
Why does it matter today?

They added a powerful quote, one or two relevant images, and a title that helped summarize the case’s importance. I’ve used Thick Slides a lot this year, but I liked this one because it helped students pull together multiple layers of information on a tough topic and create something visual that forced them to organize their thinking.

To add a local lens, we wrapped up class with a short reading about The Case of Henry Poindexter – a lesser known but powerful Ohio case that challenged the logic of Dred Scott. Poindexter was ruled free when he entered Ohio, even though the Dred Scott ruling said enslaved people weren’t citizens. That contrast hit home for students. It was a great way to help them see that not all courts agreed—and that the debate over slavery and citizenship wasn’t as cut and dry as some textbooks make it seem.

Why this lesson worked:

Quizizz built background and gave us data
Thick Slide gave students a structure to produce and reflect
The Poindexter case grounded the learning in local history and made it real

Tuesday – A Twist on the Lincoln-Douglas Debates

Tuesday was one of those days where I wanted to keep the content heavy, but the delivery light. We were building off of Monday’s work with Dred Scott, and I needed a way to connect to the Lincoln-Douglas debates without it feeling like just another block of text.

We started with an EdPuzzle, a solid recap of the Dred Scott case that also dropped in mentions of Stephen Douglas and Abraham Lincoln. It served two purposes: review Monday’s learning, and plant seeds for what was coming next. No extra slides. No extra talking. Just a well-placed video.

The the twist – instead of reading straight from the textbook, I decided to rework the passage on the Lincoln-Douglas debates. But I didn’t rework it myself—I asked AI to do it. Specifically, I asked ChatGPT to take the reading and embed five hidden clues to a mystery object. The object? An orange.

The clues: wedge, sections, bitter, peel, squeeze.

The students didn’t know this at first. They just read the modified version, answered the reading questions, and moved on. Until I dropped the twist.

I shared a Padlet and told them: “Based on what you read, I was thinking of an object. It’s hidden in the clues. Guess what it is, and explain how it connects to a country being pulled apart by the issue of slavery.”

I changed the Padlet settings to manual approval so no one could copy answers. Kids were rereading, piecing together metaphors, trying to figure it out.

The guesses ranged from “lemon zest” to “an instrument” but when a few landed on “orange” and explained it like this…

“The country was in wedges, pulling away from the center.”
“There were different sections that couldn’t stay together.”
“Everyone was getting squeezed from both sides.”

This wasn’t about right answers. This was about interpretation.

It was late in the year. Attention spans were slipping. But curiosity still works.

Why This Worked

The EdPuzzle grounded us in prior knowledge without slowing momentum.
The AI-rewritten reading kept all the important facts but added a playful puzzle.
The mystery object metaphor gave kids a reason to reread and think differently.
The Padlet added a layer of mystery and ownership—students weren’t just responding, they were interpreting.

We talk a lot about curiosity in learning, but sometimes it’s as simple as hiding a metaphor in plain sight.

Wednesday – Number Mania and Division Over Slavery

I decided to build the day around a lesson adapted from Retro Report, focused on how the Fugitive Slave Act further divided the nation and fractured the Democratic Party. We’d touched on the law last week, but this time we went deeper, analyzing its consequences more intentionally.

We opened class with a quick discussion about how a single law could force citizens to choose between their conscience and the law. Then we moved into a Number Mania. I provided students with a short, impactful reading on the Fugitive Slave Act that was rich in context and included some powerful data: $1,000 fines, $40,000 to return one man, over 300 people returned to slavery, and more. Students had to use three numbers to prove this quote true:

“The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 deepened the divide between the North and South by punishing citizens who helped runaways, rewarding biased decisions, and sparking costly conflicts over slavery.”

They added visuals, a title, and paraphrased facts supported by numbers. It was more than just pulling data, it was about making meaning with that data. This protocol always helps students see the weight that numbers can carry in understanding a moment in history.

We ended with a Fast and Curious Quizizz, looping back to the same content vocabulary and themes from Monday. Every time we run that loop, accuracy improves. It’s low stakes, high impact, and it sets kids up for deeper thinking in the next lesson.

Why it worked:

Number Mania turned data into narrative and helped students visualize division.
The reading provided the foundation, and the task forced synthesis.
Quizizz helped reinforce essential vocabulary and context.

