Hi homeschoolers! Today I am sharing a fun unit study I created on the state of Colorado.
Most states encourage (some even require) you to do a unit study on your home state sometime during a student’s fourth grade year of studies. Since we live in “Colorful Colorado”, we’ll be doing our unit this year with Turbo and Strawberry Shortcake.
My Colorado Unit Study includes teacher lesson plans, student worksheets, field trip ideas, and more fun things to do in the beautiful state of Colorado!
Some of the things covered in the study include:
- 42 daily lessons
- Colorado State Introduction
- Landmarks
- State Symbols
- My City, and My County information
- Colorado Mapping
- Agriculture and Industries
- Wildlife
- Plantlife
- Climates
- Colorado State History Timeline
- Famous Coloradans
- Weather
- Government
- State Sport Teams
- Review activities & reports
- Accompanying crafts and recipes
As I mentioned there are a total of 42 daily lessons in this unit. they will take approximately 30-45 minutes depending on the activity. We will be doing it 3 days per week, but you’re welcome to adjust it to fit the needs of your schedule.
I have geared this unit for elementary aged students, but it can be also completed by older students if applicable.
–> Download the Colorado Unit Study here!
Now before you all ask for more states, I will not be creating individual state studies unfortunately. However you can grab my Road Trip USA curriculum if you’d like to learn more about our wonderful United States of America!
Thank you so much for posting this for us! We live in Windsor Colorado!
I was very excited to find your unit and printed the entire thing out for TWO kids (wasted my paper and ink!) just to find that it was not a complete history of COLORADO!! It was the history and facts of “Eastern and Southern Colorado” ONLY. It was VERY disappointing and if you used this for your kids you did them an injustice. The Western Colorado has A LOT to offer, a lot of land marks, a lot of agriculture, and a completely different “region” as you called it. It is none of the regions you have listed. We live smack dab in the middle of the desert. There are animals, weather, and things found here that are not found in the southern, northern, or eastern Colorado. If you are going to market something as a whole please include everything.
Hi Adria,
I’m so sorry the study isn’t working for you. If you want to send me the information like landmarks, agriculture and region that you think it’s missing I’ll be happy to include it to make the study better. I thought I did a decent job at covering the entire state of Colorado, including the western and northern areas, but if you think I missed material please let me know. Hopefully you didn’t completely throw it away as it is quite comprehensive I believe. Please remember that this study is a free one and I am only trying to help bless other homeschooling families that may want to use the study.
I did do some more research on western CO and didn’t find too much, so if there’s something not online that you can share I’d be happy to add it in to the study.
Im laying in bed with tears I my eyes right now! You helped a Homeschool Momma out. I had planned to create my own curriculum but thought it was worth a google search. Thank you so much for this incredible curriculum! I can’t wait to use it with my 4th grader!
So glad it’s helpful!
I do want to say it was very nice to try and put something together for other moms and share your information!
I wanted to say thank you for this wonderful unit on Colorado. My older two will be starting on it today, and I’ll file it away for when my younger two need it as well. So kind of you to share your hard work with all of the rest of us!
Hello,
Thank you for putting this Colorado study out there! I’ve been moving toward something more formal with my kiddos, and am finding that there really isn’t much out there except for what I can put together myself. I was thinking notebook- and you’ve beat me to the punch. Thanks for sharing this as a free resource. There are some great craft ideas included. I will probably use it as a jumping off point and add items that I consider important as well. There are a couple things I noticed in the material that might be worth double-checking.
Is the record hot temperature of 103 for Denver (p29)? Temps out here (Grand Junction) in the summer are traditionally quite hot. In 2013 we usually were around 101-102, and up to 104 some days for almost all of July. The state record I found was recorded Bennett in 1888- 118 degrees F. Yikes! Also, I’m not sure what connection is being made between wheat and millet in the lesson on agriculture (p12)- they are different grains. Pg. 10 omits Denver as “The Mile High City.” The sports page lists the Outlaws as being acquired by Denver in 1006. That seems a little on the ancient side! And of course, the Broncos now have three Super Bowls under their belt. 🙂 I’m glad you included highlights from the Chronology on the Colorado.gov website. There is a lot about the Native American tribes, Mexican and Spanish involvement in the land area of modern-day Colorado that can otherwise be easily missed. It might be nice for folks to have the direct link to see more, if desired: https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/sites/default/files/Chronology%20of%20Colorado%20History.pdf
Our family lives in the Grand Junction region, and my thought is, as I said before, that this curriculum makes a great jumping off point. It really focuses on the Front Range and southern part of the state, so I’ll be adding info about the Grand Valley region/western area of the state. Here are a few items that come to mind. Forgive me if I duplicate anything already included in the curriculum.
*Additional info about water… the first drive-by shooting occurred in what is now the Morrison area of Denver- over water rights, of course! In the Grand Valley, we have the Colorado River as it exits the Rocky Mountains. It is a much contested bit of water, but it flows generously through our irrigation canals from April thru early November, and keeps things greener than they’d otherwise be. Water is a big deal in Colorado, and for the states that receive our liquid run-off via our rivers. (This is a good time to mention the Continental Divide, as well.)
