Illinois standards alignment

• SS.CV.1.9-12

  Covered

  Distinguish the rights, roles, powers, and responsibilities of individuals and institutions in the political system.

  Covered by

  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works
  • Illinois Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • Citizenship & Naturalization Basics

  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 1 · Purpose of government and the three branches
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 1 · Illinois's modern Constitution of 1970
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 2 · Illinois's plural executive: six statewide officers
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 3 · The General Assembly and the partisan-elected Supreme Court
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 5 · Home rule and local government (the opposite of Dillon's Rule)
  • · Citizenship & Naturalization Basics, Lesson 7 · Rights and responsibilities of citizenship

  Note: The roles and powers of institutions are taught head-on at both levels: the federal three branches, and Illinois's own institutions — the plural executive of six statewide officers, the General Assembly, the partisan-elected courts, and Illinois's strong home-rule local governments — beside citizens' own roles and responsibilities.

• SS.CV.2.9-12

  Covered

  Evaluate the opportunities and limitations of participation in elections, voting, and electoral process.

  Covered by

  • Illinois Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • Voting & Elections 101
  • How to Help a Campaign: A Practical, Non-Partisan Guide

  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 6 · Elections and how to take part
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 4 · The limited citizen initiative and the 1980 Cutback Amendment
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lessons 1-3 · registration, primaries and caucuses, how you vote
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 7 · Counting, canvassing, and certifying the vote
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 8 · Verify your own registration and rules
  • · Voting & Elections 101, Lesson 1 · Registering to vote
  • · How to Help a Campaign · the whole course (volunteering, donating, canvassing, with the legal guardrails)

  Note: Participation is taught as practice — Illinois's own on-ramps (same-day and automatic registration, no-excuse vote-by-mail) and the general election ladder — and the standard's “limitations” land squarely on Illinois's uniquely narrow initiative, the only thing citizens may put on the ballot themselves.

• SS.CV.4.9-12

  Covered

  Explain how the US Constitution established a system of government that has powers, responsibilities, and limits that have changed over time and are still contested while promoting the common good and protecting rights.

  Covered by

  • US Constitution 101: The Document That Builds the Government
  • State vs Federal Power: How American Government Is Divided

  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 6 · Separation of powers and checks & balances
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 7 · Federalism: state and federal power
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 2 · Three kinds of power: enumerated, implied, reserved
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 3 · The enumerated powers: Article I, § 8 (the Necessary and Proper Clause)
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 6 · Concurrent powers: what both levels share
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 7 · McCulloch v. Maryland (1819): implied powers and supremacy
  • · US Constitution 101, Lessons 2-9 · the Constitution analyzed article by article
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 8 · The Bill of Rights (Amendments I to X)
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 1 · What is federalism, and why split power at all?

  Note: The U.S. Constitution ladder's core: separation of powers and checks and balances, the enumerated/implied/reserved/concurrent powers taxonomy, federalism, and the Bill of Rights as a limit on government — taught as a living, contested system.

• SS.CV.7.9-12

  Covered

  Describe the concepts and principles that are inherent to American Constitutional Democracy.

  Covered by

  • US Constitution 101: The Document That Builds the Government
  • State vs Federal Power: How American Government Is Divided
  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights

  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 6 · Separation of powers and checks & balances
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 7 · Federalism: state and federal power
  • · State vs Federal Power, Lesson 1 · What is federalism, and why split power at all?
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 2 · The Preamble: who, and why
  • · The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights, Lesson 1 · What is the Bill of Rights?

• SS.CV.10.9-12

  Covered

  Explain the role of compromise and deliberation in the legislative process.

  Covered by

  • How a Bill Becomes Law (Federal): From Idea to Public Law
  • US Civics 101: How American Government Works

  • · How a Bill Becomes Law (Federal) · the whole course, introduction to public law
  • · US Civics 101, Lesson 3 · How a bill becomes a law
  • · How a Bill Becomes Law, Lesson 8 · Tracking a bill and making your voice heard

  Note: The federal bill-to-law process is taught end to end — committee filter, floor deliberation, conference reconciliation, veto and override, the compromise the standard names — with a companion lesson tracking a live bill through it.