Thursday: Election of 1860 and the Nation Splits

Thursday we wrapped up the second part of our Retro Report lesson on the road to the Civil War—this one focused on the Election of 1860. After covering the Fugitive Slave Act earlier in the week, this was a natural next step. It helped students see how deep the divisions were not just in laws, but in politics.

We started with an EdPuzzle on the Election of 1860. Just a four-minute video with a good breakdown of the four major candidates and how their platforms represented the different regions of the country. It was a great primer, quick, clear, and helped set up the rest of the lesson.

After the video, students read short excerpts from each of the party platforms. We didn’t go overboard here, I just wanted them to pull out the core ideas: What did each party believe about slavery? About federal power? About the territories?

We wrapped it up with a Short Answer Battle Royale using the platform. The question was simple:

How did the results of the 1860 presidential election show that the United States was becoming more and more divided?

There was candy on the line, so they wrote like it actually mattered. Some of the answers were solid—claims, evidence, explanations. Some still needed guidance. But that’s the beauty of ShortAnswer. Students saw each other’s responses in real time. They adjusted, they improved, and they learned from one another.

It wasn’t a loud or flashy lesson, but it worked. The video gave them context. The reading gave them specifics. The writing gave them purpose. And the candy didn’t hurt, either.

Friday – Choice and Review to Close the Theme

We wrapped up the week and our “A Nation Divides Over Slavery” theme with a final round of Quizizz. This was our retrieval layer to see what stuck after hitting the Dred Scott case, the Fugitive Slave Act, Lincoln Douglas Debates, and the Election of 1860. The class averages were solid: 94%, 85%, 90%, and 86%. That tells me this themed structure is working. The repetition, the chunking, the protocols—it all adds up.

But what I liked even more was the choice students had in their assessment.

Option 1 was “Divide the Pie”—a visual breakdown of how much each event contributed to the growing division between North and South. Students had to assign a percentage to each of the four events and then justify those numbers with specific evidence. Not just pulling numbers out of thin air—but actually defending them based on class work and content we’ve layered all week. It wasn’t just about what they remembered. It was about what they understood.

Option 2 was the Sega Genesis Game template from EMC² Learning. This one let students reimagine the week’s events as a vintage video game. Their job? Turn historical conflict into gameplay. What would the levels be? What obstacles would the player face? What’s the story arc? It’s creative, but it still demands content knowledge. I built out some success criteria so they weren’t just designing for fun—they had to make their game tie back to each event.

That’s the point. We’re giving students tools to own their thinking. Whether it’s defending a pie chart with historical evidence or turning a political crisis into pixelated gameplay, they’re showing what they know in ways that stick.

TWTW

The Week That Was In 234

This week wasn’t about cramming in new content or racing toward a test—it was about building something that lasted. We used a layered mix of retrieval, reading, analysis, structured writing, and reflection, and each protocol helped us answer a bigger question. Coming off spring break, I knew students would need structure but also some momentum. So I stacked the lessons with intention.

We used Fast & Curious with Quizizz every day, not just to review terms, but to show how retrieval works when it’s spaced out and tied to deeper learning. We layered in Annotate & Tell for close reading and sourcing, and we used Graph & Tell to compare data with perspective. Students analyzed primary sources, revised flawed writing, and built arguments from multiple viewpoints.

We pulled in Archetype Four Square to reframe historical figures like Eli Whitney, then brought it full circle with Class Companion, Thick Slides, and a hands-on word wall review to tie everything together.

It wasn’t flashy, but it was meaningful.

Monday – Primary Sources, Questions

Tuesday – Cotton Gin Rack and Stack

Wednesday – Friday – Life of the Enslaved Rack and Stack

Truth with Sprinkles – Class Companion Link

Monday

We came back from spring break, and I knew better than to pretend everything would pick up right where we left off. After 10 days off, kids needed a ramp—but that didn’t mean the day had to be a throwaway. I wanted to build back some content momentum while still reinforcing writing skills. So I stacked the lesson around a clear essential question and layered the tasks with a mix of retrieval, source analysis, and structured writing.

Quizizz:

We kicked things off with a Quizizz that blended review and preview questions from our industrialization unit. The idea was to warm up their brains without pressure. It gave me a quick read on what stuck over break, what needed refreshing, and where we could push forward.

Primary Source Pack: Framed by a Big Question

The textbook has a set of primary source lessons—usually I tweak or skip them, but this one had potential. The essential question was:
How can changes in work and social life affect a society?

