Social Studies — Grade 8

WBT Charlotte in the golden age of radio

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.12

Article about the history and development of North Carolina's first radio station, WBT Charlotte, which played an important role in the history of country music.

Format: article

By Emily Jack.

Southern women and the bicycle

In North Carolina in the New South, page 5.3

Editorial from the Charlotte Observer, 1895, on whether women in North Carolina were "ready" for bicycles. Includes historical commentary.

Format: newspaper/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by L. Maren Wood.

Sour stomachs and galloping headaches

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.13

Excerpts from an online exhibit about the rise of "patent medicine" in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Includes several examples of packaging and advertising.

Format: exhibit/primary source

Sanitation and privies

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 2.10

This article, published by the North Carolina State Board of Health in 1889, tried to educate people about how to improve their health, as well as the health of their neighbors, by building proper outhouses. Includes historical background and commentary.

Format: article/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by L. Maren Wood.

Rural Free Delivery

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.4

Home delivery of mail wasn't established in most of the United States until the twentieth century, and when it came, it was revolutionary. This magazine article from 1903 tells the story of the new rural free delivery. Includes background and historical commentary.

Format: magazine/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by David Walbert.

The roller skate craze

In North Carolina in the New South, page 5.5

Early motion picture of people roller skating. Includes historical commetnary.

Format: article

The road to the first flight

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.6

This article explains how the Wright brothers developed their pioneering airplane, from their first experiments as boys to the first successful flight in 1903.

Format: article

Railroads in Western North Carolina

In North Carolina in the New South, page 2.6

In the nineteenth century, Asheville, a crossroads for agriculture, became a destination for tourists, loggers, and miners. New railroads meet the needs of all these groups.

Format: article

Newspaper coverage of the first flight

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.8

Newspaper article about the Wright brothers' first flight in December 1903, written from an intercepted telegram sent by the brothers to their father in Ohio. Historical commentary points out the differences between the version of events that reached the public and what actually happened.

Format: newspaper/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by L. Maren Wood.

New machine shop in Plymouth, N.C.

In North Carolina in the New South, page 2.12

Broadside advertisement for a machine shop opening in Plymouth, North Carolina, in 1880. Includes historical commentary.

Format: advertisement/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by L. Maren Wood.

Municipal electric service

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.1

Series of newspaper articles tells the story of New Bern's political struggles to provide municipal electric service in 1901–02. Includes historical background and commentary.

Format: newspaper/primary source

Inventions in the tobacco industry

In North Carolina in the New South, page 3.6

Several inventions made the tobacco industry so highly profitable in the late nineteenth century, including machines for tying strings on bags and for rolling cigarettes.

Format: bibliography

The impact of the telephone

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.5

When the telephone became widely available in the early twentieth century, it changed the way people lived and the ways businesses operated. This 1926 essay and accompanying historical commentary explain how.

Format: book

Idol’s Dam and Power Plant

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.3

Though electricity first arrived in Winston and Salem in 1887, it was the development of Idol's Dam and Power Plant a decade later that truly moved the towns forward in terms of productivity and industrial development.

Format: article

The Good Roads movement

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.11

The first document on this page is a letter written by the president of the North Carolina Good Roads Association, W. A. McGritt, to the state’s governor, Thomas Bickett. The second is from a pamphlet published by the association, encouraging citizens to support a tax for the construction of roads. Historical commentary provides a short history of the Good Roads movement.

Format: letter/primary source

Commentary and sidebar notes by L. Maren Wood.

Going to the movies

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 6.12

Newspaper article about the first "talkie" shown in Wilmington, North Carolina, 1929. Includes historical background and commentary.

Format: newspaper/primary source

Electric streetcars

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 1.2

North Carolina's first electric streetcar systems were built between 1889 and 1902. The new form of transportation changed the layout of cities.

Format: article

Death in a Pot

In North Carolina in the early 20th century, page 2.8

This article, republished by the North Carolina State Board of Health in 1900, informed the public about health hazards associated with new, and devious, ways of processing and packaging food. Includes historical commentary about the growth of concern about food safety and of public health as a field.

Format: article/primary source

Cities and public architecture

In North Carolina in the New South, page 5.7

In this activity, students compare photographs of public buildings in Charlotte before and after industrialization and the growth of the city in the late nineteenth century to learn about industrial wealth and the culture of the Gilded Age.

