Investigating History for Grades 3 and 4

Investigating History is coming to third and fourth grades! Our upcoming courses align fully to the Grades 3 and 4 content standards and are being developed in collaboration with Massachusetts educators and experts. They engage students with the history of Massachusetts, the United States, and North America through a variety of lenses and a diversity of perspectives.

Throughout the pilot of the Grades 3 and 4 materials in school year 2024-25, DESE gathered valuable feedback from teachers, administrators, and students about how to make the Investigating History curriculum for these grade levels as strong as possible. In order to provide time to incorporate this feedback, the formal release of the Grades 3 and 4 Investigating History curriculum is scheduled for Summer 2026, in time for the 2026-27 school year.

Revisions to pilot materials will focus on building in more robust supports for multilingual learners; updating materials, maps, and sources to maximize grade-level appropriateness and usability; strengthening the consistency of routines and instructional strategies across all units and grade levels, and ensuring that skills and content flow coherently into the Grades 5, 6, and 7 materials.

Given the importance of these revisions, DESE strongly recommends that schools who were not part of the 2024-25 pilot wait to implement the full curriculum until the 2026-27 school year.

Explore Key Resources for Grades 3 and 4:

• Register to access pilot curricular materials. Please note that these units are currently under revision, with new fully published units available for School Year 2026-27.
• Explore the Background Briefs for each third and fourth grade unit. These asynchronous, online modules are intended to help deepen teachers' content knowledge and prepare them to more skillfully implement the curriculum with their students.
• Certified professional development providers are available to work with educators, schools, and districts and begin orienting them to the Grade 3 and 4 materials' content, instructional design, and pedagogy through a variety of professional development offerings.

We are excited about the level of interest in Grades 3 and 4 Investigating History and look forward to sharing these materials with educators across Massachusetts. If you have questions, please reach out to InvestigatingHistory@mass.gov .