• SS.CV.3.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze the impact of constitutions, laws, and agreements on the maintenance of order, justice, equality and liberty.

  Covered by

  • Illinois Civics: How Your State Government Works
  • US Constitution 101: The Document That Builds the Government
  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights

  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 1 · Illinois's modern Constitution of 1970
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 2 · Illinois's plural executive: six statewide officers
  • · Illinois Civics, Lesson 3 · The General Assembly and the partisan-elected Supreme Court
  • · US Constitution 101, Lessons 2-9 · the Constitution analyzed article by article
  • · US Constitution 101, Lesson 1 · Why a constitution? From the Articles of Confederation
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 2-5 · speech, religion, press, assembly, including at school and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 6-8 · the 4th Amendment: searches, stops, and your digital life
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 2 · Freedom of speech: what's protected, and what isn't
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 5 · Speech and religion at school, and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 7 · Police stops, reasonable suspicion, and your privacy

  What we do and don't cover: Constitutions and laws are analyzed directly — Illinois's 1970 Constitution and the U.S. Constitution as a document, with landmark cases as applied rules balancing liberty and order. The standard's “agreements” (treaties and compacts) are not the courses' subject.

• SS.CV.8.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze how individuals use and challenge laws to address a variety of public issues.

  Covered by

  • How a Bill Becomes Law (Federal): From Idea to Public Law
  • The Bill of Rights: Know Your Rights
  • The History of Unions: America and the World

  • · How a Bill Becomes Law, Lesson 8 · Tracking a bill and making your voice heard
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 2-5 · speech, religion, press, assembly, including at school and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lessons 6-8 · the 4th Amendment: searches, stops, and your digital life
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 2 · Freedom of speech: what's protected, and what isn't
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 5 · Speech and religion at school, and online
  • · Know Your Rights, Lesson 7 · Police stops, reasonable suspicion, and your privacy
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 16 · The colour bar: unions' own history of exclusion
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 17 · Randolph to Memphis: the labor half of the civil-rights movement

  What we do and don't cover: How individuals use and challenge laws is taught by example — invoking rights through the landmark-case line, tracking a live bill, and the labor and civil-rights movements' use of law and protest — not as a general survey of every avenue.

• SS.CV.9.9-12

  Partially covered

  Evaluate public policies in terms of intended and unintended outcomes and related consequences.

  Covered by

  • How a Bill Becomes Law (Federal): From Idea to Public Law

  • · How a Bill Becomes Law, Lesson 8 · Tracking a bill and making your voice heard
  • · Ep 18 · Bolivia's Bet (Bolivia's legal coca model against U.S.-funded eradication)
  • · Ep 18 · The Balloon Effect
  • · Ep 17 · Where the Poppy Grows (Afghanistan and the Golden Crescent)
  • · Ep 16 · The Justice Gap
  • · Ep 17 · The Scott County Lesson
  • · Ep 17 · Treatment Versus Punishment

  What we do and don't cover: Taught through one worked domain — drug policy — evaluated for unintended consequences: the War on Drugs' foreign-policy and incarceration effects, and how a needle-exchange ban helped drive the Scott County HIV outbreak. Not a general public-policy-analysis unit.

• SS.H.3.9-12

  Covered

  Evaluate the methods utilized by people and institutions to promote change.

  Covered by

  • The History of Unions: America and the World
  • Poland: Solidarność, When a Union Brought Down a State
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 4 · Two ideas about who a union is for: the Knights and the AFL
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 5 · Haymarket, 1886
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 6 · Homestead, Pullman, and the weapon that actually broke strikes
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 3 · A workers' state with a worker problem
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 7 · 13 December 1981: the state answers (martial law)
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 8 · 1989: a union negotiates a state out of existence
  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 4 · Resistance and Revolution
  • · Ep 11 · The Maroons
  • · Ep 11 · The Haitian Revolution
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom
  • · Ep 11 · The Black Jacobins (C.L.R. James)

  Note: The methods of change are taught in depth: the Gilded Age labor movement's strikes and organizing, Solidarność undoing a communist state, and resistance to slavery from Maroon communities to the Haitian Revolution.

