WARRIOR RUN SCHOOL DISTRICT
WARRIOR RUN HIGH SCHOOL
AP UNITED STATES HISTORY
CURRICULUM
PREPARED BY:
RICHARD T. NORNHOLD, JR.
JUNE 2007
Warrior Run High School
AP United States History
Syllabus
Scope:
The course is taught as a survey of the history of The United States
from the Pre-Columbian Period to today, with the major emphasis on the
years 1763 to 1988 which span our history from the emergence of an
American identity to the end of the Cold War and the resurgence of
Conservatism. The course seeks to achieve a number of outcomes based on
the Academic Standards established by the state of Pennsylvania and
consistent with the Advanced Placement Curriculum. These include:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
Recognizing continuity and change in United States history by
examining the growth and changing role of the American
political and economic system as well as the foundations and
evolution of American culture.
Developing critical thinking skills and a deeper appreciation
of the complexity of historic issues and their relationship to
current events by examining primary and secondary written,
oral and physical evidence.
Understanding the role of conflict and compromise and how
individuals have shaped American history through working
together and also by challenging each other.
Developing critical thinking skills and a deeper appreciation
of the complexity of historic issues and their relationship to
current events by evaluating historical interpretation of events.
Preparation to be successful on the Advanced Placement
United States History test through:
a.) mastery of content relevant to the test
b.) frequent practice in writing analytical and interpretive essays
with special emphasis on the documents based essay (DBQ)
The basic framework of the course centers on eight units
each of which include chapter tests, at least one seminar and its
associated primary and secondary sources and a unit test which
includes a DBQ or a free-response essay based on the types used
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in the AP test. Students spend a great deal of time evaluating their
own and their classmates’ writing using the AP rubric.
Due to the exigencies of scheduling in the high school, the
course meets one period daily during the first semester and then
switches to a double period daily during the second semester. This
results in more student projects during the second semester. Students
are also required to write a term paper as a joint project with the
English Department.
Course Materials:

Kennedy, David, Lizabeth Cohen and Thomas Bailey. The American
Pageant. 12th ed. New York: Houghton Mifflin Company, 2002. (This
is the course’s basic text used along with its associated website and
other supplemental materials provided by the publisher.)
 AP reading list developed by the instructor and the high school
librarian.
 Secondary and primary source readings as assigned by the instructor
for discussion of seminar topics. Some representative examples will
be included in the Course Sequence.
 A variety of Internet sites and interactive web activities chosen or
created by the instructor. Representative examples will be included in
the Course Sequence.
Course Activities:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Lecture and PowerPoint presentations by the instructor
class discussion / seminars
Joint English and History term paper
Selected videos and video clips
Library and internet research
Interactive PowerPoint activities
Student essays and written reports.
Student created dramatizations, PowerPoint presentations and
visuals
Readings and assignments from the textbook
Readings and assignments from teacher selected supplementary
sources
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Expected Levels of Achievement:
1. Student will maintain a 65% or better average on all assigned work.
To receive AP credit and the associated weighting factor for the final
GPA, an overall grade of 85% must be maintained.
2. Students are expected to complete all assigned work on time and
participate consistent with their abilities in all activities.
3. Students are expected to be prepared for class and keep a notebook.
4. Students are expected to maintain good attendance and accept
responsibility for make up work.
5. All 11th grade students are expected to complete a term paper, which
is a joint project of the History and English Departments.
6. Completion of a summer assignment prior to the start of the school
year is also a prerequisite for participation in the AP course.
Methods of Evaluation:
1. Class participation as observed by the instructor and by the
2.
3.
4.
5.
completion of a variety of in class tasks assigned by the instructor.
Chapter tests, unit tests and written assignments.
Participation in seminars as observed and recorded by the instructor.
Student projects selected from teacher and/or student created lists and
approved by the teacher.
Student self-evaluations and student evaluations of their peers.
Curriculum Calendar, Content and Pennsylvania State Standards
Addressed:
Unit 1
Founding the New Nation
 Instructional time 25 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 1 and 2 (included in the summer
assignment) and chapters 3-8.
 Group Activity – comparison of a Native American creation story
to Genesis in the King James Version of The Bible. Develop a
thesis and content outline for a compare and contrast essay.
Students work with a partner to write a “sophisticated and well
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developed” thesis based on their comparison of the creation
stories and what they might tell us about the two cultures that
have come into contact in the New World. Students also prepare a
content outline listing information from the creation stories and
relevant content from the 2nd and 3rd chapters of the text that
would support their thesis. The class compares, analyzes and rates
each thesis for the extent of its development. This is their first
introduction to a simplistic thesis vs. a well-developed thesis.
 Unit DBQ: “To what extent had the colonists developed a sense of
their identity and unity as Americans by the eve of the
Revolution?” The Unit test is always followed with a lesson or two
in which the classes’ responses to the DBQ portion of the test are
analyzed. Especially following the first few DBQ’s the class is
given a handout of each person’s first paragraph and asked to
evaluate the thesis and look for indications of sophisticated
analysis and development. After every DBQ the documents used
in the essay are also analyzed by the group to examine different
possible interpretations and uses in the essay.
