Greg Vigil's CU

Understanding Human Responses to Climactic Changes
By Historic and Modern People of the Southwestern United States

Gregory James Vigil

Academic Setting

This unit is to be used at Taylor Middle School in Albuquerque, New Mexico. The unit is designed for use with seventh grade, regular social studies classes. Seventh grade students study geography and history of Canada and Latin America in the first semester and New Mexico history during the second semester. The unit is to begin in the first semester when students survey human arrivals and the Aztecs and Incas. The unit is to be briefly reintroduced and then covered in-depth during the second semester in which an in-depth study of New Mexico’s Indian groups is necessary to understand their role in the development of New Mexico.

Taylor Middle School is ethnically and socioeconomically diverse. It is located in Albuquerque’s North Valley Region and covers the northern boundaries of the APS attendance zone. Its students are drawn from the communities of Los Ranchos de Albuquerque and Alameda. Its student population is predominantly Anglo, and there are also students of Hispanic, African-American, and Native-American backgrounds. Parents in the Taylor district work in both public and private sector employment. Many are self-employed business people or professionals. Thirty-five percent of the school’s students receive free or reduced meals.

Context and Background

Introduction

As a teacher and student of New Mexico’s long history I was intrigued by an article in the May 1, 2002 Albuquerque Journal titled “History Calls This Rainy.” In this article, reporter Jennifer McKee presented a correlation of New Mexico’s dendroclimatologic data for the last millennium with milestones in both the rise and fall of the Anasazi civilization and events in more recent New Mexico history – notably the Pueblo Rebellion of 1680 and the severe three-year drought of the 1950s. The purpose of the article was to put an historic perspective on our current drought conditions (McKee).

McKee claims that our weather has been unusually moist since 1976, but that we are now enduring a period of cyclical drought. McKee quotes climate researcher Henri Grissino-Mayer of the University of Tennessee. According to Grissino-Mayer this drought could last longer and be much dryer than the 1950s drought. McKee also cites an unnamed 1998 United States Department of Agriculture study of rainfall in the Rio Grande Basin over the last 500 years. McKee and the study assert that droughts occurred in the Rio Grande Basin during that time about “every nine years and lasted about 4 ½ years.” The study notes Tewa and Keres abandonments occurring at the same time, and that Hispanic villagers noted Athabascan raids simultaneously increasing. McKee cites drought as an environmental factor in inducing events such as the abandonment of the Anasazi complex at Chaco Canyon, raids on pueblos by Apaches and Navajos, and the Pueblo Rebellion. McKee’s writing is accompanied by a timeline that correlates McKee’s climate and historical data by Journal artist Carol Cooperrider that visually correlates McKee’s historic and climate data. The timeline confirms McKee assertions.

I began to wonder if McKee’s assertions could be verified using different data, and if so, how far back in time could weather data be obtained. I also questioned if drought alone was as big a factor in the retrenchment and restructuring of the Anasazi world between 1150 and 1300 as claimed. I also wondered if drought played a cooperative role or a driving role in social and behavioral changes that drove the abandonments. I reverted to my role of a teacher of New Mexico history and further wondered if 7^th grade students of New Mexico history could conduct such a study on their own and what conclusions they might reach. I was at first skeptical. Where could I find ancient climate data? How could this data be interpreted? How could 7^th graders be taught to find and interpret such data?

Review of Literature

I have located varied paleoclimatologic materials on both the Internet and in UNM library resources. I will review each briefly.

Some very useable dendroclimatologic data is exhumed from Climate of the Southwest by Paul R. Shepard et al., University of Arizona Laboratory of Tree Ring Research, 1999.
Further useful information was found in Dendrochronology and Dendroclimatology, Thomas Swetman and Julio Betancourt, Northern Arizona University, 1999. This study yielded a source of climate data for the last millennium that has been adapted for this study. It forms the basis for discussion of Anasazi response to drought.
Radio-carbon based paleoclimatologic information was found in the UNM Centennial Science and Engineering Library.

