This manuscript explores the power of using inquiry in a second-grade classroom to make students' understanding of citizenship more complex. It describes an inquiry unit in which students studied primary sources, engaged with fiction and nonfiction children's literature, and participated in interdisciplinary learning to further understand the…

This article describes second graders in a predominantly white suburban school who were assigned to ask their grandparents to write about their experiences during the Civil Rights Movement. The letters bring surprising wisdom--and some thought-provoking issues--to the classroom. The author found that the power of the primary source documents…