• SS.H.7.9-12

  Covered

  Identify the role of individuals, groups, and institutions in people’s struggle for safety, freedom, equality and justice.

  Covered by

  • The History of Unions: America and the World
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • The Great Migration: How Six Million People Remade America

  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 16 · The colour bar: unions' own history of exclusion
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 17 · Randolph to Memphis: the labor half of the civil-rights movement
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 4 · Two ideas about who a union is for: the Knights and the AFL
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 5 · Haymarket, 1886
  • · The History of Unions, Lesson 6 · Homestead, Pullman, and the weapon that actually broke strikes
  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 4 · Resistance and Revolution
  • · Ep 11 · The Maroons
  • · Ep 11 · The Haitian Revolution
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom
  • · Ep 11 · The Black Jacobins (C.L.R. James)
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 11 · Politics & civil rights

  Note: Directly the catalog's spine: A. Philip Randolph and the labor half of the civil-rights movement, the industrial labor movement, enslaved people's resistance and the Haitian Revolution, and the Great Migration's political power.

• SS.H.9.9-12

  Covered

  Analyze the relationship between historical sources and the secondary interpretations made from them.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection

  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story, Beckford (1790) against Equiano (1789) and Mary Prince (1831) on the same plantation world
  • · Ep 3 · Two Ways of Seeing a Bean
  • · Ep 5 · Two Ways of Knowing
  • · Ep 18 · Whose Voice
  • · Ep 10 · The Oral History That Survived (recovering Nathan “Nearest” Green's erased role)
  • · Ep 19 · Peer Review Versus Press Release
  • · Every course's Sources bibliography, with per-claim verification
  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story

  Note: Exactly the Whose Voice method: primary accounts read against each other and against the secondary record, and the Nathan “Nearest” Green lesson teaching why the oral and documentary records diverge — source and interpretation held apart on purpose.

• SS.H.1.9-12

  Partially covered

  Evaluate how historical developments were shaped by time and place as well as broader historical contexts.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace

  • · The Commodity Map itself, every episode pinned at its origin
  • · The Growing Belts map, production regions by latitude band and country
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 3 · The Cacao Tree and the Narrowest Belt
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only
  • · Ep 1 · Climate Change Is Redrawing the Map
  • · Ep 3 · A Two-Degree Threat
  • · Ep 10 · Karst Limestone and Bourbon
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, assess a producing country's climate viability and defend the assessment
  • · Ep 3 · Conquest and the Great Reversal
  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 11 · The Triangular Trade
  • · Ep 12 · Burning the Books (the destruction of the Mesoamerican codices)
  • · Ep 15 · From Sacred to Commodity
  • · Ep 2 · The Tea Plant and Its Climate Zones
  • · Ep 3 · The Big Producers and the Cacao Varieties
  • · Ep 4 · From New Guinea to the New World

  What we do and don't cover: Taught as the series' method — how climate, latitude, and place shaped where commodities grew and what happened there (the Columbian Exchange, the agricultural hearths) — that lens applied to commodity history, not a general survey of causation.

• SS.H.8.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze key historical events and contributions of individuals through a variety of perspectives, including those of historically underrepresented groups.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • The Great Migration: How Six Million People Remade America
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom

  • · Ep 4 · The Triangular Trade and the Middle Passage
  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story (Equiano, 1789; Mary Prince, 1831)
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 6 · The Black press as engine: the Chicago Defender
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 7 · The Harlem Renaissance & the New Negro
  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story, Beckford (1790) against Equiano (1789) and Mary Prince (1831) on the same plantation world
  • · Ep 3 · Two Ways of Seeing a Bean
  • · Ep 5 · Two Ways of Knowing
  • · Ep 18 · Whose Voice

  What we do and don't cover: Underrepresented perspectives are centered — formerly enslaved writers (Equiano, Mary Prince) on the Middle Passage and plantation, the Harlem Renaissance and the Black press — but as commodity and labor history, not a comprehensive multi-perspective survey.