I ran all six sources through AI and had it reword them to be more accessible without losing meaning. I also had AI generate two basic questions per source to give kids a little guidance. After each source, students wrote a 6-word summary that directly tied back to the essential question. That’s what kept the focus. No wandering. Every source came back to that one big idea.

The sources included:

A Lowell Mill girl’s journal
An immigrant’s first letter home
A factory owner’s defense of conditions
A political cartoon from the time
A protest flyer
An anti-immigrant speech

Each gave students a different perspective, and the layering really helped them start to think critically about the intersection of work, immigration, and social change in the 1800s.

Short Answer: Revising a Bad Paragraph

Once we had enough content, I dropped them into a Short Answer task. I gave them a clearly incorrect paragraph that oversimplified everything. Their job was to revise it using evidence from the sources.

Here’s what they had to fix:
Changes in work and population didn’t really affect anything. Most people stayed on farms and worked outside. Immigrants had an easy time finding jobs and were treated fairly. Factory workers only worked a few hours a day, and their jobs were fun and safe. No one complained, and the government made sure everything was perfect.

The responses were solid. Short Answer let them see peer examples and compare their thinking, which always boosts engagement. We weren’t writing full-blown essays—just clean, focused revisions with evidence and reasoning. That’s the kind of writing practice that sticks.

Fast and Curious Again:

To finish class, we went back to Quizizz with a Fast and Curious round. It was the same set as earlier, but now students had background knowledge from the readings and writing. I wanted to see if the scores improved, and they did. Retrieval practice works—especially when the content is layered.

Tuesday

This lesson was all about getting students to see the layers of impact behind Eli Whitney’s invention—not just the praise in textbooks, but the real, complicated ripple effects. We used a mix of protocols to help students analyze, compare, and respond to those consequences.

Quizizz Check – Fast and Curious

We started with a Fast & Curious Quizizz round. The goal was to preview key terms tied to the cotton gin: invention, economy, agriculture, slavery, unintended consequences. I saw right away where the gaps were. Some students had never really connected the cotton gin to slavery. That told me the rest of the lesson needed to go beyond “Eli Whitney invented something helpful.”

Archetype Four Square: Who Was Eli Whitney?

Next, we moved into an Archetype Four Square. After reading a short bio of Eli Whitney, students picked an archetype they felt best represented him. Then we had them support it with evidence from the reading and make a historical or pop culture comparison. It sparked some great thinking. Was he a hero? A sage? A magician?

Annotate & Tell

From there, we jumped into an Annotate & Tell using two primary sources—newspaper articles from 1818 and 1825 celebrating the cotton gin. Students highlighted quotes that showed the invention’s impact: increased cotton production, land value, and Southern prosperity. Then we paused and asked the real question: What’s missing from this praise?

Graph & Tell

To bring in the other side, students examined a chart showing the rise of enslaved persons alongside the rise of cotton production. This was our Graph & Tell moment. They filled in a chart and wrote a short summary of what they noticed: a clear correlation between more cotton and more slavery. Then we pushed further—Does this data support or challenge what the primary sources said? That question changed everything.

Class Companion

To wrap things up, students went to Class Companion and wrote from a chosen point of view: Eli Whitney, a plantation owner, an enslaved person, or a Northern factory worker. Their task was to explain the consequences of the cotton gin from that lens, including both short- and long-term effects.

The AI feedback blew me away. It didn’t just give grammar tips—it recognized their POV and gave specific feedback tied to it. For example, students writing as enslaved people got suggestions on expressing emotion or explaining hardship more clearly. It was targeted, authentic, and helped them revise in real time.

Wednesday – Friday

Wednesday through Friday were choppy. State testing threw off our schedule, kids were in and out, and nothing was consistent. But in some ways, that made the lesson better. We had space to slow down and focus on the people most impacted by what we’d learned earlier in the week—enslaved individuals.

After exploring the unintended consequences of the cotton gin, we shifted into the question: What was life like for the people whose lives were changed by it? It wasn’t about moving on—it was about going deeper.

Starting with Language

We began with a short but important conversation about how we talk about people in history. I introduced person-first language:

“enslaved person” instead of “slave”
“enslaver” instead of “master”
“freedom seeker” instead of “runaway”

I told students these words don’t just sound better—they shift how we see people. They’re human first. Not property, not background characters in someone else’s story. The kids caught on quickly and started using the new terms without being reminded. That one shift helped everything else land better.