Format: article

The Bonsack machine and labor unrest

In North Carolina in the New South, page 3.7

When the Duke tobacco company adopted the Bonsack machine for rolling cigarettes, workers who had rolled cigarettes by hand were thrown out of work, and their replacements made less money.

Format: article

A road map to reading

Students struggle with informational texts and websites. Understanding the structure of these texts is essential to efficient information gathering. The "Road Map" is a pre-reading strategy. Like the road map in your atlas, this mapping activity will help students visualize the layout of the text before they start reading so they will have an idea of where they are going (or where to find the information they are looking for) when they start reading. This lesson will also address active-reading strategies students can use to find information for research in print and electronic sources.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 English Language Arts, Information Skills, and Social Studies)

By Elizabeth Hubbe and Melissa Thibault.

Outfitting a World War I soldier: Teaching US history with primary sources

What do soldiers wear? Students will say a uniform and mention boots. However, many of the necessities of soldiers are often overlooked by civilians whether the items be standard issue or personal.This lesson gives students the opportunity to not only look at William B. Umstead's artifacts from World War I, but gain insight into how and why each item was used.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 Social Studies)

By Paulette Scott.

The North Carolina mountains in the early 1900s through the writing and photography of Horace Kephart

Students will develop an understanding of daily life and culture in the mountains of North Carolina during the early 20th century through photographs and written sources; practice visual literacy skills and gain experience analyzing visual and written sources of historical information; and learn to revise their early analyses of historical sources and to synthesize the information found in different kinds of primary documents by planning a museum exhibit.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 Social Studies)

By Kathryn Walbert.

Mountain dialect: Reading between the spoken lines

This lesson plan uses Chapter 13 of Our Southern Highlanders as a jumping-off point to help students achieve social studies and English language arts objectives while developing an appreciation of the uniqueness of regional speech patterns, the complexities of ethnographic encounter, and the need to interrogate primary sources carefully to identify potential biases and misinformation in them. Historical content includes American slavery, the turn-of-the-century, and the Great Depression.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 English Language Arts and Social Studies)

By Kathryn Walbert.

The little house out back: The architecture of an outhouse

In this lesson students will practice forming opinions and supporting them with facts by examining pictures of a North Carolina outhouse and an architectural plan of an outhouse. They will use their knowledge of history to draw conclusions about the conveniences available to people of different socio-economic groups in North Carolina.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 Social Studies)

By Loretta Wilson.

Industrialization and Progressive Reform in the Craft Revival

In this lesson plan, originally published on the Craft Revival website, students will analyze the process of making a hobby into a job. They will explore Craft Revival work environments, representations of industrial work environments, and data regarding Craft Revival work. To close the activity, students write a journal entry comparing Craft Revival and industrial work experiences.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 and 11–12 Social Studies)

By Patrick Velde.

Good medicine

Students will examine changes in technology, medicine, and health that took place in North Carolina between 1870 and 1930 and construct products and ideas which demonstrate understanding of how these changes impacted people living in North Carolina at that time. To achieve these goals, students will employ the eight intelligences of Howard Gardner's Multiple Intelligences Theory.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 English Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, and Social Studies)

By Leslie Ramsey.

Dynamic dialect: Horace Kephart and Our Southern Highlanders

Students will read an excerpt from Horace Kephart's Our Southern Highlanders and explore how language and dialect have changed over the years.

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 and 11–12 English Language Arts and Social Studies)

By Billie Clemens.

Resources on the web

Webquest: Building an historic district

In this lesson for eighth grade social studies, students use historical overlay maps to create an historic district in Oxford, North Carolina. (Learn more)

Format: lesson plan (grade 8 Social Studies)

Provided by: UNC Libraries

Fueling the fires of American industrialization

In this lesson from the Forest History Society in Durham, North Carolina, students examine the role wood played in the American Industrial Revolution. By calculating how much wood was consumed by U.S. railroads before and after the invention of wood preservatives,... (Learn more)

Format: lesson plan (grade 5 and 8 Social Studies)

Provided by: Forest History Society

Carnegie libraries: The future made bright

Using maps, images, and web texts, students explore the philanthropy of Andrew Carnegie and the impact of the libraries he endowed. (Learn more)

Format: lesson plan (grade 5 and 8–12 Information Skills and Social Studies)

Provided by: Teaching With Historic Places: National Park Service