unit offerings
Live It Learn It offers a robust menu of 20+ academic programs at some of the most interesting and important sites in the nation’s capital. We work closely with educators at our partner sites to develop rigorous and engaging activities that are interdisciplinary, age-appropriate, and aligned to Common Core standards.
3rd grade
Click the images!
Students use maps, critical thinking, reading and writing skills to discover information about DC’s history and culture to determine what makes it so unique.
Along the National Mall, students investigate monuments and memorials to understand how they can tell the story of important moments in our country’s history.
Students explore watershed ecosystems in DC as they learn how to become stewards that can protect and preserve the Anacostia River and our environment.
Students explore the inner workings of the local DC government, including its branches and local leaders, gaining an understanding of the democratic process.
All plants have roots, stems, and leaves, but students must think like botanists in order to discover why plants in various environments adapt to look a certain way.
Students investigate how friction and other forces like pushes and pulls impact movement to understand how forces shape the world around them.
Students think like zoologists throughout the Amazonia House observing species and learning how different adaptations help animals survive in unique habitats.
4th grade
Click the images!
Students create self-portraits to reveal and celebrate their identity after learning how artists tell stories of people through composition, symbolism, and expression.
Students take a deeper look into Congress and the function, history, architecture, and art that can be found within the halls of the U.S Capitol Building.
Students investigate symbols, words, and primary sources to understand how Frederick Douglass and Thomas Jefferson shaped the concept of freedom in the US.
Students uncover the factors that ignited the American Revolution and examine the differing perspectives that fueled the fight for independence.
Students explore various works of narrative art among the Native nations of the Great Plains - with an emphasis on family life, ceremonial events, Native identity, and pop culture.
Students (or perhaps, spies) will travel back in time to the summer of 1781 to understand the different tactics that were used to win the Revolution.
Students examine the artwork of Wifredo Lam and consider the artistic elements used in his paintings, such as color, line, shape, texture, and balance.
By becoming storytelling detectives, students analyze narratives to discover how authors use storytelling to make their tales interesting before using these same moves to tell a story of their own.
Thinking like geologists, students explore gems and mineral specimens of every size, shape, and color of the rainbow to understand how rocks and minerals are part of our everyday life.
5th grade
Students embark on a journey to explore the planets within our Milky Way Galaxy to learn about the solar system’s celestial bodies and their unique characteristics.
Students launch into an exploration of flight as they study the Wright Brothers to better understand how the process of discovery and the evolution of innovations revolutionized human aviation.
Students explore how slavery shaped Washington DC and the conditions that led to the Civil War, diving into pivotal moments such as Lincoln’s presidency and assassination.
Through Jacob Lawrence’s paintings, students consider how historical events (from the Great Migration to the Civil Unrest of 2020) can create positive change.
Students will explore the critical role that plants play in the cycling of matter and energy within ecosystems and also examine how energy flows through these systems.
By hearing stories from diverse individuals who lived in DC during the Civil War, students gain better insight into how those encounters influenced President Lincoln’s views on the Civil War and emancipation.
Students will focus on how African Americans made opportunities for themselves when faced with discrimination by exploring the exhibits Making a Way Out of No Way and Game Changers.
Students will investigate the Black experience during the Civil War and Reconstruction while exploring the broader complexities of these periods.
Students delve into the complexities of the Civil Rights Movement by investigating the experiences of participants at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom.
Students investigate westward expansion from Native American perspectives, exploring their enduring influence on U.S. identity through historical events, images, and stories that connect the past with contemporary American life.