Bruce Allen and Roger Anderson studied lake bed sediments from New Mexico’s Estancia Valley that establishes a paleoclimatologic record with age ranging from 12, 490 to 23,290 years before present.
Irving Friedman et al. wrote on isotopic evidence of climactic change in ancient woods discovered in Colorado’s San Juan Mountains. Their data ranges from 4,000 to 10,000 years before present.
Fred Philips, et al., researched radioisotopes in groundwater samples from New Mexico’s San Juan region. Their findings, for purpose of this study, are very general and hard to adapt, but present another area in which some generalized paleoclimatologic data can be developed.
Some very valuable data was obtained from recent issues of Radiocarbon available through the UNM Zimmerman Library website. R.E. Taylor in Radiocarbon reviewed the 50 year use of radiocarbon dating in archeology throughout the Americas. He observed that the introduction of C14 into American archeology “was like an atomic bomb.” This article will be further utilized in this study.
Margaret Nelson and Michelle Hegmon, both of the University of Arizona, reviewed the timing of the building of smaller settlements away from larger settlements by the Mimbres peoples and deduced that a regional abandonment did not occur, rather a redistribution to nearby smaller sites to better utilize the resources of the area occupied by the Mimbres. They argue that such redistributions prevented the abandonment of a total region and a way of life. This argument is used later in this study to reach conclusions about the 1300 changes in the Anasazi world.

Anasazi cultural information comes from “The Anasazi”, no author listed, www.Desertusa.com, and Anasazi Ruins of the Southwest in Color, Ferguson and Rohn. Also being consulted are National Geographic Magazine, February 1964 and November 1982. Also being consulted is The Story of Mesa Verde, by retired National Park Service archeologist Gilbert Wenger. This publication is an internet-available and hardcopy book for general audiences. It is sold in the Museum book shop and in consumable form on the Mesa Verde National Park website. This publication is deeper in scope than the park’s brochure and was intended as a resource for further study by park patrons.

The Shepard and Swetman papers are excellent sources of up-to-date, well-founded information that I intend to use. The www.Desertusa.com web page has some useful information on Anasazi cultural development, but is written as an Internet magazine. It grants permission for classroom use, but lacks scholarly perspective. It will be used in a limited manner. William Ferguson and Arthur Rohn provide a reliable timeline and clear narrative on Anasazi development. Their presentation is based upon Anasazi/Pueblo cultural developmental periods that were agreed upon by researchers at the 1927 Pecos Conference. Those periods divide Anasazi development into three Basketmaker stages and six pueblo stages. Other writers also use this system, including Calvin and Susan Roberts, co-authors of A History of New Mexico which is a text on New Mexico history that is locally written and adopted for use in New Mexico 7^th grade New Mexico history curriculum. I will use Ferguson with dendrochronologic data. The 1964 National Geographic article by Douglas Osborne is a synopsis of information gleaned from Wetherill Mesa excavations funded by the National Geographic Society and conducted by the National Park Service in the late 1950s and early 1960s. It is useful, but old. The November 1982 Geographic article speaks mostly of Chaco Canyon – mostly the formation of the Chaco Phenomena. It too is useful, but old. Further research uncovered pedagogical methods in dendrochronology from www.pbs.org.

The Carbon 14 (C14) data collected will be used in narrative form and used to deduct the climate-induced behavior of Paleolithic peoples.

