Transportation History Timeline

Have students underline signal words while reading the Dust Bowl text before filling in the chart. For the timeline and census sheets, check each student's scale or first few points before they continue.

Build a timeline of 8 events from the Erie Canal to GPS, then count the years between them. The directions on the page read: Choose a scale that fits all eight dates and write a year in each box. Mark each event with a dot on the line and write its letter above it. Then answer the questions. An answer key is included.

Yes, both. We made it for 6th Grade Sources, Data and Research Skills, and the page works the same whether it lands on a kitchen table or a center rotation. At home, most families go through it together and talk the answers out loud, and that talking is where most of the learning happens with timelines, causes and data. In class it runs well as independent work while you pull a small group. Print one copy or thirty, whichever the day needs.

The reading explains that farmers plowed up native grassland, so the topsoil lay loose and exposed. A severe drought began in 1931, and strong winds lifted the dry soil into huge dust storms called black blizzards.

Pick an even interval that fits every date from earliest to latest. On Transportation History Timeline the dates run from 1825 to 1995, and the answer key shows a sample scale in steps of 20 years while accepting any even scale that fits.

A census is a count of the population, which the U.S. Constitution requires every ten years. The sheet's table shows population growing from 3.9 million in 1790 to 76.2 million in 1900, and the percent living in cities rising from 5.1% to 39.6%.