Heuristic Teaching

✦ UNIT 1 BUNDLE — FOUNDATIONS + LATE 19TH CENTURY U.S. ✦ 4 full weeks of teaching + one 100-point summative assessment. Everything you need to teach 5th grade U.S. history from 1865 to 1900.This is Unit 1 of a full 36-week 5th Grade Tennessee Social Studies curriculum. Buying the bundle gets you all four weekly products PLUS the complete Unit 1 Assessment package — saving roughly 20% off the cost of buying each piece separately. The unit covers U.S. history from the end of the Civil War (18

Based on The Book Whisperer, I have created a cute and functional way to assess new students coming into your class. This resource helps you get to know them better as readers. This Google Form asks them about their reading habits, what they like to read, and their library interactions. This is fully editable through Google Forms. You can adjust any question to better suit your needs. This form has the EXACT SAME questions as my paper version of the Reader's Survey ** Back To School **. You c

✦ WEEK 4 — THE GILDED AGE ✦ 5 days. 1 download. Zero prep.This is Week 4 of a full 36-week 5th Grade Tennessee Social Studies curriculum. Each week is a fully built, classroom-ready set of slides, notes, exit tickets, vocabulary supports, and an assessment — designed around TN standard 5.03 and Social Studies Practices SSP.01, .02, .04, and .05. Your students will leave the week able to explain: Why Mark Twain coined "Gilded Age" — and how a single word choice (gilded vs golden) shaped 150 y

✦ WEEK 3 — SETTLING THE GREAT PLAINS ✦ 5 days. 1 download. Zero prep. Can be used stand-alone or with my Year-Long 5th Grade Tennessee History Teaching MaterialThis is Week 3 of a full 36-week 5th Grade Tennessee Social Studies curriculum from Heuristic Teaching. Each week is a fully built, classroom-ready set of slides, notes, exit tickets, vocabulary supports, and an assessment — designed around TN standard 5.02 and Social Studies Practices SSP.01, .02, .04, .05, and .06. Use this resourc

5 days. 1 download. Zero prep.This is Week 2 of a full 36-week 5th Grade Tennessee Social Studies curriculum. Each week is a fully built, classroom-ready set of slides, notes, exit tickets, vocabulary supports, and an assessment — designed around TN standard 5.01 and Social Studies Practices SSP.01, SSP.04, SSP.05, and SSP.06. Your students will leave the week able to explain: Why the South was in ruins after the Civil War — and how Henry Grady's vision for a "New South" tried to rebuild itWh

Based on Donalyn Miller's book, "The Book Whisperer", I created this reader's journal as a place for students to log the books they had read and reflect as their reading challenge progressed. TO SEE THIS PRODUCT IN USE, CLICK ON THE FREE VIDEO ATTACHED HERE.Why use Google Slides for this product?This product is perfect for your digital classroom makeover. Students can each be given a copy on Google Classroom. This gives you access to all of their journals (WITH NO BULKY PAPERS OR NOTEBOOKS TO D

✦ UNIT 1 ASSESSMENT — FOUNDATIONS + LATE 19TH CENTURY ✦ One full 100-point, ~60-minute test covering U.S. history from roughly 1865 to 1900.This unit assessment was built as the official end-of-unit test for Weeks 1-4 of my 36-week 5th Grade Tennessee Social Studies curriculum (Heuristic Teaching) — BUT it works just as well as a standalone assessment for any 5th grade teacher covering this time period. If you teach post-Civil War U.S. history, westward expansion, the New South, the rise

Pushing Students To Connect With The Text For Deeper Comprehension. This resource is paper and digital compatible. It is fully editable.TRY THE FIRST CHAPTER FOR FREE HERE! This resource was designed to help my own students go deeper with their understanding of our in-class novels we would read in Book Clubs or read-aloud. I designed 4-5 questions for each chapter that require the student to connect different parts of the text, see the author's purpose, evaluate character motivations, and so mu

No more losing task cards! No more students fighting over who gets to use which card! NO MORE COPIES WASTED! Want to see how they were used in class? Check out my blog post using these task cards! Heuristic Teaching: Digital Task Cards-Volume These task cards are designed to make it easier and more efficient to collect data on what your students are working on in class. Use these task cards as you would paper copies, assigning them for centers, using them in your small group time, and using t

Looking for a complete, NO PREP introduction to 5th grade Social Studies? This FREE Week 1 set teaches students to THINK LIKE A HISTORIAN — primary vs secondary sources, chronology, historical empathy, and map skills. Everything to launch the year: 5 days of teaching slides, matching guided notes with built-in exit tickets, and full answer keys. ⭐ Use it DIGITALLY (Google Slides + Google Docs) OR PRINT and go. No prep. No extra work. 📚 WHAT'S INCLUDED✔ Teaching Slides Deck — 5-day PowerPo

Pushing Students To Connect With The Text For Deeper Comprehension. This resource is paper and digital compatible. It is fully editable.PURCHASE THE FULL PRODUCT HERE! This resource was designed to help my own students go deeper with their understanding of our in-class novels we would read in Book Clubs or read-aloud. I designed 4-5 questions for each chapter that require the student to connect different parts of the text, see the author's purpose, evaluate character motivations, and so muc

Here is a quick video breakdown that just quickly shows you how you will need to assign the 40 Book Challenge to make it editable by each student! As always, if you have any questions feel free to email me or ask a question on the product page! If you have not purchased the 40 Book Challenge you can click here!If you would like a video showing what the 40 Book Challenge looks like, click here to watch over it!

Turn your Gilded Age social studies content into rigorous, test-aligned reading practice — at three reading levels, with answers spread across A–D and questions written exactly like the state test.Vanderbilt. Carnegie. Rockefeller. Morgan. The four men who built America's railroads, steel, oil, and banks — and the enormous fortunes that came with them. This set brings your history and social studies instruction together with close reading and test prep in one print-and-go resource. Students read

Turn presidential research into a detective mission! In this no-prep WebQuest, students become "Presidential Detectives" and use trusted websites to crack 45 fun-fact "case files" — one surprising, little-known fact for EVERY U.S. president from Washington to Biden. It's an engaging way to build research skills, practice using reliable sources, and learn that history is full of weird, true, and totally memorable stories.Perfect for Presidents Day, a U.S. history unit, sub days, early finishers,

Make Presidents Day the lesson your students actually remember! This complete, low-prep bundle turns one class period into an engaging journey through the holiday's history, a primary source investigation, and the weird-but-true stories of America's presidents — famous AND forgotten. Built to flex across the wide range of middle grades, it has the depth to challenge your 8th graders and the clarity and fun to reach your 4th graders.Everything is print-and-go and fully editable, so you can teach