• SS.H.10.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze the causes and effects of global conflicts and economic crises.

  Covered by

  • Poland: Solidarność, When a Union Brought Down a State

  • · Ep 17 · The Opium Wars
  • · Ep 17 · Lin Zexu's Letter
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 3 · A workers' state with a worker problem
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 7 · 13 December 1981: the state answers (martial law)
  • · Poland: Solidarność, Lesson 8 · 1989: a union negotiates a state out of existence

  What we do and don't cover: Taught through two worked cases — the Opium Wars and their long consequences for China, and the Cold War's end in Poland — rather than as a survey of global conflicts and crises.

• SS.EC.10.9-12

  Covered

  Explain how globalization trends and policies affect social, political, and economic conditions in different nations.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • Mexico: The Protection Contract, and the Trade Deal That Came for It

  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 7 · Who Captures the Value
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · Ep 3 · Conquest and the Great Reversal
  • · Ep 5 · How Coca-Cola Got Its Name (biopiracy)
  • · Ep 7 · The Same Story, Six Times
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom (the 1825 French indemnity and Haiti's modern poverty)
  • · Mexico, Lesson 7 · Mexico rewrites its labor law, and the 68-year gap that explains why
  • · Mexico, Lesson 10 · The Rapid Response Mechanism: an international labor rule with teeth
  • · Mexico, Lesson 12 · The limits, honestly: the cases the United States lost

  Note: Globalization's effects are traced through real chains — the commodity trap that keeps producing nations poor, how colonial patterns persist, and NAFTA→USMCA's effect on labor on both sides of the border.

• SS.EC.1.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze how scarcity and incentives influence choices to consume or produce for different individuals and groups.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis
  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · Ep 5 · The Reciprocity Economy
  • · Ep 6 · Ceremony Meets the Market
  • · Ep 7 · Two Ways of Doing Economics
  • · Ep 1 · Price Shocks and Why You Keep Buying
  • · Ep 4 · From Luxury to the Cheapest Calorie

  What we do and don't cover: Scarcity and incentives are taught through real commodity markets — reciprocity versus market economies, and inelastic coffee demand absorbing a price spike — not as a general choice-and-incentives unit.

• SS.EC.5.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze the ways in which competition and government regulation influence what is produced and distributed in a market system.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods

  • · Ep 4 · The Hidden Costs of Cheap Sugar
  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed

  What we do and don't cover: Worked through the U.S. sugar program — how quotas, tariffs, and price supports reshape what is grown, imported, and sold, and who captures the value. One case, not a general treatment of market structure.

• SS.EC.9.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze the role of comparative advantage in global trade of goods and services.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace

  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · The Commodity Map itself, every episode pinned at its origin
  • · The Growing Belts map, production regions by latitude band and country
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 3 · The Cacao Tree and the Narrowest Belt
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only

  What we do and don't cover: The geography of who produces what and who earns from it is the series' spine (coffee, sugar, chocolate), but comparative advantage as a named formal model is not taught.

• SS.G.8.9-12

  Covered

  Evaluate how short and long term climate variability impacts human migration and settlement patterns, resource use and land uses.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom

  • · Ep 1 · Climate Change Is Redrawing the Map
  • · Ep 3 · A Two-Degree Threat
  • · Ep 6 · Why Volcanic Soil Only
  • · Ep 10 · Karst Limestone and Bourbon
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, assess a producing country's climate viability and defend the assessment
  • · Ep 6 · Islands Under Pressure
  • · Ep 8 · Beer Geography Is Shifting
  • · The Commodity Map itself, every episode pinned at its origin
  • · The Growing Belts map, production regions by latitude band and country
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 3 · The Cacao Tree and the Narrowest Belt

  Note: This is the Growing Belts map: climate and latitude deciding where each commodity can grow and be settled, and climate change redrawing that map for coffee, cacao, and more.

