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This course, part of the Gilder Lehrman Institute’s History Essentials series, examines the history of European and Anglo-American expansion into what would become the American West. Professor Scharff begins with an overview of the geographic and cultural landscape of Indigenous America, examining societies of Native peoples across the continent prior to European colonization and the ongoing clashes between peoples. She continues by discussing exploration and settlement, beginning with early colonization efforts, and ends in the twentieth century examining women’s suffrage and the Dust Bowl. The course concludes with the question “What should the West be?” and explores the tragic paradoxes between the displacement of Native Americans and the expansion of land, rights, and freedoms for invading groups of White settlers.

Led by Virginia Scharff, Professor of History, University of New Mexico

This online course is aligned with the needs of elementary school teachers. For more resources for elementary school teachers, visit our Elementary Curriculum I: Colonial America to Reconstruction to explore a timeline, lesson plans, student activity sheets, and interactive maps.

The History Essentials series is free to all Affiliate School teachers and Affiliate Library staff.