Virginia SOL USII.1

USII.1 is a Standards of Learning history and social science standard. These are the skills expectations under it.

• USII.1.a

  explaining how technology allowed settlers to adapt to the physical features and climate of the West

• USII.1.b

  identifying the motivations for westward expansion

• USII.1.c

  examining the impact of policies, legislation, and treaties associated with the growth of the nation

• USII.1.d

  explaining the effect that the growth of the United States had on Indigenous people.

01

What Students Need to Do

Students connect inventions such as railroads, windmills, and barbed wire to settlement patterns in the West. They use maps and sources to explain motives, government actions, and consequences for different Indigenous nations.

02

What Mastery Looks Like

Students can build a clear cause-and-effect chain using evidence from a map, image, law, or treaty. They can compare settler and Indigenous perspectives without treating either group as having one shared experience.

03

Common Misconceptions

Students may describe western land as empty or assume all Indigenous nations had the same response. They may also assume treaties were fair and honored, or that new technology helped everyone equally.

04

How to Assess It

Give students a railroad map and a short treaty excerpt. Ask them to identify one settler goal, one government action, and one effect on an Indigenous nation, using evidence from both sources.

1. 01

   Layer maps of rainfall, railroads, bison range, Indigenous homelands, and settlement, then mark where changes created conflict.

2. 02

   Discuss whether the transcontinental railroad created the same kind of opportunity for settlers and Indigenous nations, citing two source details.

3. 03

   Sort Homestead Act, windmill, gold, reservation, and bison-loss cards into cause-and-effect chains, then defend one chain.

4. 04

   Compare a current western city map with an 1860s railroad map, then explain why the city grew where it did.

• USII.3

  The student will apply history and social science skills to understand how industrialization changed life in rural and urban America after the Civil War by

• USI.8

  The student will apply history and social science skills to explain westward expansion and reform in America from 1801 to 1861 by

• USII.4

  The student will apply history and social science skills to explain the changing role of the United States from the late 19th century through World War I by

• USI.3

  The student will apply history and social science skills to explain European exploration and colonization in North America by