nhfr

The Quick Reference Chart uses eight focus questions to organize possible topics to teach within ears. You and your students can choose from this smorgasbord to suit your needs and appetites. As with a smorgasbord worthy of its name and purpose, however, one cannot consume it all. So rest assured, no one expects you to teach all of this. At the same time, you may wish to add topics of your own.

Use the chart to help make a plan, whether you are a school district, a school, a department, or an individual teacher. Use the chart when you want to:

decide which eras you presently cover.
determine which eras you want to cover in more depth.
organize your students' course of study.
find ideas for topics that explore specific focus questions.
develop a scope and sequence for New Hampshire studies.
apply the content of New Hampshire history across grades and disciplines.

Why Focus Questions? The eight questions help students and teachers focus learning around ideas that connect facts and events. The questions suggest paths for inquiry and thus are more directive than themes.

Beginning with the general focus questions, teachers and students have the freedom to create more specific questions as they follow inquiry at any level -- local, state, or national. Even though the emphasis is on history, by virtue of their design the focus questions also call upon geography, economics, civics and government.

A prime advantage of organizing with focus questions is an implicit invitation to compare topics across time. For example, a course of study could investigate Focus Question 1 (boundaries) in Era 1 (beginnings to 1623) and then compare the finding to investigations of the same question in Era 10 (1968-present). Similarly, students could explore and compare transportation technologies under focus question V (technology) in Era 1, (beginnings to 1623) , Era 3 (1754-1820's), and Era 7 (1890-1930).

Why Eras? Events happen in time. We need to keep time in mind in order to see patterns and to discover possible cause-effect relationships. Ears encourage an awareness of time within manageable increments. Although we do not advocate meaningless lists of dates, we do advocate paying attention to pivotal dates or turning points, general sequence, and clusters of related events within and sometimes across eras.