Advanced Placement United States History

The design of the Advanced Placement United States History class is primarily to facilitate the students’ transition from the secondary school
to the college or university. It is to be stimulating, challenging, and to offer each student an opportunity to experience a course that offers
college-level work. Topics explored during the academic year will include colonial life in early America, the American Revolution, counterrevolution and the Constitution, Jeffersonian and Jacksonian democracy, Antebellum America, Manifest Destiny, Civil War, Reconstruction,
the Gilded Age, Industrialization and Immigration, Imperialism, the Progressive Era, The Great War (WWI), Boom to Bust 1920’s, the Great
Depression and the New Deal, World War II, Cold War at Home and Abroad, Happy Days to the Great Society, Watergate to the BiCentennial, The Reagan Revolution and the Age of Technology.
Several important themes will be addressed and examined throughout the course of study. Among these is the development of the American
character during different time periods as well as geographic regions, the changing economic and political characteristics of the United States,
the role reform movements have had in creating conflict and change socially, politically and economically, the legacy of slavery and its
impact, the role of war and peace in the development of the United States and the role technology and the impact on the social, political and
economic institutions domestically and globally.
The purpose of the themes is to illustrate the dynamic nature of American history and the relationships these have to a deeper understanding
of United States history.


The text for this course is Out of Many by Faragher, Buhle, Czitrom, and Armitage (Combined Edition 1994).
Supplemental Readings include excepts from the following:
American Lives: Cultural Differences, Individual Distinction by Amy A. Kass
Conflict and Consensus in Modern American History by Allen F. Davis and Harold D. Woodman
The American Spirit Volumes I and II by Thomas Bailey and David M. Kennedy
American Experiences Volumes I and II by Randy Roberts and James S. Olson
Interpretations of American History: Patterns and Perspectives by Gerald N. Grob and George Athan Billias
Discovering the American Past: A Look at the Evidence by William Bruce Wheeler and Susan D. Becker
Retrieving the American Past by Managing Editor John Day Tully
Organization of American Historians Magazine of History
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Course and Examination Standards

In May, each student is encouraged to take the Advanced Placement exam. The exam consists of a 55-minute multiple-choice section and a
130-minute free-response section. Students are prepared by receiving periodic tests modeled after the Advanced Placement exam. Students
also receive frequent in-class writing assignments that simulate free-response and document based question (DBQ) essays. Frequent quizzes
are given based upon Brainstorm lists or Decade information. Brainstorm lists are generated from the Areas of Focus that follow. Decades
quizzes are specific timeframe quizzes requiring the recall of event information within a period of 20 years. These quizzes are identified in the
syllabus as either BS (Brainstorm) or DQ (Decades Quiz)

In addition, throughout the year students will be required to read additional scholarly articles and to prepare reports of these materials for their
classmates. Lastly, each student will prepare and deliver a research paper by the close of the school year on a topic in United States History
approved by the instructor.
Evaluation

Grades for course work will be determined through test results, papers, quizzes, take-home and in class assignments. Tests and papers receive
more weighting than other assignments due to the fact they represent the culmination of unit studies. Other assignments are factored as
fractions of a test grade. The exception to this is the Research Paper that will represent at least fifty-percent of the fourth quarter grade.
The following is a guide to reading and themes for our course of study. Please note that there are events and situations that may alter these
timelines. In addition, the instructor reserves the right to have unannounced quizzes that may include information previously covered.
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COURSE: Advanced Placement United States History
TIME
FRAME
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS/MEDIA
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
SummerSeptember
Summer Reading: In Out of Many Read
through the first 6 chapters and section 1 of
chapter 7 (Chapter 1 A Continent of
Villages, Chapter 2 When Worlds Collide,
Chapter 3 Planting Colonies in North
America, Chapter 4 Slavery and Empire,
Chapter 5 The Cultures of Colonial North
America, Chapter 6 From Empire to
Independence, and through the War for
Independence C7 Section 1) to prepare for
the first two weeks of classes.
The present is influenced by
the past.
How do we construct
meaning of our own time
by studying the past?
