Teach Traits of Good Citizens with Abigail Adams

As the wife of President John Adams, Abigail Adams sought to help improve the country. She used her knowledge to support women’s rights. She wrote letters, editorials, and articles to government officials, asking them to change laws preventing women from voting or owning property. She continuously worked to make a difference in the United States.

This two-page resource consists of the following stages of writing development.

1. Students will read a short history passage including facts about Amelia Earhart and the character trait of determination. Students will learn about her role in aviation history and how her determination demonstrated good citizenship. 
2. Students will complete a R.A.C.E.S. graphic organizer to plan their responses.
3. Students record their answers as a constructed response paragraph and use a checklist to verify that all parts are included.

With this reading passage and accompanying graphic organizer, students can learn about Abigail Adams, answer critical thinking questions, and write their own constructed response paragraphs using the R.A.C.E.S. paragraph model.

Tips for Differentiation + Scaffolding 

In addition to independent student work time, use this worksheet as an activity for:

• Guided reading groups 
• Lesson warm-up
• Lesson wrap-up
• Homework assignment
• Whole-class review (via smartboard)

Abigail Adams Enrichment Activities

• Challenge your fast finishers to extend their constructed response topic into a research project or informative essay development activity. 
• Provide your students with children’s books to read in your classroom library.
• Have your students use websites or trade books to learn more about Abigail’s determination and drive to succeed.

Support Struggling Students

• Support struggling writers or ESL students by providing sentence frames to aid them in constructing their sentences.
• Read the passage together and highlight ideas that could be used as evidence and supporting details.

Easily Download & Print

Use the dropdown icon on the Download button to choose between the PDF or Google Slides version of this resource. 

To save paper, we suggest printing this 2-page worksheet double-sided. 

Additionally, project the worksheet onto a screen and work through it as a class by having students record their answers in their notebooks.

This resource was created by Nicole Ellis, a teacher in New York and Teach Starter Collaborator. 

Don’t stop there! We’ve got more activities to shorten your lesson planning time:  

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