Being a rather large and well-known state, California was a definite choice for our US studies. I’ve never been to California myself, but I know a lot of Californians. Here’s what we did for our California unit:
Week 1
Located California on our US map and colored it in; discussed capital and major cities.
Sang “Western Border of the United States” (Geography Songs)
Notebook page (Homeschool Creations)
Flag page (Apples 4 the Teacher)
Wednesday: Geography from A to Z: desert, beach, coast, mountains
Map page (Enchanted Learning)
Discussed Sierra Nevada Mountains, Death Valley, and Mohave Desert; and we watched some YouTube videos, but I don’t have the links for them (sorry!).
Discussed earthquakes and read the book …if You Lived at the Time of the Great San Francisco Earthquake
We did watch some YouTube videos on the 1906 and 1989 San Francisco earthquakes, but I forgot to bookmark the ones we watched, so I don’t have any links.
Learned the song “California Here I Come” (I sang this song and did a little dance routine with classmates in our 5th grade musical, so it brought back fond memories.)
Discussed Hollywood
Week 2
Famous People: Ronald Reagan, Richard Nixon, Sally Ride, Ansel Adams, Shirley Temple, Robert Frost, Jeff Gordon, George Lucas (click on links for interesting websites)
YouTube video links
Good Ship Lollipop (Shirley Temple)
First American Woman in Space (Sally Ride)
Stopping by woods on a snowy evening (Robert Frost)
Isaac did a report on the Golden Gate Bridge (webpage HERE)
YouTube video on Golden Gate Bridge
Discussed San Francisco, cable cars (YouTube Videos HERE, HERE, and HERE)
Discussed California National Parks and watched YouTube videos:
The Coolest Stuff on the Planet: Yosemite National Park
Kings Canyon & Sequoia National Park
Tallest tree found in Redwood National Park
Unusual Beauty of Joshua Tree National Park
Read some Native American folktales: The Origin of Yosemite and How El Capitan Grew
Discussed Gold Rush (Click on that link for and interesting webpage and The Elephant, PBS Kids, and Onsite Adventures for more!)
YouTube video on the Gold Rush
Discussed missions (particularly San Juan Capistrano), Read book Song of the Swallows and a guidebook on San Juan Capistrano, where the story takes place.
YouTube video on early missions
Check out these California unit studies by other bloggers!
Get Down and Get Your Hands Dirty
More California links:
Crayola Suspension Bridge craft (we didn’t have time to do this, but it’s pretty cool)
I'm linking this post to "History and Geography" at All Things Beautiful.
Another wonderful state study! I love the way you have broken it all down for us. You have done all the work! It would be so easy to follow your directions for an easy but thorough state study!
ReplyDeleteOkay, so now I'm acutally sitting down and awake. I had your post still saved in my reader to check out. We're actually going to go back to California when we get there again by looking at states in order, so I'm sure I'll be checking out your posts for video ideas.
ReplyDelete