Quizizz

Next, we ran a Quizizz. I built it around key vocabulary like abolitionist, resistance, enslaver, overseer, and oppression. I also kept a few questions from earlier in the week to bring back some of the Eli Whitney and cotton gin context. The goal wasn’t a grade—it was to activate thinking, catch misconceptions, and see what needed clearing up before we hit the heavier stuff.

A lot of kids didn’t fully understand “resistance,” so that told me where to lean in next.

EdPuzzle

We watched a high school-level EdPuzzle on slavery and resistance. I picked the 9–12 version on purpose—it talked about the Underground Railroad as a metaphor instead of a literal train line. That helped break a common misconception right away.

More importantly, the video gave a broader definition of resistance. It wasn’t just running away—it was breaking tools, learning to read, preserving family bonds, working slowly on purpose, singing coded messages in songs. It gave them a new way to understand how enslaved people fought back.

Annotate & Tell

After that, we moved into Annotate and Tell with two powerful excerpts:

Solomon Northup from Twelve Years a Slave
Harriet Jacobs from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

We started with short background blurbs so students knew who these people were and why their stories mattered. Then we read each passage together, pausing to highlight key phrases and answer focused questions.

Northup described long days in the field, being forced to pick 200 pounds of cotton, being punished if you fell short, and chores that lasted well into the night. Jacobs described the cruelty and control that came with wealth—enslavers who tortured without consequence and normalized abuse.

Thick Slide: Be the Abolitionist

Then it was time to apply what they learned. Students created a Thick Slide from the point of view of an abolitionist trying to convince others that slavery must end. Their slide had to include:

Three quotes from the readings that exposed the reality of slavery
An explanation of why those quotes mattered
One form of resistance from the EdPuzzle and why it was important
A Human Spotlight featuring Harriet Jacobs, Solomon Northup, or someone from the video
A picture and a short caption telling that person’s story—what they saw, suffered, or stood for

Some students picked quotes that showed the physical brutality. Others focused on how people kept resisting anyway. Their captions were sharp, and a few were honestly emotional. They weren’t just checking boxes—they were making a case.

Teaching the AI Workflow

After they built their slides, I walked them through a quick Chromebook skill:
Ctrl + Shift + Window Switcher = screenshot tool.

Then I showed them how to upload that screenshot into a MagicSchool chatbot I had set up. I modeled how to ask for specific feedback. As I always say, “If you give the AI tool crappy prompts, you’re going to get crap back.”

The whole point was to show them how to use AI after the thinking is done—to reflect, revise, and improve. Not to let AI do it all for them.

Word Wall Review

To wrap everything up, we did a drag-and-drop word wall. Students sorted terms and ideas between North and South—factory, agriculture, slavery, resistance, cotton, railroads, canals, unions, etc. It tied together everything we’ve covered the last two weeks in one quick review. Fast, visual, and a good reset after a deep few days.

Truth With Sprinkles

On Friday, I wanted something new for retrieval practice. I began class with a Class Companion – but with a twist!

I had AI create 2 paragraphs with 4 historical errors. Here is what AI came up with:

In the early 1800s, the United States began to shift from farming to factory work. Most industry grew in the South because of its strong transportation system and large population of factory workers. One major invention that helped speed up this progress was the cotton gin. Created by Eli Whitney, this machine made cotton easier to clean and reduced the need for enslaved labor in the South.

Meanwhile, in Massachusetts, young women flocked to places like Lowell Mills for clean and safe factory jobs. They worked short hours and were treated fairly under new labor laws. Many factory owners supported the rise of labor unions because they wanted to keep their workers happy. These early unions helped workers demand better conditions with the full support of the people in charge.

I called it “Truth with Sprinkles” – sprinkles of fiction, that is! I brought sprinkled donuts for my 1st period because they worked so damn hard on the state test. It was unbelievable. They wrote their hearts out and gave it everything they had – it was awesome.

So, as they were eating their donuts (some with chocolate frosting and sprinkles) they were finding the sprinkles of fiction in the paragraphs. They were historical detectives.

I set up the Class Companion for only 1 submission – I didn’t want them submitting right away and trying to get the answers. They were discussing, analyzing, and acting as historical detectives fixing the errors. This was an awesome retrieval practice. Class Companion gave them great feedback on each error they tried to correct – it worked out so well!