Areas of focus would be as follows:
Imperial organization; Spanish, French
and English; Native Cultures;
mercantilism; slavery; colonial life in
New England, Middle and Southern
colonies; French and Indian War;
Colonial conflicts with Imperial
Britain, French and Indian War, Causes
and Consequences of Parliamentary
Acts, Franklin’s Albany Plan of Union,
Revolutionary thoughts, War for
Independence, Patriots and Loyalists,
Articles of Confederation and The
Constitution of the United States,
Shays’ Rebellion, The Constitution as a
Counter Revolution, The New Nation
under Washington and Adams.
Document Analysis
APPARTS: Common Sense
Declaration of Independence
Washington’s Farewell Address
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
What is a Free Response Essay?
Free Response Essay –(SAMPLE)
Analyze the extent to which TWO of
the following promoted the movement
towards Independence from 1760-1776
.
French and Indian War
British tax policies
Sons of Liberty
Second Continental Congress
Chapter 7 The Creation of the United States
Sections 2-4
Article- Women and the American
Revolution
Chapter 8 The United States of North
America
A variety of sources can
provide information about the
past.
A conflict can create an
opportunity.
Citizens of a nation have both
rights and responsibilities.
What can I learn from the
past?
How can the perspective
we have about out own
life experiences be
viewed as part of the
larger human story across
time?
How much power should
the national government
have?
Can government truly
represent all of its
citizens?
Article- Taking a Stand for Speech
How do rights demand
responsibility?
Media-PowerPoint Presentation
Documents of the Revolution
Hamilton and Jefferson and the Evolution of
Political Parties
What were the vested
interests that both
determined the content of
the constitutional debates
and influenced their
outcome?
Multiple Choice Test 1600-1763
3
Time
Frame
October
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS/MEDIA
Out of Many Chapter 9 The Agrarian
Republic
Article-A Reincarnated Jefferson
Chapter 10 The Growth of Democracy
Article- The Age of Jacksonian Democracy
Chapter 11 The South and Slavery
Chapter 12 Industry and the North
Article- Everyday Life Before the Civil War
Media: Thomas Jefferson-A Film by Ken
Burns
PowerPoint Presentation
United States Constitutional Convention
Thomas Jefferson and the Louisiana
Purchase
Andrew Jackson
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
Representative government is
challenged by vested interests
that must be balanced with
those of ordinary citizens.
What does it mean to be
an American?
Jefferson as President, Louisiana
Purchase, Lewis and Clark, Marbury v.
Madison, Native tribes and government
policy, Mr. Madison’s War, the politics
of compromise, The common man,
suffrage and Jacksonian Democracy,
Trail of Tears, Internal improvements
and new technologies, The Bank and
Tariff Issues, panics, The rise of the
Whig Party, Texas revolution,,
King Cotton and the economics of
Slavery, Planters and Yeomen, Slave
communities and slave labor, Free
black communities, defense of slavery,
Industrial revolution and the cash
economy, the factory town, emergence
of the middle class.
Set boundaries have impacts
on cultures and relationships
with other powerful nations.
Would the U.S. have
become a world power if
it had followed
Jefferson’s hopes for a
nation of farmers?
Was the displacement of
the American Indian
inevitable?
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
Anatomy of a DBQ;
DBQ (SAMPLE)
To what extent was the design of the
Presidency at the Constitutional
Convention of 1787 a response to
fears of a potential American
monarch?
APPARTS: OGRABME cartoon,
Andrew Jackson Cartoons, Liberator
editorial
4
Free Response Essay (SAMPLE)
Analyze the ways in which the
Antebellum era altered the social and
political fabric of America. Focus on
the period from 1820-1860.
Multiple Choice Test 1763-1840
5
Time
Frame
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
November
Out of Many Chapter 13 Coming to Terms
with a New Age
Individuals, groups, and
societies have the opportunity
to make significant political
choices and decisions that
have consequences.
Did reformers of this era
make a difference?
The Spirit of Reform: Evangelicalism
and Reform, Labor movements, Seneca
Falls and Women’s Rights,
Abolitionism and anti-slavery,
Manifest Destiny, War with Mexico,
Gold Rush, Compromise of 1850,
Free-Soil Party, The crisis defined,
slave power conspiracy, Fugitive Slave
Act, Dred Scott Case, Bleeding
Kansas, The Republican Party, John
Brown, Southern Revolution for
Conservative Purposes, A Call to
Arms, Strengths and Weaknesses,
Greenbacks, Anaconda Plan, Antietam,
Gettysburg, Vicksburg, Total War,
Grant, Lee, Sherman, Emancipation
Proclamation, Harpers Ferry.