• SS.G.12.9-12

  Covered

  Evaluate how competition for scarce natural resources contributes to conflict and cooperation within and among countries.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom
  • BVC: Kava — The Root of Peace
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis

  • · Ep 17 · The Opium Wars
  • · Ep 17 · Lin Zexu's Letter
  • · Ep 2 · Who Grows the Tea (colonial and plantation labour)
  • · Ep 5 · Whose Knowledge Is It
  • · Ep 6 · Kava Governs
  • · Ep 20 · The Ban Against the Evidence
  • · Ep 3 · Conquest and the Great Reversal
  • · Ep 5 · How Coca-Cola Got Its Name (biopiracy)
  • · Ep 7 · The Same Story, Six Times
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom (the 1825 French indemnity and Haiti's modern poverty)

  Note: Competition for commodities as a driver of conflict is taught directly — European imperialism run through cash crops, and the Opium Wars fought over trade — with the colonial patterns that outlast them.

• SS.G.6.9-12

  Partially covered

  Analyze how historical events and the diffusion of ideas, technologies, and cultural practices have influenced migration patterns and the distribution of human population.

  Covered by

  • The Great Migration: How Six Million People Remade America
  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 4 · Routes and railroads: the three streams
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 5 · Arrival: Chicago, Detroit, New York, and the Pacific Northwest
  • · The Great Migration, Lesson 9 · Faith, family & mutual aid
  • · Ep 1 · The Coffee Belt: Where Coffee Grows and Why
  • · Ep 2 · The Tea Plant and Its Climate Zones
  • · Ep 3 · The Big Producers and the Cacao Varieties
  • · Ep 4 · From New Guinea to the New World

  What we do and don't cover: Taught at case depth through the Great Migration — its streams and arrival cities — and the diffusion of crops from their agricultural hearths. Not a general treatment of migration and population.

• SS.G.11.9-12

  Partially covered

  Explain how globalization impacts the cultural, political, economic, and environmental characteristics of a place or region.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: My Daily Altar — Season Synthesis
  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Guayusa & Kola Nut — Forest Wisdom

  • · Ep 3 · The Commodity Trap
  • · Ep 7 · Who Captures the Value
  • · Ep 21 · The Smile Curve, Confirmed
  • · Ep 1 · Follow the Money: Bean to Cup
  • · Ep 2 · Who Gets Paid, Tea and Coffee Compared
  • · Ep 12 · The Jimador's Share
  • · Ep 14 · Pattern 3: Labor Captures the Smallest Share (the smile curve)
  • · Ep 3 · Conquest and the Great Reversal
  • · Ep 5 · How Coca-Cola Got Its Name (biopiracy)
  • · Ep 7 · The Same Story, Six Times
  • · Ep 11 · The Debt of Freedom (the 1825 French indemnity and Haiti's modern poverty)

  What we do and don't cover: Globalization's economic and political imprint on producing regions is taught through commodity case studies — value capture along the chain and the commodity trap — rather than a full four-characteristics analysis.

• SS.IS.4.9-12

  Covered

  Gather and evaluate information from multiple sources while considering the origin, credibility, point of view, authority, structure, context, and corroborative value of the sources.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Tea — The Way of Tea
  • BVC: Chocolate — Food of the Gods
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution
  • Spotting Misleading Marketing

  • · Ep 19 · Peer Review Versus Press Release
  • · Every course's Sources bibliography, with per-claim verification
  • · Ep 1 · Reading a Coffee Ad
  • · Ep 2 · Reading a Tea Ad
  • · Ep 3 · Reading a Chocolate Ad
  • · Ep 4 · Whose Voice Tells the Story (reading a text for what it leaves out)
  • · Ep 11 · Tiki and the Tropical Paradise
  • · Ep 15 · The Language of Doubt
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option B, 3+ peer-reviewed sources and an APA bibliography
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option C, interview ethics: informed consent, right to review
  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 3 · Weasel words and what the fine print takes back
  • · Spotting Misleading Marketing, Lesson 5 · Fake reviews, astroturfing, and undisclosed #ads

  Note: Source evaluation — origin, credibility, point of view, corroboration — is modelled in every media-literacy episode and required in the Coffee project's sourced, cited research.

