It is an excellent interactive game where students can experience the trials and tribulations of a pioneer family heading West. To help hit home the importance of having laws and rules, students will work as collaborative teams to create stories of chaos and mayhem about a town without rules and laws. We will create a classroom crime and have a mock trial to demonstrate how a jury works. The students will learn the concept of innocent until proven guilty, and will understand the patriotic duty one has to register to vote and serve on jury duty and how satisfying serving your community can be. We will discuss the importance of the logging industry in the Black Hills and take a field trip to Pope and Talbot in Spearfish or Rushmore Forest Products in Hill City.
Tourism is an extremely important industry in our area.
We will visit some of the tourist attractions, such as Mount Rushmore. We will be bridging the gap in our community by establishing a friendship with another third grade classroom across the city. We will discuss the differences in our parts of the community and will e-mail messages throughout the year. At one point of the year, we will send that class specific directions on how they can get to our school from theirs. After completing the communities unit, we will make a web in the Inspiration program to show the components of Rapid City and the process it has had to go through to become the city it is.