Chapter 14 The Territorial Expansion of the
United States
Article: A Mexican Viewpoint on the War
With the United States
Set boundaries have impacts
on cultures and relationships
with other powerful nations.
Can you accurately
predict the outcome of a
decision?
What constitutes an
effective decision?
Chapter15 The Coming Crisis
Chapter 16 The Civil War
Article: Civil War and the Use of Sermons
as Historical Documents
What does it mean to be
an American?
Can we balance
individual liberties and
the public good?
Media: The Civil War a Film by Ken Burns
PowerPoint Presentation
Manifest Destiny and Imperialism
Compromise to Crisis-Prelude to the Civil
War
Images of the Civil War-The Photography of
Matthew Brady
Was it inevitable that the
U.S. would come into
conflict with powers who
claimed territory on the
North American
continent?
APPARTS: Abolition Song, The
Terrors of Submission (Charleston
Mercury) Declaration of Secession
State of South Carolina, A Call to
Arms (North Carolina), Gettysburg
Address
In what ways did the
Civil War build a stronger Brain Storm List quiz on terms
government?
Is equality possible?
DBQ
Multiple Choice Test 1840-1865
6
Time
Frame
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
Out of Many Chapter 17 Reconstruction
Individuals, groups, and
societies have the opportunity
to make significant political
choices and decisions that
have consequences.
December
Chapter 18 Conquest and Survival:
Communities in the Trans Mississippi West
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
Why are politics called
the art of compromise?
Chapter 19 The Incorporation of America
Article: The Big Road
Article: The History of Business in America
Media: Reconstruction: The Second Civil
War (American Experience)
The Iron Road (American Experience)
PowerPoint Presentation
Reconstruction
Industry and new
technological advances have a
major impact on society’s
culture and standard of living.
What is the American
dream and who was left
out of it?
Should the government
regulate business?
How do individuals make
a difference?
The Ten-percent Plan, Freedmen’s
Bureau, Radical Republicans,
Constitutional Crisis, 13th, 14th and 15th
Amendments, African American
politics and communities, Counterrevolution of whites in South,
Compromise of 1877,
Homestead Act, migration,
Transcontinental Railroad, Irish and
Chinese workers, Reservations, War
for the West with Natives, Cowboys,
Miners, and Farmers, The Gilded Age,
role of unions, urbanization, political
bosses and spoils system, Chinese
exclusion.
APPARTS: Thomas Nast political
cartoons Harper’ s Weekly, The Ghost
Dance, Carnegie’s Gospel of Wealth
Industry in America 1865-1900
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
Free Response Essay (SAMPLE)
Big Business and American culture.
Multiple Choice Test 1865-1898.
7
Time
Frame
January
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
Out of Many Chapter 20 Commonwealth and
Empire
Chapter 21 Urban America and the
Progressive Era
Article: Why Big Bad Oil?
Media: The Richest Man in the World:
Andrew Carnegie (American Experience)
America 1900 (American Experience)
PowerPoint Presentation
Progressive Era
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
The strength of a country’s
industrial base is often
correlated to its global power.
Rapid industrialization led to a
variety of problems and to
harsh and dangerous working
conditions.
People emigrated to America
for different reasons. Each
individual has contributed to
the identity and development
of this country.
Immigrants experienced many
difficulties after their arrival in
the U.S. They were torn
between old traditions and the
new American culture.
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
What is the relationship
between industrialization
and world power?
Why did immigrants
come to this country?
How does culture shape
the way we see the world,
ourselves and others?
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
Populism and the Free Silver
Movement, the Grange, Panic, Jim
Crow and Racism, White Man’s
Burden, The Spanish-American War,
Square Deal, Political, Industrial and
Social Reforms, Immigration,
Muckraking, Washington and DuBois
and Issues of Race, Unions and
Radicalism, Wilson’s New Freedom,
Trust Busting
APPARTS: Political Cartoons on
Imperialism, The Jungle
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
What factors influenced
or determined the way an
immigrant group was
received and treated by
the citizens of this
country?