TWTW

The Week That Was In 234

This week was all about building depth and complexity while keeping students engaged with a variety of EduProtocols. We wrapped up Westward Expansion with strategies that helped students compare perspectives, analyze sources, and refine their writing skills.

We used Annotate & Tell to break down Texas independence and the Mexican-American War, Map & Tell to visualize territorial disputes, and Thick Slides to connect primary and secondary sources on the Mormon migration. Parafly helped students paraphrase historical texts, while MiniReports with Class Companion pushed them to synthesize information and improve their writing with AI feedback. We even tied in local history by exploring Clermont County’s own Gold Rush in 1868.

Each of these protocols ensured that students weren’t just memorizing facts—they were actively engaging, thinking, and making connections across history.

Tuesday – Texas Independence Rack and Stack

Wednesday – Mexican American War Rack and Stack

Thursday – Mormon Migration Rack and Stack

Friday – Gold Rush Mini Report

Tuesday

Tuesday’s lesson wasn’t just about reviewing Texas Independence—it was about digging deeper into how Texas annexation shaped American expansion and government policies. Instead of running through surface-level review questions, I stacked Annotate and Tell and Archetype Four Square to help students analyze the political and social consequences of annexation, make connections across history, and examine the perspectives of different groups.

Annotate and Tell: Breaking Down Texas Independence

We started with Annotate and Tell, where students worked through a reading on Texas Independence, highlighting key points and responding to Depth and Complexity-aligned questions. What major conflicts led to rebellion? How did tensions between Texas and Mexico mirror other revolutions in history?

Students identified patterns in why revolutions happen, comparing Texas’s fight for independence to the American Revolution and other independence movements. After annotating, we had a discussion about how perspective shapes historical narratives, particularly in how Texas Independence is viewed by Americans versus how it was seen by Mexico.

Archetype Four Square: Analyzing Government Post-Texas Annexation

Once students had a solid foundation on Texas Independence, we shifted focus to the role of the U.S. government in Texas annexation. Using Archetype Four Square, students analyzed the U.S. government’s actions through different archetypes. Was the U.S. acting as a Protector, an Opportunist, or an Aggressor in annexing Texas?

The connect piece was built into this activity as well. Students had to relate Texas annexation to another historical event. Many connected it to the Trail of Tears, recognizing that U.S. expansion often came with the displacement of Native American groups. Others linked it to the Louisiana Purchase, seeing it as another example of the U.S. growing its territory at the expense of others. This led to a discussion on whether Manifest Destiny justified these actions or simply provided an excuse for expansion.

Wednesday

Wednesday’s lesson was all about analyzing the causes and outcomes of the U.S.-Mexican War through layered activities that encouraged critical thinking. Using Map & Tell, Annotate & Tell, and Sketch & Tell-O, students built a deeper understanding of how territorial disputes, political decisions, and war shaped the history of the United States and Mexico.

Map & Tell: Setting the Stage

To start, we used Map & Tell to provide a visual representation of the territorial dispute between the U.S. and Mexico. Students labeled key locations, including the Nueces River, Rio Grande, and disputed land. We discussed why both countries claimed the land and how this disagreement escalated tensions.

Annotate & Tell: Analyzing Justifications for War

Next, students examined primary and secondary sources through Annotate & Tell to break down the events that led to war. Using depth and complexity prompts, they highlighted key parts of the text and answered questions that pushed them to think critically:

Why did Mexican leaders refuse to discuss John Slidell’s offer, and how did their response influence Polk’s decision to go to war?
Students highlighted the sentence explaining Mexico’s refusal and discussed how it reinforced Polk’s belief that military action was necessary.
Perspective: How might Mexico’s refusal to sell land be viewed differently by American expansionists and Mexican leaders?
Many students noted that expansionists saw it as an opportunity to fulfill Manifest Destiny, while Mexican leaders saw it as an unjust attempt to take their land.

Annotate & Tell: Justifying War

The second Annotate & Tell focused on how President Polk framed the conflict:

Highlight the sentence that explains how Polk justified going to war. How did he use Mexico’s attack to convince Congress? Why might some people have disagreed?
Students highlighted Polk’s statement about “American blood on American soil” and debated whether this was a valid reason for war or a strategic move to gain support for expansion.
Ethics – Right vs. Wrong: Was it fair for President Polk to send U.S. troops into disputed land, knowing it could lead to war? Why or why not?
This question sparked discussions about whether Polk provoked Mexico into war and whether the conflict was avoidable.

