CD History Web Lessons NOW Available thanks to the Verizon Grant Program! Thank You!!

Lesson Plan #1 - New York State "Farm" History        © Lesson Plan in PDF Format        © Lesson Plan in Word Format

These Cd's are still available to anyone who did not receive one. Please contact us at 1-800-342-4143 or at sprokop@nyfb.org

Lesson Plan One Overview

This lesson was designed for use in a 7^th or 8^th grade American History classroom.  In the 1^st part of the lesson students will read the biography of a NYS farm.  In the 2^nd part they will use Google maps to identify geographic features of the farm and the area around it.  After each part of the lesson students will answer questions from the constructed response worksheet.         

The lesson can easily be modified for use with small or large class sizes and classrooms with one or multiple computers.  The lesson can be completed in 2 class periods.

 Objectives:

• Students will be able to identify the ways that agriculture and farming changed in New York State.
• Students will be able to recall key groups and their importance in the history of agriculture in New York State.
• Students will make connections regarding the importance of agriculture and key events in the history of New York State.

Lesson Plan Two Overview

This lesson was designed for use in the 7^th grade and would also work great as review at the beginning / end of the year in the 8^th grade.  The questions on the Constructed Response Worksheet were created to resemble a DBQ, using the Diversity and Change CD-ROM as the document.             

There are many different options for using the CD and Constructed Response Worksheet in the classroom depending on each individual teacher’s curriculum, class size, and availability of computers.  The worksheet questions do not have to be used all at once; they can be used as each unit is covered in class or for review at the end of the year.

Objectives:

¨  Students will be able to identify the ways that agriculture and farming changed in New York State.

¨  Students will be able to recall key groups and their importance in the history of agriculture in New York State.

¨  Students will make connections regarding the importance of agriculture and key events in the history of New York State.

Creation Partner: Q. Jones – Partner in CD History Web Lessons Project

Q. Jones is originally from Norwich, New York.  He attended SUNY Cobleskill and received an A.A.S. degree in Micro-computer Applications in 1999.  After graduation Q. entered the auto industry focusing on car sales for the next eight years.

While working as a car salesman he decided to fulfill his dream of becoming a Social Studies teacher and began working on his degree in Adolescent Education in 2003 at SUNY Oneonta. 

In 2007 Middleburgh Middle School hired Q. to fill a leave position in 6^th grade mathematics and at the end of the year he was hired to fill a 7^th grade American History position in the school district.  Q. is also the Varsity tennis coach in Middleburgh and is completing courses at SUNY Albany for a Masters degree in History.

A teacher with proper credentials worked with the Foundation to create two lesson plans in conjunction with the 7th grade standards.  The lesson plans are tied to the CD History of New York Agriculture that was distributed to 7th grade social studies classes throughout New York State.  Lesson plans utilize the information and websites on the CD plus the histories and pictures from the highlighted farms featured on the CD.  These lesson plans are available for download from the Foundation website.

These lesson plans are available to teachers and home schoolers and all with internet access via our website, thereby eliminating the need for expensive publishing and mailing while increasing access and usage. 

This project enhances many of the disciplines of literacy (including agricultural literacy).  The interactive CD is just the first step in the process.  Touching those that utilize this resource through narration, printed word and individually-centered exploration via today’s technology.  Due to the “local” concept presented through the family histories spanning more than 100 years for each of the 19 farm families highlighted, a personal attachment to history is developed which is an incentive to learn more about the family, commodity and region. This interactive process has been very successful in improving literacy skills, community knowledge plus boosting self confidence in the students due to the ease of learning and allowing for a more individualized learning pattern.  This enhancement of self confidence has a very positive impact on the entire education process of everyone in the general population, regardless of any qualifiers.

This project addresses literacy in a variety of forms.  The benefits of improvement of literacy skills, increased community knowledge plus elevated self confidence provide for a social structure that can grow positively.  Agricultural literacy and understanding provide skills and knowledge that enhance the locale through career visions of more depth and breadth and an elevated awareness of opportunities for entrepreneurship.  Literacy means that misconceptions are questioned and the truth about any number of topics is brought to light.  Literacy is growth of expectations, energy, creativity, and ideas.  Agriculture is not only an essential of life, but THE essential of life.  The sustenance, shelter, and protection brought to us via agriculture need to be understood and the consuming public’s ag literacy level needs to be raised from its present level.  Agriculture is a part of, not apart from, all that we are now, and of our past history.  Improved agricultural literacy is one of the projects goals, reached with a partnering benefit of increased literacy, critical thinking skills, community history and knowledge and endless opportunity.  Literacy can be the overseer of a solution for many of the problems that plague us today.