Take a 5,000-year journey from cave paintings to artificial intelligence! The History of Writing is a complete, full-year themed curriculum for middle schoolers. Every subject connects to the story of how people learned to record ideas, share stories, and change the world with words.
 
Each week has its own theme. Students explore cave art and clay tokens, decode hieroglyphs and the Rosetta Stone, follow the first alphabets through Greece and Rome, and watch the printing press spread new ideas. Then they travel through revolutions, world wars and the space age, and end the year exploring how writing went digital.
 
Subjects Included
English Language Arts
Math 6, Math 7 and Math 8
Science
Social Studies (choose one): World History, U.S. History, or Civics
Art: The Art of the Written Word
Health: Messages and the Mind (semester elective)
The Secret Code Society (year-long elective with ciphers, invisible ink, and code-breaking)
 
What’s Inside
A full school year: 36 weeks, 180 days, organized into 4 quarterly student packets
Tracks A, B and C, so students in grades 6, 7 and 8 can learn side by side
“Look Closely” pages with real public domain images, such as the Lascaux cave horses, Tutankhamun’s tomb and the Hubble Space Telescope
Video and website links in every lesson
Hands-on science labs and art projects using everyday household supplies
Weekly quizzes, quarter tests and final exams
A Parent Answer Key covering every weekly quiz, quarter test and final exam
 
Format
Instant digital download (printable PDFs) delivered as a ZIP file after purchase. Print what you need, week by week.