*The eastern portion of the Grand Valley used to be all fruit- peaches, peaches, and a few other fruits like cherries, and more peaches. A huge number of the orchards have been removed in favor of urban development. Apples are still aplenty to the south, where the mountain ranges keep things a bit cooler, and now there is also a growing vineyard/wine industry.
*Colorado National Monument (breathtakingly beautiful- Garden of the Gods is pretty, but the Monument is STUNNING!)
*The Grand Mesa… a 10,000 foot flat-top mountain- a world in an of itself high above the valley with amazing fishing, hunting, camping, hiking, skiing, etc. It is widely recognized as the largest, flat-topped mountain in the world.
*Mountain biking… HUGE out here- 15 of the 75 top-ranked trails in the state
*Rocky Mountain National Park (add to the physical map assignment)
*Great Sand Dunes Nat’l Park and Preserve
*Hot springs (of all sorts, all over our glorious Rockies!)
*The Glenwood Canyon interstate— a modern “wonder” in terms of engineering and construction
*The Johnson-Eisenhower tunnel- revolutionized transportation across the state and made it possible for the ski industry to be what it is today.
*Dinosaur National Monument (western Colorado is part of the Dinosaur Triangle, which includes part of eastern Utah and is home to A LOT of dinosaur fossils). The stegosaurus is Colorado’s state fossil, since the very first one was found here in 1876 (statehood year, ironically enough).
*Colorado coal industry and uranium mining industry (especially in the Western Colorado region)- might as well include Rocky Flats and the Rocky Mountain Arsenal with the uranium.
*”America the Beautiful” written by Katharine Lee Bates after viewing the vast planes from the pinnacle of Pike’s Peak
*The Boettcher family- very important in terms of the history of Colorado’s economy and agriculture (they weren’t JUST the Brown Palace and the Boettcher Mansion up on Lookout Mtn.)
*The Colorado Gold Rush (and devaluation of silver- which led to the financial ruin of the Tabors, after the U.S. switched to the Gold Standard)… could include the unique Hanging Flume originally built in the Dolores Canyon, the 2015 Gold King Mine wastewater spill into the Animas River, and heavy metals leaching out of other mines and into state waters
*NORAD, the Air Force Academy, and the various military bases in Colorado
*Camp Amache (Granada, Colorado- relocation camp for Japanese-Americans during WWII)
*Maybe a lesson on the Coloraod railroad system in general, and the unique narrow gauge railroads- include the Georgetown Loop, which was immediately a tourist attraction upon being opened for service, and the Moffat Tunnel (my brother did a huge, paper-machet on chicken wire model of the Moffat Tunnel for his big fourth-grade Co history project- with green and yellow cocktail toothpicks poked in all over to represent pine and aspen forests)
*The mountain pine beetle
*Could probably discuss hunting, fishing, and the role that Colorado Parks & Wildlife plays in population management with the living things lesson
That’s the majority of what comes to mind immediately. Another GREAT museum (FULL of real artifacts- probably one of the largest collections in the state, if not THE largest) is the Museum of the Mountain West in Montrose, Colorado. It is absolutely fantastic- full of everything real (including the carriage works building where Jack Dempsey used to train), moved from their original locations to the museum- indoor and outdoor, it is absolutely amazing and our field trip group has gone twice in the last two years because it is so informative and everyone has enjoyed it/learned more with each visit.
Another excellent set of resources on Colorado history are the 30-minute “Colorado Experience” movies posted on YouTube by Rocky Mountain PBS. My kids have already enjoyed learning about the Denver Mint, the Dust Bowl, the Stock Show, and much more through these informative pieces. I’ve learned a lot too that I don’t ever remember being covered in school when I was younger (born and raised in a town north of Denver). It appears that new ones are being posted on a regular basis.
A DVD, “How the States Got Their Shapes,” published in 2010 by A&E Television Networks, gives a fascinating history of the various states, including Colorado. (Did you know the Kansas territory used to come as far west as Cherry Creek? Neither did I!) It’s available through the Mesa County Libraries. There are two seasons-worth of these shows available on the History Channel’s website as well: http://www.history.com/shows/how-the-states-got-their-shapes/season-1
I hope this is a help to anyone reading this- I’m copy-pasting my list now to add to everything already in the prepared material.
Thank you again for taking the time to share what you put together for your family. It truly is a blessing to many of us out there, and as homeschoolers, we always appreciate free!!!
Hi Amy, thanks for sharing all of this great info!
Thank you sooo much! I just had to withdraw my 4th grader from school and this is perfect! Thank you for sharing!
I’m so excited about this. We are moving to Gorgeous Colorado soon so it will be fun to start learning about it before we head out.
I am a volunteer English as a Second Language tutor. So that I can teach my adult students English grammar WELL, I am looking for materials. My students are at about the 4th grade level and I am looking for something for me, the instructor. Can you recommend anything?
I like the IEW Fix It Grammar, it’s fairly easy and straight forward. https://iew.com/affiliate/279406/
Thank you so much! This is so helpful to our home school, too!! What an incredible resource you have blessed us with!
Thank you so much for this wonderful Colorado packet, now that we are home with COVID-19 its a GREAT time to learn about Colorado. My 4th grade will love it!!
Thank you so much