The most useful paleoclimatologic data for this study comes from the analysis of stratigraphic samples of lakebeds in New Mexico’s Estancia Valley conducted by Allen and Anderson. The data is most relevant and reliable since it discusses weather in an area frequented by New Mexico’s Paleolithic people. Ancient pollens and the remains of the microbiologic forms, Ostracodes, were used to deduce periods of moisture and drought. According to Allen and Anderson, New Mexico experienced periods of drought and high moisture, similar to present-day patterns, up to 24,000 years ago (Allen and Anderson 1451). The lakebed revealed periods of high moisture in the times approximately 13,000, 14,000, 21,000, and 23,000 years ago. Periods of moderate moisture and drought fell in intervening times. Extremely wet periods were shown approximately 21,000 years ago, and less moist, but significant moisture fell 13,000 years ago. Humans were not yet present in New Mexico within the range of the Allen and Anderson data, but it could be inferred that contemporary fauna flourished due to an abundance of food and the lack of human predation.

The very useful Taylor paper from Radiocarbon confirms the use of C14 dates in dating ancient climates. Most notable is the use of C14 is its use in the Kennewick Man controversy. C14 dates Kennewick man to 8410 +/- 60 BP (Taylor 6). The C14 and stratigraphic data support a claim to the remains by Native Americans under the 1990 Native American Graves Protection and Repatriation Act. The skeleton, nonetheless, has more distinct European features than it does Native American features. Resolution of the skeleton’s ownership is pending in Federal district court.

The most crucial use of C14 came when it was calibrated using ancient organic and chemical samples. Notable calibration work came when C14 provided a chronologic definition for the Mount Mazama eruption. Ash from that episode was distributed throughout the United States northwest region and southwestern Canada. Different dates were obtained by different laboratories for ash samples collected at diverse sites. Two reliable dates then placed the eruption at either 6845 +/- 50 BP or 6730 +/- 40 BP (Taylor 6). C14 was also used to determine the date of arrival of maize (corn) in the southwest United States from Mesoamerica. The research has placed that event at around 3000 BP (Taylor 7).

Taylor notes C14 dating of critical Paleo-Indian sites such as the Aubrey site, a Clovis dig to 11,570 +/- 70 BP. Taylor’s work is a strong archeological reference. His work, however, has no paleoclimatologic applications. This work, however, does establish a link to the arrival of paleo humans in the Americas. Since Clovis ancestors had to migrate from Beringia, that migration had to have occurred after 11,570 BP. It has been accepted that Clovis peoples followed the herds of mammoth, mastadont and bison.

The data presented by Friedman et al. had an inauspicious beginning. In 1978 Lake Emma, a natural lake in Colorado’s San Juan Mountains was accidentally drained when mining activity below the lake undermined the lakebed. The lake broke through into the mine shafts below and destroyed the mine. Wood fragments ranging from 9,600 to 3,100 years BP were discovered in the dry lakebed. The cellulose in some of the specimens was analyzed for deuterium deposits. Deuterium is mostly absorbed from summer rains, and those rains draw moisture from the oceans. The amount of deuterium decreased 70% from the times the samples grew to the present (Friedman 351). The writers cite three possible climatic reasons for the decrease in deuterium deposits:

Addition of freshwater from glacial melt.
A change in the timing of deuterium depositing precipitation from late summer rains to more prevalent winter precipitation.
A change in moisture availability from the Gulf of Mexico and eastern Pacific Ocean during the early Holocene to moisture from the Gulf of Alaska and the northern Pacific Ocean at present. The southern (new) moisture arrives with less deuterium content than northern moisture which would have passed over more land mass on its way to the San Juan region. The findings were confirmed through similar work by contemporary North American studies.

Friedman et al. cite their contemporaries, Markgraf and Scott, who used pollens found in the Crested Butte, Colorado, area to postulate on concurrent paleoclimatic changes. Markgraf and Scott said that climate changed from cool-moist prior to 10,000 years BP to warm-moist 10,000 to 4,000 years BP. They say that modern weather has become warm-dry in the last 4,000 years. They suggest summer monsoons shifted northward about 10,000 BP resulting in increased summer precipitation and higher summer temperatures. A shift to fewer monsoons after 4,000 BP would result in the present climatic regime where the San Juan moisture is partially monsoonal and partially derived from Pacific storms.

