California Curriculum Standards

The View from Emeryville: The Use of the Emeryville Shellmound Site in the Teaching to California History and Social Science Strands and Content Standards

Goals & Curriculum Strands	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
Knowledge and cultural understanding	Perspective of 2,800 years of change in the Bay Region; appreciation of contribution of diverse cultures to our history
Democratic understanding and civic values	Understanding that many factors play into the process of change and decision making in a community
Attainment and social participation	Engagement in the story of their own local community

Social Science & Historical Analysis Skills	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
Chronological and spatial thinking	Timelines, archaeological data, historic and modern maps and historic events all contribute to chronological sequencing events in time and of changes of the locale through time
Research, evidence and point of view	Archaeological data is provided as a primary source of information about the past. Artifacts and historic photos provide opportunities to understand changing points of view, and also to appreciate that each culture must solve a similar set of problems, and the solutions may be very different,
Historical interpretation	Study of a long sequence of change in a single locale provides a context for interpretation of historical change

Grade Level Content Standards

Grade 3: Continuity & Change

The material provides a 2,800-year perspective on a single locale.

Chapters	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
3.1 Students describe the physical and human geography and use maps, tables, graphs, photographs, and charts to organize information about people, places, and environments in a spatial context.	Maps of the Bay Region, of the Emeryville Shellmound, and Shellmound Park show series of changes that have happened at this location in the physical and cultural environment.
3.1-1 Identify geographical features in their local region	Text and maps describe natural and cultural features of the Bay Region
3.1-2 Trace the ways in which people have used the resources of the local region and modified the physical environment.	Describes use of resources and local physical environment by occupants of Emeryville Shellmound over a 2,800-year period
3.2 Students describe the American Indian nations in their local region long ago and in the recent past.	Treats archaeological data relevant to prehistoric lifeways of the Ohlones and their ancestors who lived at the Emeryville site
3.2-2 Discuss the ways in which physical geography, including climate, influenced how the local Indian nations adapted to their natural environment (e.g. how they obtained food, clothing and tools).	Describes prehistoric cultural adaptations to the bay shore marsh environment for food resources, tools and other elements of material culture described for the Emeryville Shellmound.
3.3 Students draw from historical and community resources to organize the sequence of local historical events, and describe how each period of settlement left its mark on the land.	Provides a historic timeline that sets the shellmound in world history. Addresses a series of major local changes in land use at the site.
3.3-3 Trace why the community was established, how individuals and families contributed to its founding and development, and how the community has changed over time, drawing on maps, photographs, oral histories, letters, newspapers, and other primary sources.	Provides discussion of archaeological evidence, as well as historic maps, letters and photographs, and describes the "players" and events in the sequence of change at Emeryville.
3.5 Students demonstrate basic economic reasoning skills and an understanding of the economy of the local region.	Addresses historic sequence of changes in the local economy
3.5-1 Describe the ways in which local producers have used and are using natural resources, human resources, and capital resources to produce goods and services in the past and the present.	The Emeryville Shellmound represents a hunter-gatherer economy strongly focused on local resources augmented by trade for "luxury" goods. Later the site was used as an amusement park, then for industry, and finally as a focus for redevelopment.
3.5-2 Understand that some goods are made locally, some elsewhere in the United States, and some abroad.	The shellmound archaeological collection includes examples both of prehistoric and historic trade.

Grade 4: California: A Changing State

Material focuses on a series of changes that have taken place on the San Fransisco Bay shore

Chapters	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
4.1 Students demonstrate an understanding of the physical and human geographic features that define places and regions in California.	The Emeryville Shellmound is identified as a geographically significant place in its natural and cultural setting.
4.1-3 Identify the state capital and describe the various regions of California, including how their characteristics and physical environment affect human activity	Students will observe the strong connection between the bay and its shores as geographic features and prehistoric life ways around the bay.
4.1-4 Identify the locations of the Pacific Ocean, rivers, valleys and mountain passes and explain their effects upon the growth of towns	Modern and historic maps of the Bay Region on the website emphasize the influence of the ocean, the bay and local fresh water sources on settlement patterns in the Bay Region since prehistoric times.
4.1-5 Use maps, charts, and pictures to describe how communities in California vary in land use, vegetation, wildlife, climate, population density, architecture, services, and transportation.	Historic photos and maps show Emeryville, as a settlement strongly influenced by the bay, as a context for comparison with other regions of California.
4.2 Students describe the social, political, cultural and economic life and interactions among people in California from the pre-Columbian societies to the Spanish mission and Mexican rancho periods.	The prehistoric life ways of the Emeryville Shellmound hunter-gatherers provide early part of the spectrum of life ways found in California history.
4.2-1 Discuss the major nations of California Indians, including their geographic distribution, economic activities, legends, and religious beliefs; and describe how they depended on, adapted to and modified the physical environment by cultivation of the land and use of sea resources.	Bay Region Native Americans represent a life way of most of the native people of central California; focus is environmental adaptations to bay and coast
4.4 Students explain how California became an agricultural and industrial power, tracing the transformation of the California economy and its political and cultural development since the 1850s.	The development of Shellmound Park; and subsequent industries focus locally
4.4-4 Describe rapid American immigration, internal migration, settlement, and the growth of towns, and cities	Growth and industrialization and subsequent redevelopment of Emeryville are good local examples

Grade 5: U.S. History & Geography

History of the Bay Region and its contributions to the longer history of the nation

Chapters	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
5.1 Students describe the major pre-Columbian settlements, including the cliff dwellers and pueblo people of the Desert Southwest, the American Indians of the Pacific Northwest, the nomadic nations of the Great Plains and the woodland people east of the Mississippi River	Bay Region Native American cultures are a good example of the hunter gatherer life ways that were shared throughout much of California and throughout the U.S.
5.1-1 Describe how geography and climate influenced the way various nations lived and adjusted to the natural environment, including locations of villages, the distinct structures that they built and how they obtained their food, clothing, tools and utensils.	Emphasis is on adaptations of local people to changing environment of San Fransisco Bay

Grade 6: World History & Geography

Prehistoric California is 1 example of a "stone age" civilization that survived as late as 1800 AD

Chapters	Relevance of Emeryville Shellmound Material
6.1 Students describe what is known through archaeological studies of the early physical and cultural development of humankind from the Paleolithic era to the agricultural revolution	Archaeology as a source of information; provides understanding that all areas of world did not develop at same rate and in same direction: native California was still "stone age" in 1769, agriculture was not practiced by native people of Central California
6.1-1 Describe the hunter-gatherer societies, including the development of tools and the use of fire	Emeryville Shellmound people were hunter-gatherers using similar tools and living strategies to those used in Paleolithic cultures
6.1-2 Identify the human communities that populated the major regions of the world and describe how humans adapted to a variety of environments.	Human adaptation to the San Fransisco Bay environment is central to this material.
6.1-3 Discuss the climatic changes and human modifications of the physical environment that gave rise to the domestication of plants and animals and new sources of clothing and shelter	Environmental changes on the bay caused some significant shifts in food sources; native people also may have changed habitats and altered animal population. There have been significant environmental changes in the Bay Region due to historic and modern activities that have required changes in life ways.