Keep your students engaged in learning about life in Early Canada through this Canadian Fur Trade project based learning activity. Students are hired by archeologists to scout out a location of a fictional fort from the past.
This product is part of our Grade 5 Alberta Social Studies Bundle.
Students present a map of the location of the fort, a visual representation of what the fort looked like and a written report outlining life in the fort, including the weather, defence, trade, natural resources, local Indigenous People, and how furs were transported back to Europe.
This product-based learning task includes:
- a complete lesson plan for teachers explaining how to do the project with students.
- modifications for differentiation.
- student planning pages.
- tips for project-based learning.
- three different student checklists: so you can choose the best one for your students.
- assessment rubric.
- student examples of the map, fort (visual representation) and written portions.
- teacher background information by category for easy reference.
- student reflection page.
- suggested web links to use for reference.
Students need to have a basic understanding of the fur trade and basic geographic knowledge of Canada in order to be successful, but this can be learned as students work on this project.
This is a very open-ended and flexible task, with a clear rubric outlining the content which is expected to be addressed. Students are kept engaged in their learning for 2-3 weeks of social studies classes. We've done this project for as long as a month.
This activity has been tested with dozens of different groups of grade five students and is a HUGE hit. Students have designed forts that included diagrams, building blocks, video games, cardboard, and even one made of sticks and mud.
Ninja Note: This project can be done with paper and pencil. Students do not need to build dioramas or elaborate forts to be successful.
This task aligns with:
- Alberta Program of Studies for Grade 5 Social Studies: Early Canada.
This task supports:
- Canadian social studies lessons.
- learning about the fur trade.
Ninja Note: This file is a PDF and requires printing for students to use the student pages. Printing the entire file is not required.
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