Friedman et al. give us enough information to infer a drying out of grasslands and shrubbery that would have doomed mega fauna at the same time human predation increased dramatically. With the loss of mega fauna, Clovis and Folsom hunters would have had to adapt to hunting for smaller fauna, intensified gathering activities and then developed gardening as a method of making a more reliable supply of useable plant foods. Such changes are recognized as the practices of the Anasazi antecedents known as the Desert Culture people, 6000-500 BC. Desert Culture peoples preceded the Basketmaker peoples (Roberts 20). Essentially, a drying and warming trend forced changes in the habits of Paleolithic humans. These humans would have been forced to adapt. These adaptations set the pattern of gardening that developed into larger-scale farming seen during Basketmaker Periods I and II.

Research Method

I had hoped to create an unbroken chain of climate data reflecting drought and wet cycles in southwest during the Pleistocene and Holocene periods. That task has proven impossible as gaps exist in the data.

Further difficulties were encountered when I discovered that a choice of dendrochronologic-based data existed between Swetman-Betancourt and Shepard. Swetman-Betancourt offered a histogram of 1000 years of Southwest tree ring growth data (Swetman, Betancourt 1), and Shepard offered a histogram of data compiled using several tree-growth and moisture-availability data, but gave no histogram (Shepard 12). Swetman-Betancourt was selected for use in this study because the data is more relevant, less complex, and is easier to interpret and replicate. The Swetman-Betancourt data represents tree ring growth in the southwest from AD 1998 to 1000. The index scale on the left, which is graduated from 0.0 to 2.5, charts tree ring growth on a standardized scale. The ring growth data is calculated using a negative exponential curve that filters out variations in tree ring growth resulting from tree geometry and actual placement of a particular ring within the ring sample. In this manner distortions in interpretation of ring growth data can be prevented.

The Swetman-Betancourt data was replotted on an 8 1/2” x 22” sheet of paper. This is substantially larger and easier to read than the 6” x 3” original (see Figure 1, 1000 Year Dendrochonology and Affected Human Behavior in the Southwest).

Ferguson’s Pecos Conference Anasazi periods beginning with Pueblo II through the present was concurrently plotted below the climatologic histogram (Ferguson 6). Dates of events assumed to be caused by periods of high moisture and drought were also plotted. Osborne dates the last large-scale cliff dwelling construction in the Wetherill Mesa digs, that of Long House, was found to be 1278. The National Park Service dates the final abandonment of the entire Mesa Verde complex 22 years later, 1300 (NPS 73).

Ferguson and Canby give conflicting dates for the peak and abandonment of Chaco Canyon. Canby places those dates at 1085 to 1150. Ferguson says the Chaco Phenomenon peaked in 1150, but the entire system of outliers and Chaco society gradually unraveled, with final abandonment around 1300.

Findings

The Swetman-Betancourt data show periods of above-normal moisture and intermittent droughts through 1150. The high level of cultural activity known to us as the “Chaco Phenomeno” peaked in 1150, but Chaco Canyon remained occupied for another 150 years as there was sufficient moisture to maintain farming. In this case, farming in Chaco Canyon likely decreased with drought, but food supplies could have continued arriving in Chaco Canyon over the vast road system to Chacoan outliers. Mesa Verde continued to build through the period in which Chaco Canyon declined. Mesa Verde reached a cultural climax with the last large-scale cliff dwelling construction at Long House in 1278. Mesa Verde too was abandoned by 1300.

The peak of the Chaco Phenomenon came during a remarkable period of sustained drought between 1131 and 1150. Although the Chaco Phenomenon ended, there are more periods of high moisture than drought through 1300. Mesa Verde saw twenty years of drought prior to its final abandonment.

