TCI’s online Social Studies Alive! programs teach students about the world around them in ways that make them excited to learn every day. Activities like the Revolutionary War tug-of-war capture their imagination and help them long remember key content. With TCI’s elementary programs, students don’t just learn social studies. They learn to love social studies.
Geography and World Cultures Alive! (Texas Edition)
Designed for the Texas TEKS, TCI’s Geography and World Cultures Alive! is a stimulating, case-study approach to geography, history, economics, government, citizenship, and culture. Thoughtfully designed lessons bring the contemporary world alive for students through interactive and engaging activities.
- The Tools of Geography
- A Spatial Way of Thinking
- Settlement Patterns and Ways of Life in Canada
- The Great Lakes: The U.S. and Canada’s Freshwater Treasures
- Urban Sprawl in North America: Where Will It End?
- National Parks: Saving the Natural Heritage of the U.S. and Canada
- Consumption Patterns in the United States: The Impact of Living Well
- Migration to the United States: The Impact on People and Places
- Spatial Inequality in Mexico City: From Cardboard to Castles
- Indigenous Cultures: The Survival of the Maya of Mesoamerica
- Dealing with Extreme Weather: Hurricanes in the Caribbean
- Land Use Conflict in the Amazon Rainforest
- Life in the Central Andes: Adapting to a Mountainous Region
- Supranational Cooperation in the European Union
- Population Dilemmas in Europe
- Invisible Borders: Transboundary Pollution in Europe
- Russia’s Varied Landscape: Physical Processes at Work
- New Nation-States from the Old Soviet Empire: Will They Succeed?
- The Nile River: A Journey from Source to Mouth
- Life in the Sahara and the Sahel: Adapting to a Desert Region
- Micro-entrepreneurs: Women’s Role in the Development of Africa
- Nigeria: A Country of Many Cultures
- Resources and Power in Post-apartheid South Africa
- Oil in Southwest Asia: How “Black Gold” Has Shaped a Region
- Istanbul: A Primate City Throughout History
- The Aral Sea: Central Asia’s Shrinking Water Source
- Waiting for the Rains: The Effects of Monsoons in South Asia
- Tech Workers and Time Zones: India’s Comparative Advantage
- Mount Everest: Climbing the World’s Tallest Physical Feature
- China: The World’s Most Populous Country
- Population Density in Japan: Life in a Crowded Country
- The Global Sneaker: From Asia to Everywhere
- Relative and Absolute Location: What Makes Australia Unique?
- The Pacific Islands: Adapting to Life Surrounded by Ocean
- Antarctica: Researching Climate Change at the Coldest Place on Earth
- Evaluating Economic Development in Latin America
- Mexico City Bus Tour
- Discovering Africa’s Cultural Diversity
- Cultural Tour of Southwest Asia
- Cultural Tour of Southeast Asia
History Alive! The United States Through Industrialism
History Alive! The United States Through Industrialism immerses students in a powerful journey through the history of the United States from its earliest foundations to the age of industrialism.
Unit 1: Our Colonial Heritage
1. The First Americans
Essential Question: How did the first Americans adapt to their environments?
In a Social Studies Skill Builder, students hypothesize the geographic origins of American Indian artifacts to explore how the first Americans in eight cultural regions adapted to their environments.
2. European Exploration and Settlement
Essential Question: How did Europeans explore and establish settlements in the Americas?
In a Visual Discovery activity, students analyze and bring to life images depicting European exploration and settlement to discover how European nations explored and established settlements in the Americas.
3. The English Colonies in North America
Essential Question: What were the similarities and differences among the colonies in North America?
In a Problem Solving Groupwork activity, students analyze the similarities and differences among the English colonies in North America by creating and visiting sales booths in a “colonial fair.”
4. Life in the Colonies
Essential Question: What was life really like in the colonies?
Students work in pairs in a Social Studies Skill Builder to analyze primary and secondary source material to explore eight aspects of life in the American colonies, including rights of colonists, religion, education, and life for enslaved African Americans.
Unit 2: Revolution in the Colonies
5. Toward Independence
Essential Question: Why was there an American Revolution?
In a Response Group activity, students participate in a series of colonial town meetings to debate whether to rebel against British rule. In the process, they evaluate the events that deeply divided the American colonists and eventually caused them to rebel against the British government.
6. The Declaration of Independence
Essential Question: What principles of government are expressed in the Declaration of Independence?
Students learn about key events leading up to the writing of the Declaration of Independence and, in a Writing for Understanding activity, analyze key excerpts of the Declaration and the principles of government they express.
7. The American Revolution
Essential Question: How was the Continental army able to win the war for independence from Great Britain?
In an Experiential Exercise, students participate in a game of Capture the Flag. They compare their experience to the determining factors of the war for independence from Great Britain—examining the strengths and weaknesses of each side, important battles, and other key factors in the conflict—to determine how the British were defeated.
Unit 3: Forming a New Nation
8. Creating the Constitution
Essential Question: What compromises emerged from the Constitutional Convention?
In an Experiential Exercise, students examine the factors that led to the creation of a stronger central government under the U.S. Constitution by re-creating a key debate from the Constitutional Convention.
9. The Constitution: A More Perfect Union
Essential Question: What compromises emerged from the Constitutional Convention?