Sketch & Tell-O: Understanding the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo

To close out the lesson, students completed a Sketch & Tell-O focused on the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo. Each student created a visual representation of:

The land acquired by the U.S.
The impact of the treaty on Mexico
How the treaty shaped future territorial expansion

They also wrote a short explanation connecting the treaty to previous historical events, with many linking it to the Trail of Tears, recognizing the continued displacement of people as the U.S. expanded westward.

Thursday

Thursday’s lesson focused on the Mormon migration and the challenges they faced during westward expansion. To make the content engaging and meaningful, I used a mix of EduProtocols, incorporating depth and complexity elements to push students’ thinking beyond just recalling facts.

Wicked Hydra: Generating Inquiry from Primary Sources

We started with a Wicked Hydra, where students analyzed Executive Order 44, also known as the “Extermination Order” issued by Missouri’s governor in 1838. The document stated that Mormons must be treated as enemies and either exterminated or removed from the state.

Students generated questions such as:

Who were the Mormons?
Why were they hated?
What did they do to provoke this response?
How could a state issue an extermination order?

These questions helped frame the lesson, setting up historical context and encouraging students to think about discrimination, religious freedom, and government authority.

Number Mania: Proving the Statement with Evidence

Next, we ran a Number Mania to reinforce the scale of the Mormon migration. The statement to prove was:
“The Mormon migration was one of the largest and most significant westward movements in U.S. history, involving thousands of people traveling thousands of miles to settle in Utah, where they established a thriving community despite early challenges.”

Students had to:

Find four numbers that proved the statement true.
Paraphrase facts from the textbook reading.
Add four icons or pictures to visually represent key details.
Title their Number Mania creatively to reflect the historical significance.

This protocol pushed students to analyze the numbers behind historical events and justify the migration’s impact with data.

Thick Slide: Memory, Complexity, and Comparison

Students then created a Thick Slide, recalling four important facts about the Mormon migration from memory. But instead of stopping at just listing information, I added a depth and complexity twist:

“Would Brigham Young have agreed with Manifest Destiny? Why or why not?”

This question encouraged students to think critically about how religious groups viewed expansion differently than the U.S. government. Some argued that Young supported expansion for the survival of his people, while others pointed out that Mormons weren’t interested in spreading democracy or territorial claims in the same way as the federal government.

To deepen analysis, students then compared secondary source facts from the textbook with primary source excerpts from Mormon journals. They looked for corroborating details between historical records and personal accounts of migration hardships. This activity helped reinforce sourcing skills and historical interpretation.

Friday

We started the day with a Friday check-in: What seemed like an exciting experience but ended up being a complete letdown or genuinely difficult once you were actually there? I wanted students to connect with the experience of prospectors who traveled west expecting instant riches but faced harsh realities. This helped students build a personal connection to the topic before diving into the content.

MiniReport: Analyzing the Gold Rush from Multiple Perspectives

To examine the impact of the Gold Rush, we structured our lesson around a MiniReport paired with Class Companion for writing and feedback. The central question for this activity was:
How did the discovery of gold shape economic growth, migration, and public perception in the United States?

Step 1: Gathering Information from Multiple Sources

Students worked with three sources:

An EdPuzzle video on the California Gold Rush, which provided an engaging, visual introduction.
A McGraw Hill textbook reading on the economic and social effects of the Gold Rush.
A local history connection—the 1868 gold rush in Clermont County, Ohio.

Students organized their findings into three categories:

Economic Impact: How the rush transformed industries, trade, and the economy.
Migration and Settlement: How it spurred mass movement westward.
Perception vs. Reality: The myths versus the actual struggles of prospectors.

Step 2: Writing & Feedback with Class Companion

After gathering their evidence, students wrote a structured paragraph in Class Companion, where they received instant AI-driven feedback. I linked the Ohio State Test informative/expository rubric to the assignment, reinforcing the writing expectations they will face on standardized tests.

Students focused on:

A clear topic sentence.
Supporting details from their sources.
A strong concluding statement.

I also used this opportunity to discuss how AI scoring systems on state tests look for specific key phrases, transitions, and evidence-based reasoning—helping students understand how to write for their audience.