McKee cited other remarked periods of drought driving historic events later in the millennium – The Pueblo Rebellion and the mid-1950s. This study shows that although 1680 was an average year, the Pueblo Rebellion was preceded by thirty years of average to below-average moisture. This supports assertions of hard-times in the verbal record of the modern pueblos and documented history left to modern historians by the Spaniards who were, habitual, and nearly obsessive record keepers. The Pueblo Rebellion, though, was not caused only by drought. The drought induced Puebloans to believe they were being punished for turning from their traditional religion. They returned to it as Spaniards were increasingly occupied by infighting during the early and mid 1600s. When the Spanish infighting stopped in 1670, the missionary friars discovered apostatic conditions among their charges. Severe punishments resulted. The resulting crackdown on Pueblo religion placed even more pressure on the Puebloans to return to traditional ways. The Puebloans might have also sought to relocate during this time, but since their Spanish overlords would have refused permission to relocate, a traditional method of response was unnaturally denied to the Puebloans. The Puebloans then had no other choice than rebellion, which was just as cataclysmic for both the Spaniards and the Puebloans.

The record reflects nearly uniform tradeoffs between wet and dry cycles into the 20^th century. The dustbowl years of the 1930s and the mid-1950 drought are being referred to by our chroniclers as examples of severe drought. The years 1930-1940 were in reality a time of average to above average rainfall. The rainfall averages, however, through the 1920s, were depressed. We can infer that years of sustained drought lead to the ecologic disaster known as the “Dustbowl.” The Dustbowl actually impacted only a small part of the Southwest region. The Dustbowl does reflect in averages calculated by the Swetman project since tree-ring samples were taken in northeastern New Mexico, which was affected by “Dustbowl” conditions. On the large part, the Dustbowl was a Great Plains and Midwest event. Those areas receive moisture through different weather devices than does the Southwest, but drought conditions did persist in all parts of the Southwest. Widespread soil management practices which loosened and left topsoil unanchored. High winds then launched the loose soil into the air causing the well-remembered dust storms that destroyed farms and associated support businesses. This destruction deprived farmers and businesses of a living and drove these people onto our nation’s highways seeking sustenance and shelter. Widespread reform of economics, agriculture, and social services ensued during President Franklin Roosevelt’s “New Deal” programs. It can be inferred that President Roosevelt’s New Deal was in part a sophisticated response to drought.

The 1950s were indeed a time of significant drought, with average and below-average rainfall from 1948-1960. That period, as hard as it is remembered, was not as sustained as those drought periods prior to the Dustbowl, the Pueblo Rebellion, or the 1300 changes in the Anasazi world.

Discussion

We do not have enough information to speculate on drought-induced changes in human behavior as far back as 11,500 years ago. It does seem reasonable to say that Paleolithic hunters obtained food as best they could during dry periods. Later drying resulted in mega fauna extinction and even further adaptation (hunting smaller game and gardening). This adaptation did lay the groundwork, throughout the Americas, for the rise of the mega pre-Columbian civilizations. Those civilizations developed farming to a high degree. Later droughts forced relocations.

Although relocations were a result of droughts in the 1100s and 1200s, it appears that there were more causes than just a lack of moisture. Nelson and Hegmon suggest that modern scholars redefine the meaning of “abandonment.” Abandonment can be either large or small scale, and people may abandon sites to relocate in nearby sites to redistribute population or reorganize land use (Nelson 213-235). Such redistribution, based on 11^th and 12^th century movements in the Mimbres region, suggest that a pattern of dispersal from large to small sites enabled Mimbres peoples to continue to occupy the Gila region, but continue living and farming in smaller sites that encouraged occupation of a wider area.

