The Grandparent/Elder Project

Project Overview

The Grandparent/Elder Project is a major curriculum unit integrated into the ninth grade Twentieth Century History course at The Urban School of San Francisco. The Grandparent/Elder Project consists of five main parts or units:

1. Studying the world through the eyes of contemporaries.
2. Conducting and recording an interview with a grandparent or elder.
3. Learning to locate primary and secondary sources to discriminate between the two, and to use them to learn history.
4. Writing a four to six page formal history research paper on a student chosen topic concerning twentieth century history events .
5. Creating timelines of twentieth century history.

Completion of the full curriculum includes the following:

1. Study of five pages from the March 13, 1913, edition of the New York Times. This exercise engages students in learning from a contemporary source about events leading up to the Great War of 1914-19. The purpose of this exercise is to help students comprehend how "history" is made.
2. Access methods for location of primary sources in the American Memory collections.
3. Techniques and procedures for conducting and recording an interview.
4. Study of primary sources in different media (photographs, sound recordings, documents, films, etc.).
5. Research on family life during the Great Depression as a model of focused research procedures.
6. Study of family life in the Great Depression through the use of primary sources. Comparison of the results of primary source study with the Depression history found in secondary sources such as history textbooks.
7. Methods for selecting and limiting a research topic; learning how questions help to maintain focus research.
8. Instruction in accessing primary sources for the selected research topic.
9. Research methods and techniques:

-selection of sources;
-writing and revising focused questions about a topic;
-locating and evaluating potential sources;
-writing a preliminary bibliography;
-taking notes on note cards;
-writing a detailed outline;
-writing an introduction linking the research topic to the grandparent/elder;
-writing rough and final drafts of the four to six page history research paper; and
-citing and documenting sources.
-Note: The history research paper encourages, but does not require, the inclusion of footnotes or endnotes. Teachers using this curriculum may choose to require footnotes or endnotes.


10. Guidance in the methods for effective oral presentation of historical research to the class. A visual must accompany the oral presentation.
11. Presentation of the results of research to the class.
12. Creation of Web page timelines of twentieth century history gleaned from the interviews, lives of grandparent/elder, and research papers.

Specific Skills

See Skills Developed and Learned during the Grandparent/Elder Project.

Student Materials

Student Introduction.

Each student is required to have a special folder into which all of the materials, assignments, notes, etc. from this project will be placed. The teacher may wish to distribute these folders to the students so that they are all the same type and color. Folders with pockets are the most useful. Students should put their names (and class, etc.) in a prominent place on the folder.

Overview  |  Teacher's Guide