4th Grade Social Studies Curriculum – Early Texas Settlements Unit – TEKS

Are you an upper elementary teacher looking to find a quality TEKS-aligned resource that covers early Texas settlements and exploration? Looking for minimal-prep and engaging lessons and activities to teach social studies concepts to your 4th-grade students? Look no further!

Unit 5 of the Smart and Simple Social Studies Texas History Guided Curriculum is about Early Texas Settlements. The main topic of this unit is designed to help upper elementary students understand and learn about the exploration, colonization, and settlement in Texas, life in early Texas, missions and other Spanish settlements, Texas’ role in the Mexican War of Independence, and significant figures from Spanish and French explorers to empresarios.

This 2-week unit includes lesson plans, guided notes, practice activities, exit tickets, a project, unit assessment, and more. Each lesson includes slideshows in both PowerPoint and Google Slides, as well as student digital activities of the notes, practice activities, exit tickets, project, and unit assessment.

This unit primarily correlates to the current TEKS 4th Grade Social Studies standards (adopted in 2024). It includes EVERYTHING you need to teach early Texas settlements – just print & go!

This unit covers the following topics:

• Lesson 1: Exploring, Colonizing, and Settling in Texas
• Lesson 2: Spanish Settlements in Texas
• Lesson 3: Texas and the Mexican War of Independence
• Lesson 4: Important Figures of Texas Settlement
• Lesson 5: Early Texas Settlement Review Game

What’s included in this resource?

• 2-week pacing guide and overview
• Scope and Sequence
• 5 teacher lesson plan guides
• 4 non-editable slideshows (Google Drive & PPT versions)
• 1 editable slideshow review game with student recording sheet and QR code
• Guided notes for Lessons 1-4 (2 versions: fill-in-the-blank and highlighted words) – 2 size options – full-page size for binder and smaller size for notebooks
• 4 practice activities
• 5 exit tickets
• Digital and full-color versions of student activities
• Unit Project
• Unit Assessment
• Answer keys for all student activities

RESEARCHED for ACCURACY and CULTURAL RELEVANCE – The Southern Teach creates resources that are thoroughly researched and checked for accuracy. My mission is to show ALL sides of history and believe it’s important to share this in a way that is appropriate for upper elementary students.

What makes this Guided Social Studies Curriculum Smart and Simple?

✅ The social studies daily lessons and activities are bite-sized and can easily be implemented in 30-45 minutes.

✅ The social studies curriculum is TEKS-aligned (for Texas) but is still flexible enough to use in any order.

✅ Each social studies unit has everything you need to simply teach social studies – easy-to-follow lesson plans, guided notes, practice activities, exit tickets, and more!

It’s everything you need to implement engaging social studies lessons that students love and teachers enjoy (because it’s comprehensive and easy to prep)!