 Seminar topics:
1.
Was colonial culture uniquely American?
2.
What was the major cause of the American Revolution? Was
it really a revolution? (Sample readings list for typical
seminar: excerpts from historians, Crane Brinton, Theda
Skocpol, Martin Lipset, and John C. Miller defining the
concept of revolution; excerpt from Thomas Paine, Common
Sense; Timothy D. Hall, Central Michigan University, The
American Revolution and the Religious Public Sphere;
excerpt on James Otis and Patrick Henry from Henry
William Elson, History of the United States of America;
Stamp Act Congress, 1765, The Resolutions of the Stamp
Act Congress; excerpt from Stephen Hopkins, 1764, The
Rights of Colonists Examined; excerpt from Martin Howard,
1765, A Letter from a Gentleman at Halifax … upon a
Pamphlet entitled “The Rights of Colonists Examined”)
3.
To what extent were our Founding Fathers democratic and
to what extent were they self-interested?
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.2 7.1B 7.3 7.4 5.1ABC
5.3ABEK 5.4A 6.3B 6.4BCG
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Unit 2
Building the New Nation
 Instructional time 38 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 9-15
 Activities:
1.
Web quest topic – During the 1830’s, as abolitionists
became more outspoken in the North, Southerners defended
their “peculiar institution” by arguing that their slaves were
happier and better treated than workers in Northern
industries. Assess the validity of this argument in pre-Civil
War America.
2.
Group activity – Students working with a partner pick a
theme from the reform era of early 19th century America
such as The 2nd Great Awakening, temperance, women’s
rights, Utopianism, etc. Each team then presents a report to
the class outlining key ideas, people and the influence of
their topic on American life and culture. The team must also
find a current event topic with a relationship to their reform
era theme.
 Unit DBQ: “ ‘Reform movements in the United States sought to
expand democratic ideals.’ Assess the validity of this statement
with specific reference to the years 1825-1850.”
 Seminar topics:
1.
What was the true cause of the War of 1812?
2.
When Andrew Jackson vetoed the renewal of the Second Bank
of the United States in 1832, he argued that it had become a
nondemocratic institution “dangerous to the liberties of the
people” and primarily benefiting wealthy stock holders. Assess
the validity of this argument. (Sample readings – Andrew
Jackson, Veto of the Bank Renewal Bill. July 10, 1832. Daniel
Webster, Speech to the United States Senate Urging an
Override of the Veto. July 1832. Gareth Davis, The Destruction
of The Second Bank of the United States; Rational and Effects.
Various readings from student research on the 2nd BUS and
from Andrew Jackson on the Web edited by Tim Spalding.)
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.2 8.3 7.3 6.1D 6.2H 5.1 5.3
Unit 3
Testing the New Nation
 Instructional time 15 days
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 The American Pageant Chapters 16-19
 Activity – comparison of the speeches by Daniel Webster and John C.
Calhoun on the Compromise of 1850
 Unit DBQ: “By the 1850’s the Constitution, originally framed as
an instrument of national unity, had become a source of sectional
discord and tension and ultimately contributed to the failure of
the union it had created.” Using the documents and your
knowledge of the period 1850-1861, assess the validity of this
statement.
 Seminar topic – Assess the role of each of the following as a cause of
the Civil War: slavery as a moral issue, expansion of slavery, regional
economic differences, lack of effective political leadership, and states’
rights vs. federalism. (Sample readings – Abraham Lincoln, First
Inaugural Address. James McPherson, A War That Never Goes Away.
Andrew Curry, The Better Angels. The South Carolina Secession
Declaration. Selected Statistics on Slavery: 1860 Census. Excerpts
from Helen Bosanquet, Free Trade and Peace in the Nineteenth
Century. James DeBow, DeBow’s Review: On the Views of Nonslaveholders. 1860.)
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.3 7.1B 7.3 6.1A 6.4 5.1 5.3
Unit 4
Civil War and Reconstruction
 Instructional time 9 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 20-22
 Activity – analysis of political cartoons and a sharecropper’s contract
from the Reconstruction Period
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.2 8.3 7.1B 5.3G
Unit 5
Forging an Industrial Society
 Instructional time 21 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 23-26
 Activities
1. Students work in teams to create a documents based essay.
Students write an appropriate essay question based on a theme
from one of the chapters in the unit, find appropriate primary
sources to use as documents for the essay and also provide a
scoring rubric, outside information list and a summary of
possible analysis and inferences that might be derived from the
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documents. Students administer and score the DBQ’s they
have created. Some sample student DBQ’s from this unit:
a. To what extent did farmers and factory workers agree
on politics and trusts? How did their individual lives
differ throughout the Gilded Age?
b. How did the rush of immigration and urbanization of
America during 1865-1900 affect the country politically,
socially and economically? Were the changes for better
or worse? Explain thoroughly.
c. Discuss the effect that trusts and the completion of the
transcontinental railroad had on America’s working
class.
d. “During the Gilded Age, the Republican and Democratic
parties grew so similar in policy that presidential
campaigns resorted to mud-splattering.” Assess the
validity of this statement.
2. Analysis of a political cartoon from the Presidential Election of
1896.