Osborne, Ferguson, and Canby agree that Anasazi abandonment had multiple causes. Could it be possible that the Nelson, Hegmon observations could apply to Chaco Canyon and Mesa Verde? Laguna and Acoma mythology attribute their origins, in part, to Chaco Canyon. The architecture, pottery, and farming observed among the modern Puebloans certainly link them to every abandoned site in the Anasazi world. Nelson and Hegmon could be right if we consider that modern Puebloans endure the same climactic challenges as did the Anasazi. Dry land farming too can be a struggle at Zuni, Laguna, Acoma, and the Hopi homeland. Although not very close in miles to Chaco Canyon, these famous sites are still within the same climactic region. We can infer from Nelson and Hegmon that the 1300s, while a time of retraction, the Anasazi relocated closer to more sustainable sources of water. Thus, the 1300s relocations were not a total regional abandonment, but a relocation that permitted the Anasazi lifestyle to continue to flourish in new places.

Could we consider the 1300 retraction a total abandonment? If you consider that specific sites, which were questionable at best for long-term occupation, were abandoned, again, yes. Chaco Canyon is occupied today through the use of modern groundwater extraction technology. So to is Mesa Verde, but without such technologies, occupation would be impossible. So, with Anasazi descendants living close by, but in slightly moister locations, total regional abandonment was not carried out. What we have seen is site abandonment, but not regional. The Anasazi and their descendants have adapted to this region of wild climactic variation quite successfully. They occupy an ecologic niche. So it seems that the 1300s relocation would follow the model proposed by Nelson and Hegmon.

With rainfall decreasing prior to the 1300 relocation, and also at other times, Anasazi peoples had to find some method to ameliorate the dry conditions. The Mesa Verde Sun Temple is thought to be a religious appeal for moisture, as its construction is dated to the times prior to abandonment. Sun Temple is the only example of this type of structure at Mesa Verde. If it was built, there was a purpose. This is in opposition to Chaco Canyon where there are many examples of large-scale religious structures including great kivas and the Talus Unit at Chetro Ketl. The Chaco Canyon religious structures were not only a part of the Chaco Phenomenon, but they were built throughout the entire occupation of Chaco Canyon.

It is also possible that internal divisions among the Mesa Verdeans resulted as one group of religious leaders might have had more apparent success than others at inducing rain through prayer and ritual. A split could have induced or exacerbated tensions among people struggling over scarce resources. Disaffected groups might have left sooner, found more reliable sources of water sooner, and thus survived longer than the other more successful groups.

Ferguson suggests that Chaco Canyon was abandoned gradually after sustained drought, shortened growing seasons, and Athabascan raids. No further conjecture is provided. Thomas Y. Canby in the 1982 National Geographic article provides a brief discussion of the retraction of the Anasazi world that too is based on drought and its effects. No discussion is provided of other possible factors. Osborne, in the 1964 National Geographic article provides proof from ancient soils that farming decreased at Mesa Verde after Anasazi farmers wore out their fields. It is not mentioned, but is highly likely that the Anasazi were unaware of crop rotation, or if they suspected such a practice were possible, they did not have any other grain crop with which to rotate their corn. Only modern experiments can tell us what would result from the rotation of corn lands with squash and beans. Osborne observes the presence of other foods in the diets of Mesa Verdeans such as bee weed (Cleome serrulata) and miners’ lettuce (Montia perfoliata) (Osborne 173). Ancient human fecal matter discovered at Mesa Verde by the Osborne digs reveal softened cactus spines in the diets of increasingly hungry Anasazi.

Osborne does speculate on some social factors arising from environmental stresses when they discuss the ratio of kivas to rooms in the Long House Ruin. That ratio is one kiva to every 7 rooms of which Osborne writes, “is twice that of other Mesa Verde sites.” Even though I find his ratios reliable because they are based on studies of other Mesa Verde ruins, I feel it necessary to point out that Osborne’s count of Long House kivas is based on impossible-to-verify structural reconstructions of Long House. The foundations of that ruin; however, were surveyed during the excavations of which Osborne writes, and we further know that even in their most sophisticated forms, Mesa Verde structures rarely exceeded two or three stories in height. What we don’t really know was the actual count of rooms based on the actual shape of Long House. It is thought, by Osborne, that Long House at one time was much likely larger than Cliff Palace, but was destroyed more systematically than other ruins by heavy-handed excavation and exploration methods. Because the ruins were unguarded prior to the formation of Mesa Verde National Park by Congress in 1906, it is possible that massive pot hunting occurred. So we don’t even know how large Long House really was at its zenith, or what it looked like. It was observed that an earlier, less-scientific expedition had used dynamite to reach artifacts beneath piles of Long House rubble! One shudders at the thought.

