Grade 3 - How The Country Was Settled
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How the Country Was Settled: A Journey Through America’s Expansion! 🚂🏕️
How did the United States grow from 13 small colonies to a nation that stretched from coast to coast? What was life like for pioneers, explorers, and immigrants as they moved west in search of new opportunities? Now, 3rd-grade students can take a journey through time and discover how bravery, invention, and determination shaped America as we know it today!
📽️ “How the Country Was Settled” is a visually rich, engaging educational video that brings history to life. Through real-world connections, exciting visuals, and storytelling, students will explore the westward expansion, the Gold Rush, the Great Migration, and the inventions that transformed America.
💡 What Your Students Will Learn:
✅ How explorers like Daniel Boone and Lewis & Clark mapped new frontiers
✅ The Louisiana Purchase and how it doubled the size of the U.S.
✅ The challenges of pioneers traveling the Oregon Trail
✅ The California Gold Rush and how it changed the West
✅ How the transcontinental railroad made cross-country travel possible
✅ The impact of immigrants and the Great Migration on American cities
✅ How new inventions like electricity, factories, and automobiles shaped modern life
🌟 Why Teachers Love This Video:
🕒 No-Prep, Standards-Aligned Content – Just press play and start teaching!
🎥 Visually Engaging & Kid-Friendly – Keeps 3rd graders focused and excited.
🎯 Brings History to Life – Helps students connect with the past in a meaningful way.
📚 Perfect for Early American History Lessons – Supports discussions on westward expansion, migration, and innovation.
💡 Make History Come Alive in Your Classroom!
Give your students a front-row seat to the incredible journey of America’s growth—without extra prep work. Subscribe today and bring the adventure of U.S. history to life! 🚀
Video Length: 12:05 minutes
Learning Resources with this Video*
Quizzes – PDF & Online
Frontier Match-up Worksheet
The Louisiana Purchase
Draw A Scene – Westward Expansion of the U.S.
Journaling Like Lewis and Clark
Obstacles On The Oregon Trail
The Marks They Made
Universal Resources
National Standards
*Links are active on Full Video page.
Classroom Ideas
How The Country Was Settled
Landforms and Bodies of Water
Identify the landforms and bodies of water across the country that would have made it difficult for pioneers to travel west.
Cloze Practice
A cloze piece has full sentences used in the virtual field trip with blanks where students can write in the information that is missing. This task requires close listening to the trip in order to complete it.
Coral reefs are the _______ type of ecosystem in the world. They’ve been around for over _____ million years.
Answers: oldest; 240
Alternatively, you could have students create 5-10 cloze statements and they could share those with the class.
A third alternative is to distribute the cloze worksheets before watching the video. Students can fill them in as they watch.
Explore Vocabulary
Identify key vocabulary terms while previewing each video. Prompt students to find the meaning of each word as they watch the video. Example: What do the words consumer, budget, and expense mean? Think about the meaning of these words as you watch this video.
Art and Social Studies
Draw a scene from the video.
Visual Learning
Offer videos to struggling learners as another way of creating knowledge and accessing information.
Classroom Ideas for ALL Videos
Here are dozens and dozens of ideas that you can use in your classroom along with our videos!
Topics Covered In This Video
The 13 colonies became crowded and pioneers decided to move west to explore new frontiers
Daniel Boone helped the pioneers get around
President Jefferson bought land from the country of France in the “Louisiana Purchase” to increase the size of the country
He also hired Lewis and Clark to travel through, and map out, the new territory
They established the Oregon Trail, with Sacagawea’s help
The railroad made a huge difference in the dangerous journey westward
Big groups of people were migrating and also immigrating during this time
Technology helped to create jobs for everyone, often in factories
Videos in this Series
Grade 3 - The First Americans
Grade 3 - A Country of Cultures
Grade 3 - I Am A Consumer
Grade 3 - Businesses At Work
Grade 3 - The Geography of Our Communities
Grade 3 - How Government Helps Our Communities
Related Videos
Grade 2 - Early Americans