In an Experiential Exercise, students examine the factors that led to the creation of a stronger central government under the U.S. Constitution by re-creating a key debate from the Constitutional Convention.
10. The Bill of Rights
Essential Question: What freedoms does the Bill of Rights protect and why are they important?
In a Response Group activity, students learn about the important rights and freedoms protected by the Bill of Rights by analyzing a series of scenarios to determine whether the Bill of Rights protects certain actions taken by citizens.
Unit 4: Launching the New Republic
11. Political Developments in the Early Republic
Essential Question: How did the Federalist and Republican visions for the United States differ?
In an Experiential Exercise, students compare Federalist and Republican visions for the United States by taking on the roles of Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson to debate the main issues that divided the two groups.
12. Foreign Affairs in the Young Nation
Essential Question: To what extent should the United States have become involved in world affairs in the early 1800s?
In a Response Group activity, students assume the roles of foreign policy advisers to early presidents to evaluate the extent to which the country should have become involved in world affairs.
13. A Growing Sense of Nationhood
Essential Question: What did it mean to be an American in the early 1800s?
In a Writing for Understanding activity, students visit an art exhibit, cotillion, and literary gathering to experience American culture in the early 1800s. They then create a chapter of a book describing what it meant to be an American in this period.
14. Andrew Jackson and the Growth of American Democracy
Essential Question: How well did President Andrew Jackson promote democracy?
In a Visual Discovery activity, students analyze and bring to life images of key events in the presidency of Andrew Jackson to evaluate how well he promoted democracy.
Unit 5: An Expanding Nation
15. Manifest Destiny and the Growing Nation
Essential Question: How justifiable was U.S. expansion in the 1800s?
In a Response Group activity, students re-create each territorial acquisition of the 1800s and then evaluate whether the nation’s actions were justifiable.
16. Life in the West
Essential Question: What were the motives, hardships, and legacies of the groups that moved west in the 1800s?
In a Problem Solving Groupwork activity, students create and perform minidramas about eight groups of people who moved to the West in the 1800s to explore these people’s motives for moving, the hardships they faced, and the legacies they left behind for future generations.
17. Mexicano Contributions to the Southwest
Essential Question: How have Mexicano contributions influenced life in the United States?
Students work in pairs in a Social Studies Skill Builder to examine important Mexicano contributions and determine how they have influenced life in the United States.
Unit 6: Americans in the Mid-1800s
18. An Era of Reform
Essential Question: To what extent did the reform movements of the mid-1800s improve life for Americans?
Students examine the reform movements of the mid-1800s to evaluate to what extent they improved life for Americans. In a Response Group activity, they debate the extent to which grievances from the Declaration of Sentiments have been redressed today.
19. The Worlds of North and South
Essential Question: How was life in the North different from life in the South?
In a Visual Discovery activity, students analyze and bring to life images from the mid-1800s to compare the different ways of life in the North and the South.
20. African Americans in the Mid-1800s
Essential Question: How did African Americans face slavery and discrimination in the mid-1800s?
In a Writing for Understanding activity, students analyze quotations and examine images to discover how African Americans faced slavery and discrimination in the mid-1800s. They then create a journal describing some of the experiences of a slave in the period.
Unit 7: The Union Challenged
21. A Dividing Nation
Essential Question: Which events of the mid-1800s kept the nation together and which events pulled it apart?
In a Visual Discovery activity, students analyze and bring to life images depicting the growing conflict between the North and the South to understand why the nation could not prevent civil war.
22. The Civil War
Essential Question: What factors and events influenced the outcome of the Civil War?
In an Experiential Exercise, students take on the role of soldiers at the Battle of Gettysburg and encounter key aspects of what it was like to be a soldier in the Civil War and then write about their experiences.
23. The Reconstruction Era
Essential Question: To what extent did Reconstruction bring African Americans closer to full citizenship?
In a Visual Discovery activity, students analyze primary source images to evaluate how close African Americans came to full citizenship during Reconstruction.
Unit 8: Migration and Industry
24. Tensions in the West
Essential Question: How did settlers change the West and affect American Indians?
Students work together in a Problem Solving Groupwork activity to create a music video to illustrate how western settlement impacted the Nez Percé. They then examine how settlers changed the West and impacted other American Indian groups.
25. The Rise of Industry
Essential Question: Did the benefits of industrialization outweigh the costs?
In an Experiential Exercise, students take on the role of workers on an assembly line to experience the costs and benefits of industrialization.
26. The Great Wave of Immigration
Essential Question: What was life like for immigrants in the early 1900s?
In a Writing for Understanding activity, students create scrapbooks illustrating what life was like for immigrants in the early 1900s.
Unit 9: A Modern Nation Emerges
27. The Progressive Era
Essential Question: Did the progressives improve life in the United States?
In a Response Group activity, students take on the roles of Progressive era leaders in a panel discussion to evaluate whether progressives improved life in the United States.
28. The United States Becomes a World Power
Essential Question: Should U.S. actions in world affairs around the turn of the 20th century be praised or condemned?
In a Social Studies Skill Builder, pairs of students analyze political cartoons about U.S. actions in world affairs around the turn of the 20th century and evaluate the differing viewpoints of those actions.
29. Linking Past to Present
Essential Question: What changes since 1914 have shaped how we live today?
In a Social Studies Skill Builder, students discover important events of the last century and learn how they have affected society in the United States.