 Unit DBQ: “How successful was organized labor in improving the
position of workers in the period from 1875 to 1900? Analyze the
factors that contributed to the level of success achieved.”
 Seminar – Which is a more accurate description of the wealthy
industrialists of the Gilded Age, “Robber Barons” or “Captains of
Industry?” (Sample readings – excerpt from John Tipple, “Big
Businessmen and a New Economy,” The Gilded Age. Morgan (ed.)
Syracuse University Press, 1970. Excerpt from Alfred Chandler, “The
Beginnings of ‘Big Business’ in American Industry.” Business
History Review. 1959. Excerpts from Henry George, Social Problems.
1883. Excerpt from Andrew Carnegie, Wealth. 1889. J. Bradford
DeLong, Robber Barons. 1998. Patrick Spooner, Why We Are Rich …
the Great Legacy of America’s Robber Barons. 1998.)
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.2 8.3 7.3 7.4 6.1 6.2 6.3 6.4
6.5 5.1A,C 5.3
Unit 6
The Progressives and Boom to Bust
 Instructional time 21 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 27-32
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 Activity – Interactive PowerPoint on child labor with hyperlinks to
Lewis Hines’ photographs for The National Child Labor Committee
from 1908-1912.
 Unit DBQ: “You are the editor of the Watsontown Tribune, a
respected newspaper in the Central Susquehanna Valley. Write
an editorial expressing your opinion on whether or not the United
States Senate should ratify the Treaty of Versailles with its
commitment to the League of Nations. Remember you must rely
on your knowledge of history up to 1920 and the provided
documents. You have no knowledge of future events; you may
only deduce future outcomes of this decision.”
 Seminar topics
1.
Were the Progressives Imperialists?
2.
Using the treatment of World War I dissenters as a case study,
what limits, if any, should be placed on freedom of speech
during times of war? (Sample readings – Excerpt from Oliver
Wendell Holmes dissent in Abrams v. United States, 1919,
World War I Protesters Should Be Guaranteed Freedom of
Speech. Excerpt from John H. Wigmore. Abrams v. U.S.
:Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Thuggery in War-Time
and Peace-Time. Illinois Law Review. March 1920. Excerpt
from Eugene Debs’s Canton, Ohio Speech 1918. Section 3 of
the Espionage Act of June 15, 1917. Summary of the ruling in
Schenk v. The United States (1919). Excerpt from Ward
Churchill’s essay “Some People Push Back” On the Justice of
Roosting Chickens. 2005.)
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.3 8.4D 5.1 5.2 5.3 5.4
Unit 7
Depression to Cold War
 Instructional time 16 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 33-37
 Activities
1.
2.
Students are divided into two debate teams ( U.S. v. Soviet
Union) and research and debate “Who was responsible for
starting the Cold War?”
Students develop “ top 10” lists for 20th Century America
(examples: 10 best Presidents, 10 greatest medical
breakthroughs, 10 most important writers) then working with a
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partner they choose a list and do a PowerPoint presentation
justifying their choices to be included on the list.
3.
Analysis of a political cartoon from the New Deal Era.
4.
Sample free response question for Chapter 33 test:
“Describe the relationship between American tariff policy,
war debts, and reparations and the Great Depression.
Explain why the federal government adopted the tariff and
debt repayment policies it did. Assess the wisdom of these
policies.”
 Unit DBQ: “Analyze the responses of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s
administration to the problems of the Great Depression. How
effective were these responses? How did they change the role of
the federal government?”
 Seminar topics
1. Was the New Deal a Great Achievement? (Sample readings –
Barton J. Bernstein, “The New Deal Achieved Little” excerpt from
Towards a New Past. Random House, 1968. William E.
Leuchtenburg, “The New Deal Was a Great Achievement” excerpt
from Fifty Years Later: The New Deal Reevaluated. Temple
University Press, 1985. The New Deal: Measures for Relief,
Recovery and Reform, a brief summary of the government
programs enacted as part of FDR’s New Deal from ercir.syr.edu.
Jim Powell, “Tough Questions for Defenders of the New Deal,”
The Wall Street Journal. November 2003.
2. Was the use of the atomic bomb against Japan justified?
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.3 8.4 7.3 6.4 5.1 5.4
Unit 8
Modern America
 Instructional time 20 days
 The American Pageant Chapters 38-41
 Activities – most of the activities in the final unit are review activities
in preparation for the AP test. These include a variety of student and
instructor created games such as History Jeopardy, History Who
Wants to Be a Millionaire, interactive PowerPoint quizzes, and
practice tests.
 Unit DBQ: Use your knowledge of the decades of the 1960’s and
70’s and your interpretation of Documents A-K to construct a
coherent essay on the following question. “1968 was a turning
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point for the United States.” To what extent is this statement an
accurate assessment?
 Seminar topics
1.
Should the Electoral College be abolished?
2.
Could the fall of South Vietnam have been prevented?
3.
Will history forgive Richard Nixon?
Pennsylvania State Standards Addressed – 8.1 8.3 8.4C,D 7.3A,B,D
5.1A,B,C,E 5.2 5.3 5.4
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