Reconstruction Era
Entry Level Assessment
1. Students will create a KWL Chart
2. In their charts (3 columns), they will write down facts that they know about the Civil War and
the Reconstruction era
3. As a class, we will share the K section of the KWL chart. We will do some discussion about
what we know about the Civil War, and how certain events led to policies of the Reconstruction
era
4. The “K” is very important for me to assess how much the students already know, and what the
review, or re-teach before beginning new material that needs background information.
5. Students will fill in the W of the chart individually, citing what they want to know about this
particular period.
6. Students will watch a 10-15 minute video on the Reconstruction era on watchknow.org, in
order to fill in the L section of the KWL chart.
7. After the video, students will get into groups of 4 and share what they’ve learned. As a class,
we will share the L section.
Progress Monitoring Assessment
Students will do a group project, getting a particular time frame during the Reconstruction era.
(i.e. 1863-1865). They will have to create a PowerPoint presentation, and the order of group
presentations will be in chronological order. I will circulate around the room to make sure
everyone is on task. During their group presentations, they will have to take notes of each time
frame, creating a timeline of the Reconstruction era filled with notes.
Another progress monitoring assignment will be journal entries about each time frame. Prompts
such as “Where were you when President Lincoln was shot and how did you feel?” could be
potential topic journal entries in relation to the Reconstruction era.
Summative Assessment
As a summative assessment, students will be given a unit test that has a variety of questions
ranging from multiple choice, true or false, fill in the blank, and essay questions. The essay
questions will be similar prompts as the journal entries and will be graded on a rubric scale,
while the rest of the test will have an answer key. After the project, they will have to write about
what they contributed to the group project to assess their participation in the presentation.
Students will have to turn in their KWL chart, as well as their journal entries in an entire packet
to be counted as homework.
Also, I will be grading the PowerPoint presentations and providing written feedback to the
students of their presentation and the content of the PowerPoint. This will also be graded on a
rubric scale.