Must tradition always
give way to progress?
Free Response Essay (SAMPLE)
Imperialism and Race
DBQ-Mid Term Examination
(SAMPLE)
Jefferson and Expansion
To what extent did
immigrants assimilate
into American life?
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Time
Frame
February
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
Out of Many Chapter 22 World War I
Out of Many Chapter 23 The Twenties
Out of Many Chapter 24 The Great
Depression and the New Deal
Article-Defending the Home: Ossian Sweet
and the Struggle Against Segregation in
1920’s Detroit
Media-Houdini (American Experience)
FDR (American Experience)
PowerPoint Presentation
World War I and the 14 points
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
Individuals, groups, and
societies have the opportunity
to make significant political
choices and decisions that
have consequences.
What can be learned
about the American
character from the
manner by which the
United States mobilized,
prepared and participated
in a world war?
A nation must balance the
need for public safety with the
protection of individual rights.
Was immigration
restriction a result of the
democratic process?
Are economic recessions
and depressions
avoidable?
The 1920’s
FDR and the New Deal
How can ideas have
consequences?
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
New World Power, Moral Diplomacy,
Neutrality, “He Kept Us Out of War”,
Over There, War at Home, Sedition
Act, Red Scare, The Fourteen Points,
Jazz Age, Consumerism, Prohibition,
The Automobile, “Business of America
is Business”, False Prosperity,
Immigration Restriction, The KKK,
Harlem Renaissance, The New
Woman, Hard Times, Market Crash,
RFC, FDR and the First New Deal,
Three R’s, Dust Bowl, New Deal
Critics, The Supreme Court and the
New Deal, Swing Music, Good
Neighbor Policy
APPARTS: Lodge Reservations,
Langston Hughes poems, KKK Rally
Poster, FDR New Deal Cartoons
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
DQ (Decades Quiz) 1 and 2
Multiple Choice Test 1898-1940
Free Response Essay (SAMPLE)
FDR and the Presidency.
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Time
Frame
March
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
Out of Many Chapter 25 World War II
Out of Many Chapter 26 The Cold War
Out of Many Chapter 27 America at MidCentury
Out of Many Chapter 28 Civil Rights and the
Great Society
Article: The Rosenbergs Trial: An Account
"The Shocking Story of Approved Killing in
Mississippi," Look Magazine
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL
QUESTIONS
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
Citizens of a nation have both
rights and responsibilities.
How does a war bring out
the best and worst in a
society and its people?
Isolation to War, Lend-Lease, Allied
Powers, Axis Powers, European and
Pacific Theaters, War at Home,
Japanese Internment, The Atomic
Bomb, Price of Victory, WACs and
WAVEs United Nations, Containment,
Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan, Fair
Deal, Red Scare, McCarthyism,
Korean War, NATO, Hollywood,
HUAC, Jackie Robinson, Dixiecrats,
Returning GI’s, Mao and China, I Like
Ike, Suburbia, Rock N’ Roll, Inter-state
Highway Act, Levittown, Richard
Nixon, Polio and Dr. Salk, Television
and Mass Culture, Beatniks, Dulles and
Massive Retaliation, U-2 Flights, CIA,
French Indo-China, Sputnik, MilitaryIndustrial Complex, 1960 Election,
JFK and the New Frontier, Cuba, Bay
of Pigs and the Missile Crisis, Green
Berets, Khrushchev, Space Race and
NASA, JFK assassination, Segregation
in Post War America, Brown v. Board
of Education Topeka, KA, Little Rock,
AR, Rosa Park, Martin Luther King
and Montgomery Bus Boycott, CORE,
Thurgood Marshall, Civil Rights Act
1957, Freedom Rides, Southern
Christian leadership Conference,
Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee, James Meredith and
University of Mississippi, JFK, March
on Washington, LBJ and the Civil
Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act
of 1965, Hispanic Americans, Native
tribes, The Other America, War on
Poverty, OEO, Jobs Corps, Aid to
Families with Dependent Children
Individuals can have a
significant effect on history.
War has enormous human and
material costs.
Compromise serves the
majority needs of a diverse
group, inability to compromise
may lead to conflict.
In fighting a war, do the
ends justify the means?
Was WWII a
continuation of WWI?
