Hillsdale’s K-12 Education Office added a third unit, “The British Colonies of North America,” to the 1776 curriculum, which can be downloaded for free from the K-12 Education website. 

The new unit will cover the pre-Columbian Native American civilizations through the settlement of the 13 colonies, according to John Adams, interim director of curriculum at the K-12 office. It will also include initial efforts toward self-government, such as the Virginia House of Burgesses, as well as the history of slavery in the Western Hemisphere. 

“We hope that students will find in the example of so many settlers who sought a better life and freedom a model of the hope for human freedom and flourishing that America would come to represent while acknowledging the moral failures to which every person is subject,” Adams said. 

The unit is the latest in a series of eight planned American history units in the 1776 curriculum, a subset of Hillsdale’s “K-12 Program Guide.”

According to the K-12 education website, “This curriculum provides teachers with guidance—not dictates—about how to plan and teach a given topic in American history or civics.” This guidance includes recommended books, online courses, and questions to ask students.

Kathleen O’Toole, assistant provost for K-12 Education, said the curriculum offers students a style of history education that isn’t available elsewhere. 

“It’s important because I think people have lost sight of the fact that the key to studying American history responsibly is beginning with primary source documents,” O’Toole said.“Students are capable of reading the historical evidence from quite a young age. So we think that’s the most responsible way to begin.”

O’Toole said the development of the curriculum is a collaborative effort between Hillsdale professors, members of the K-12 Education Office, and educators who teach the curriculum in their classrooms. 

“We have classical schools across the country that we work with,” O’Toole said. “We invite them to contribute to the curriculum and tell us what’s working and what’s not.”

Maegen Satcher is a classical pedagogy trainer at Hillsdale and former dean of academics at St. Johns Classical Academy,  one of Hillsdale’s affiliate classical schools in Clay County, Florida. Satcher said one of the focuses of the K-12 curriculum is delivering dense historical information in a way that’s understandable for very young students. 

“They could draw on significant heroes from the past or they can depict battle scenes, things like that,” Satcher said. “Teachers can ask oral questions of their students to get them to retell important events. It’s looking at the content in a way that would be practical for teachers to use in the classroom, as well as for students to produce assignments.” 

Satcher emphasized the curriculum’s flexibility and accessibility to teachers in any setting, whether private, public, or homeschool.

“It’s free, and there are some resources that we recommend and suggest, but any good teacher can start with a suggested way of doing things and then can add to it as they start to become more masterful in their craft,” Satcher said.