• SS.IS.5.9-12

  Partially covered

  Identify evidence that draws information from multiple sources to revise or strengthen claims.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection

  • · Ep 15 · Doubt Is Our Product
  • · Ep 19 · Peer Review Versus Press Release
  • · Ep 20 · The Ban Against the Evidence (the UK banning khat against its own scientific advice)
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, all four options are 2-3 week research projects requiring synthesis across sources

  What we do and don't cover: Building and testing claims against multiple sources is taught through the fallacy-and-evidence lessons and the Coffee project's synthesis. Only the Coffee episode ships the graded version.

• SS.IS.6.9-12

  Partially covered

  Construct and evaluate explanations and arguments using multiple sources and relevant, verified information.

  Covered by

  • BVC: Coffee — The Daily Global Connection
  • BVC: Sugar — The Sweet Revolution

  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, Option D, a 1,200-1,500 word research paper with a required counterargument section
  • · Ep 1 · Assignment, all four options are 2-3 week research projects requiring synthesis across sources
  • · Ep 4 · Blood-Sweetened Luxury (the abolitionist sugar boycott)
  • · Ep 8 · Selling Prohibition
  • · Ep 15 · Torches of Freedom
  • · Ep 17 · Lin Zexu's Letter (using Britain's own values against its opium policy)

  What we do and don't cover: The Coffee project's argument paper asks for exactly this — a thesis defended from verified, cited sources with a counterargument — but it is one optional project in one episode, not a programme.

What we don't claim

A standards page is only worth reading if the omissions are honest too. We looked at these and left them out:

• Mathematics — nothing. This catalog does no mathematics instruction, so it meets no Illinois Common Core (Illinois Learning Standards) mathematics standard.
• Science — one partial claim, via the shared NGSS file. Illinois adopted the NGSS verbatim (January 2014) as its science standards, so our one honest science claim — HS-ESS3-1, partial — comes through the shared NGSS mapping with the limit stated on the entry. There is no laboratory work, investigation, or modelling in this catalog, and we will not claim more.
• Financial Literacy (SS.EC.FL) — nothing. Illinois's Economics strand carries a six-standard Financial Literacy sub-strand (income strategies, budgeting, interest and inflation, credit, investing, insurance). This catalog teaches no personal finance, so it claims none of SS.EC.FL.1-6.
• The Illinois Civics flagship's Illinois-specific structure has no Illinois code to cite. Illinois Civics teaches the 1970 Constitution, the plural executive (uniquely both a Comptroller and a Treasurer), the partisan-elected Supreme Court, the uniquely narrow Legislative-Article initiative and the 1980 Cutback Amendment, and one of the nation's strongest home-rule traditions — from Illinois's own official sources. But the 2017 Social Science Standards are DISCIPLINARY CONCEPTS: no standard names a state's structure, so these lessons map only onto the abstract institution and participation standards (SS.CV.1, SS.CV.2, SS.CV.3). The gap is in the standards, not the course.
• Civics standards we checked and rejected. SS.CV.5 (civic dispositions and diverse perspectives as a named concept) and SS.CV.6 (political parties, the media, and public interest groups — our media literacy is consumer protection, not political-media analysis) are not genuinely taught, so we do not claim them.
• The disciplinary standards we read and did not claim. Across History, Economics, and Geography we claim only the concept standards the catalog genuinely teaches. SS.H.2/4/5/6/11/12, SS.EC.2-4/6-8, and SS.G.1-5/7/9/10 were checked and not claimed — the change-and-continuity, market-mechanics, macroeconomic-indicator, mapping-tool, and culture standards are not this catalog's subject. The reject list is the evidence the map was not padded.