Frontiers Book 1: Pioneers, Genetics, and Energy (Differentiated Curriculum for Grade 6)

What is a frontier? What are the frontiers of the future? What frontiers are being explored today? These and other questions are presented in this series on frontiers that helps make this concept come alive to all students.

In Frontiers Book 1: Pioneers, Genetics, and Energy, students will explore forgotten pioneers in Westward expansion, the Civil Rights Movement, and medicine. They will take a close look at the field of genetics, noting the makeup of DNA, genetic inheritance, and the prediction of traits. Energy is examined from many perspectives such as food webs and deep space travel.

Examples of topics covered in this book include contributions of pioneers, biotechnology, Punnett squares, alternative resources, and nonrenewable and renewable resources, all within the broader concept of frontiers.

Other books in the Frontiers series include Frontiers Book 2: Geography, Explorers, and Literature and Frontiers Book 3: Geology, Astronomy, and Environment. Each book contains detailed lesson plans, reproducible activity sheets, and assessment tools.

This curriculum unit makes use of the following great children's literature books:

• The Watsons Go to Birmingham—1963 by Christopher Paul Curtis; and
• An American Plague: The True and Terrifying Story of the Yellow Fever Epidemic of 1793 by Jim Murphy.