• Teacher Background Material: Pierre Berton's Klondike Fever
• Gold Rush Guided Writing prompts (PowerPoint), Gold Rush Photos
• Layout Publication program such as Adobe Pagemaker, Microsoft Publisher, or Adobe In-Design
• Links: http://www.library.state.ak.us/goldrush/

This lesson is a guided writing exercise that places students in the role of a Klondike Stampeder in the late 1900s. Browse the goldrush site to gain a basic understanding of the Gold Rush, its characters and impact on Alaska history. Proceed with the guided writing. This lesson can be delivered in a regular classroom with a computer projection system, or in a computer lab with a projection system. Students can either write their responses or type them depending on what tools are available.

This lesson is broken down into five sessions. Each session has five prompts that the students will respond to in the first person. After each session, the students will write a paragraph. At the end of each class session, each student should produce between 1-2 pages of their story. At the end of the five sessions, students should have enough material to create a small book. Give the students about 5-7 minutes per prompt. It is good idea to print out the session prompts and give them to students who have a hard time keeping up the pace.

This activity lends itself to the team-teaching mode of instruction. Students may work on story organization, voice, grammar, spelling and punctuation in their language arts classes. Once the students have a polished story, they can then use a computer layout program to create a publication complete with a title page and pictures.