TRAR Survey for VA Studies

The Real American Revolution

The purpose of this survey is to learn what would help students lay a strong, accurate, and lasting foundation of knowledge and interest in the founding history and civic principles of the nation while also helping students develop skills, knowledge, and desire to become good citizens.

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Are you currently teaching 4th grade VA State Studies?
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How many years have you taught 4th grade Virginia SOL Virginia Studies?

How many VA State Studies teaching days can you devote to teach the period that begins after the French and Indian War (1763), goes through the Revolutionary War, the New Nation, Constitution, and the Bill of Rights, ending about 1812?

When (which weeks/months) during the year do you teach these units?

Would it help you to teach your students about the Virginia aspects of the American Revolution if there were an overarching storyline that captured your students' imaginations and pulled them into the world-changing ideas, issues, people and events of the Revolutionary War so that they understood, retained, and identified with this national history while seeing the context and importance of Virginia's pivotal parts of those events?
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Would it help your students understand and relate to the period if the storyline included brief narrations about a fictional but historically accurate Virginia child who is their age when students first meet him at the end of the French and Indian War, and whose personal story as he grows up and participates in/ is affected by events reappears intermittently through the study?
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Would it help you teach your students about the American Revolution and the founding of the nation from a Virginia perspective if you had grade-appropriate teaching materials that included:
Choose All That Apply

Primary sources that are age-appropriate and interesting to your students (ex: journals written by children of that period about events your students are studying) and that fit into your lessons and meet your teaching objectives.
An online animated video overview of the American Revolution.
Online short videos about aspects of the American Revolution or problems caused by the Articles of Confederation.
Music of the 18th century to be used as background in class.
Use of an interactive online game that brings home the crushing difficulty of making dangerous decisions in wartime - "Being Washington" by Mount Vernon.
Quick, accurate, fun lessons in 18th century language, deportment, and manners.
Lists of curated historical fiction about the period age-appropriate for your students.
Active lessons teaching students how to discern character traits of individuals of historical significance during the American Revolution and Founding periods (ex. Washington, Jefferson, James Lafayette, etc.).
A home conversation guide that parents could use at home if they wish to enhance student (and family) interest and knowledge.
Materials and lesson plan for an interactive multi-media experience that makes clear to students how and why the big ideas about rights, scientific reasoning, and self-government swept through the colonies and inspired American colonists.
Audio-dramas that bring to life key events during the American Revolution.
Lessons and materials that would engage students in higher level thinking, not only dealing with issues as people from all walks of life in the midst of the Revolution, but relating those issues to their own lives today.
Lessons in which students actively use principle-based reasoning and principles of self-governance to make decisions, debate elements of the Constitution, and formulate their own laws.
Active learning that builds character traits, reasoning, and behavioral habits that are components of good citizenship.
Links to short, age-appropriate videos that either dramatize or explain aspects of the War or feature an interview with a character actor portraying a particular historical person incorporated into your teaching materials?
Classroom Small Trunk: Would you like to have a permanent classroom collection of teaching objects that you could use year after year when you need them and that are keyed to specific lessons for maximum teaching impact.
Traveling Large Trunk: Portable trunk that could be reserved on certain date, subject to availability, and sent to your class for a defined period of time. The trunk contains pictures, maps, reproduction documents, and artifacts that will enable students to view, touch, feel, and analyze the purpose and use of historic objects.
Washington Rochambeau Trail Resource and Activity Book: activities including Words of History match game; geographical game, comics, secret code, word search activities; connect the historic dots; crossword puzzle; etc.
Online videos of history reenactors representing people from various walks of life who bring out the impact of British laws on their lives, and/or the impact of the War on their lives, and/or their impact on events .
Live visits from history reenactors representing people from various walk of life who discuss impact of the War from their points of view.

If you had the links, would it help you to have an introduction and/or post video discussion questions provided to you.
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Yes No

If you had online videos of history reenactors, what is the ideal maximum length of each program?

If you had online videos of history reenactors, would it help to have introductory and after-event materials for each?
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If you had live visits from history reenactors, what is the ideal length of live visits?

In such a live visit or in videos, which of the following would be most valuable to your teaching objectives?
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Lafayette: Why he and France helped and what they gave
Lafayette: His reaction to American slavery and how Black soldiers changed the opinions of some Americans
A Virginia Native American: Native American Involvement in the American Revolution
Orientation Overview of the American Revolution 1763-1789
James Lafayette: African American Soldiers in the Revolutionary War
James Lafayette: His contributions, friendship with Lafayette and later life
Washington: How his childhood choices led to generalship
Washington: Spy-craft and counterintelligence he used to keep the British from attacking the Allies marching to VA
George Washington: Giving up command
George Washington: Importance of lawful and peaceful transfer of office to next President
Banastre Tarleton: His cavalry, attitude, and acts in VA
French Commander General Comte de Rochambeau: The alliance, his challenges, trek to VA, and Yorktown
Admiral Comte de Grasse: Naval role Yorktown and World War
John Graves Simcoe, British Commander of Queen's Rangers - attacks in Virginia
General Lord Cornwallis, British Commander in Southern Campaigns: Why his attention turned to Virginia and what his forces did there: British attitudes; Yorktown
Patrick Henry: Reasons for Revolution
Camp follower: Life of a wife of a soldier; Why women were part of the army
Thomas Jefferson: Declaration expressed ideas that he and other Americans had been learning, believing, and living for their lifetimes
George Mason's contributions
Enslaved person: What the British offered
Loyalist: Explaining reasons for loyalty to Great Britain and the price paid
Martha Washington: Patriot women in the War
Spanish officer: Spain's contributions to the American Revolution
General Knox: French artillery and siege warfare at Yorktown
Martha Washington: From New Kent to Mount Vernon