Media: The Murder of Emmett Till
(American Experience)
How could mutual
distrust, suspicion and
misunderstanding
between nations lead to
fear and insecurity?
PowerPoint Presentation
The Cold War: 1945-1960
What defines abuse of
political power?
American Images: 1945-1960
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(AFDC), The Warren Court,
APPARTS: The Atlantic Charter,
Jackie Robinson, McCarran Act,
Pravda cartoon(Truman), Letter from a
Birmingham Jail
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
DQ (Decades Quiz) 3 and 4
DBQ-Sample
Civil Rights and the Supreme Court
Multiple Choice Test 1940-1968
11
Time
Frame
AprilMay 11
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
Out of Many Chapter 29 War Abroad, War at
Home
Out of Many Chapter 30 The Overextended
Society
Out of Many Chapter 31 The Conservative
Ascendancy
Article: Henry David Thoreau, Martin
Luther King Jr. and the American Tradition
of Protest
ENDURING
UNDERSTANDINGS
ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS
AREAS OF FOCUS
ASSESSMENT EVIDENCE
The present is
influenced by the past.
Are there limits to power?
Gulf of Tonkin, Operation Rolling
Thunder, Malcolm X, Cesar Chavez,
Fulbright, National Organization of
Women, anti-war protests, race riots in
Newark and Detroit, Tet Offensive,
assassinations of King and RFK, “The
Whole World’s Watching”, Chicago
and the Democratic Convention, The
New Nixon, Russell Means and
American Indian Movement,
Woodstock, July 1969 and Men on the
Moon, Pentagon Papers, Nixon in
China, Detente, SALT I, Watergate,
Wounded Knee, Agnew Resignation,
Cease Fire in Vietnam, Nixon Resigns,
Arab Oil Embargo, Roe v. Wade,
Alaskan Oil Pipeline, OPEC, Nelson
Rockefeller, Gerald Ford, WIN,
Mayaguez Incident, War in Vietnam
ends, Boston and Busing, BiCentennial Celebration, Rust Belt, Sun
Belt, Jimmy Carter and Moral Policies
Home and Abroad, Bakke Case,
unemployment, Earth Day and the
environmental movement, Archie
Bunker, ERA, Camp David Accords,
Three Mile Island, SALT II, Iran
Hostage Crisis and Yellow Ribbons,
Ayatollah Khomeini and Islamic
Fundamentalism, 1980 Election,
Olympic Boycott, Reagan Revolution,
Reaganomics, dismantling of the
welfare state, Star Wars and the
Strategic Defense Initiative, Supply
Side Economics, National Debt, The
Evil Empire and the End of the Cold
War, Iran Contra Scandal and Oliver
North, Mujahedeen in Afghanistan,
How has technology changed the
way people work and live?
Individuals, groups,
and societies have the
opportunity to make
significant political
choices and decisions
that have consequences
Article- History and the End of the Cold
War: A Whole New Ballgame?
Media: Nixon (American Experience)
Citizens of a nation
have both rights and
responsibilities
PowerPoint Presentation
The Cold War 1960-1990
American Images 1960-1990
Democratic
government requires
the input of vigilance
of the governed.
To what extent has the unequal
distribution of economic power
translated into unequal political
power?
What is the new world role of the
United States in the post Cold
War Era?
Has the concept of the American
dream changed?
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Sandinistas, Somoza and Panama,
Grenada, Cuban Boat brigades,
Glasnost, Perestroika and Gorbachev,
PLO, Lebanon and US Marines,
Silicon Valley and the PC, Microsoft
and Bill Gates, MTV, HIV/AIDS,
Homelessness, Crash of 1987 and junk
bonds, Illegal immigration, Collapse of
the USSR, Persian Gulf War (First
Gulf War), George Bush (41), Rodney
King and the Los Angeles Riots,
William Jefferson Clinton, H. Ross
Perot, 9/11/2001, Election of 1992
Brain Storm List quiz on terms
DQ (Decades Quiz) 5 and 6
EXAM PREPARATION
In class DBQ and Free Response
Sessions
Multiple Choice Test Practice
13
Time
Frame
READINGS/UNITS/TOPICS
Post
Research paper and book analysis.
Exam
May/June Several short in class projects.
Sample:
Discussion of Alvin Toffler’s themes in
Third Wave.
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