Moving Out West Mini-Dramas

Students will be divided into groups of three’s and five’s. Each student group will read and summarize multiple primary source quotes from a specific group of pioneers (such as cowboys, pioneer women, African American pioneers, the Mormons, “forty-niners”, railroad owners, and Chinese-Americans) as well as analyze an image to gain more information about their pioneers. After discussing the information from their primary sources, student groups will create a “story” of their pioneer’s travels and hardships. From this story, students will write the script for a three to five minute mini-drama about their pioneers, rehearse, and then perform for the class.

We will use the Flip cameras to record the students’ performances. Students will edit, add closed captioning, incorporate appropriate background music, and finally present their completed mini-drama to the class.

As students watch the completed performances, they will take notes on a matrix. Altogether, the class will create a body of knowledge about why many different groups of pioneers migrated west, what their journeys were like, and what life was like for them while settling in the West.