Since there is limited time to cover this period in Social Studies, would it help if there were many choices of teaching materials in both STEM subjects (Math, Science, Language Arts, and Technology) and in Art, Music, Dramatics, and P. E. that would apply the exact skills and knowledge being taught in those subjects as fast and as well or better than currently used materials, while enhancing student understanding of or illuminating important facets of the American Revolution or founding that you don't have time to teach?
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Would it help you to have available for your use a fully integrated curriculum covering this period that includes detailed lesson plans and teaching materials in social studies and all other subjects (Teachers would choose those lessons and activities that best serve their own and their students' needs.)?
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Yes No

Which of the following types of training would you use, if it were available?
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On-demand, online, segmented by topic, educator training on the period and/or about how to implement cooperatively or create lessons that are integrated across several subjects. These could be accessed at the viewer's convenience as many times as desired.
Live half-day or full-day Symposiums conducted by The Real American Revolution and the American Revolution Consortium for Civic Education featuring a combination of the aforementioned topics.
Zoom live training and Q&A series, held during the last hour of the workday over several days.

Examples of historic period presentations for teachers that you could access follow. These could be viewed online, taking advantage of all the visual material Power Point makes possible, or simply listened to, accessible as a podcast. Please select which you would be interested in viewing or listening to.
Choose All That Apply

Orientation Overview of all 26 years of the American Revolution through Constitution era, 1763-1789
African American Soldiers in the Revolutionary War
Alexander Hamilton
Artillery during the Revolutionary War
Banastre Tarleton, British Cavalry Leader
Comte de Rochambeau, Commander of French forces in America
Comte de Grasse, French Admiral
French Aid during the American Revolution
General George Washington, Commander of American Continental forces
General Henry Knox, Commander of Continental Artillery
John Graves Simcoe, British Commander of Queen's Rangers
Lord Cornwallis, British Commander in the Southern Campaigns
General Lafayette, French General who assisted the American cause
Native American Involvement in the American Revolution
Patrick Henry, Voice of the Revolution
Southern Campaigns of the American Revolution
Spanish Involvement in the Revolutionary War
Thomas Jefferson, Primary Author of Declaration of Independence
Virginia's Role in the American Revolution
Washington Rochambeau Revolutionary Route National Historic Trail
Women Leaders and Heroines of the Revolution
Yorktown and French Aid
Constitutional Convention

Would you be more likely to use an online training series if you were to receive continuing education credits for doing so?
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How many field trips do your students take per year?

What would an ideal field trip about the American Revolution or founding period include?

If a field trip relates to the American Revolution or Founding Period, would you be more likely to select it from all the possible field trips if it also relates to important teaching objectives in additional subjects such as Science, Art, Technology, and Language Arts?
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Yes No

If you were able to take your students on a field trip relating to this unit of study, assuming both the program and guides at each site are outstanding, which of the following sites would be most desirable?
Choose All That Apply

American Revolution Museum in Yorktown (State museum, Virginia)
Colonial National Historic Park (Yorktown Battlefield)
Gunston Hall, Home of George Mason
Monticello, Home of Thomas Jefferson
Montpelier, Home of James Madison
Mount Vernon, Home of George Washington
Museum of the American Revolution (National museum, Philadelphia)
Scotchtown, Home of Patrick Henry
St. John's Church, Richmond, Site of Patrick Henry's famous speech
Colonial Williamsburg
Hampton Roads Naval Museum for the Battle of the Capes games
Berkeley Plantation, Home of Harrison Family
Highland, Home of James Monroe
John Marshall House
Kenmore, Home of Mary Washington
Mariners' Museum
National Museum of the Marine Corps
National Museum of the U.S. Army
Red Hill, Last Home of Patrick Henry
Stratford Hall, Home of the Lee Family
Virginia Museum of History & Culture
Virginia War Museum
Watermens Museum
Westmoreland, George Washington's Birthplace

If you were to learn that teachers in higher grades (generally middle school teachers of US History to 1865) say they cannot teach students as well as they should about the big ideas, events, and issues of the American Revolution or the civic/government principles of the Constitution in the time available to them with the materials they have unless the students arrive with more retained knowledge and interest about these topics from 4th grade than they do now, would you be surprised?
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If you have already taught these periods of history at least one year, do you believe that enhanced teaching methods, materials, and training support would help achieve the goal of laying a strong, lasting foundation of knowledge and ownership of the civic principles and early history of the nation?
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Do you find your local school division pacing guide for VA History adequate with time allotments for dedicated teaching? Why or why not?

Type anything you would like to add.