Osborne writes, one kiva to seven rooms. This is almost double the ratio in other dwellings. This suggests that people from several smaller surface houses crowded into the dwelling. Each incoming group or … society had to have its own kiva. Does this mean that those who lived in Long House were priest-ridden and spent an uneconomical amount of time in religious activity? Does it mean that there was increasing tension as people in cramped quarters eyed the space taken up by the numerous kivas? Perhaps the people were turning ever more hopefully, finally frantically, to their gods as they battled whatever it was that drove them from their homes (Osborne 184-185).

Although speculative, I believe Osborne to be responsible as his remarks are based on verifiable data. Also, the religious factor is possible as the modern Puebloans are known for the complex structure of their yearly ceremonial cycle that is linked to their social structure. That structure is of very ancient origin and evolved into its current complex form through good years, and then was heavily employed in ensuing times of environmental and social stress.

Conclusions

I was able to verify McKee’s findings with independent sources of information. Because I used climatic data for earlier periods, I was able to get a more in-depth look at how human behavior in this region has been affected by climatic variation. Because climate changes slowly, no single life form has been able to study the changes and deduce patterns. One thing is clear though; if animal or plant forms cannot adapt to more or less moisture, they die and are replaced by forms that do adapt. I also conclude that the concepts of climatic change and adaptability can be taught to seventh graders and that they can demonstrate the workings of these two concepts. If the students are given the information they need, and shown how to distinguish between relevant and irrelevant material, they can demonstrate how humans in this region adapt to climatic changes.

Implementation

The first goal of this unit is to teach the students the skills and knowledge necessary to discover and understand ancient climates. The second goal is for students to research, interpret and present the information so that they can form their own opinion on how historic peoples have been affected by drought and how we might deal with droughts. The unit is divided into five separate steps, each is taught as a lesson that is reliant on skills from the first. Making the lessons interlocking prevents the students from forgetting a part of what they learned before they can employ it in the finished product.

Lesson one – Introduction to Southwestern Modern and Paleo-Indians

Social Studies Benchmarks Addressed:

1. 5-8 Benchmark I-A—New Mexico: Explore and explain how people and events have influenced the development of New Mexico up to the present day.

2. 5-8 Benchmark I-D—Skills: Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

Language Arts Benchmarks Addressed:

1. 5-8 Benchmark I-A: Listen to, read, react to, and interpret information (NMSDE).

Objectives:

1. Students will show the proper chronologic dates for Clovis-Folsom peoples, Anasazi peoples, and Modern Pueblo peoples by creating a timeline on which they will properly sequence and date those three groups.

2. Students will use information presented in this lesson, and information found in New Mexico History textbook to create a paragraph for each one of the groups (Clovis-Folsom, Anasazi, Modern Pueblos) explaining the dates of occupancy and three descriptive characteristics of each group.

Procedure:

1. Students will be shown a Power Point presentation that describes the entry of paleo humans to North America, and the flow of their development in Folsom and Clovis peoples (big-game hunters), then to Anasazi, then to Modern Puebloans.

(See Figure 2, Focusing Power Point Presentation).

2. Students will be instructed to follow the presentation and take notes on each of 21 slides of the presentation.

3. Students will be instructed to begin, in class, reading corresponding chapters from History of New Mexico, and they will add more information that describes how each group lived and the dates of each one of the periods in which group lived. Students will be monitored for relevancy of the information they write down. They will be asked to write down only notes that summarize details that they feel are most important. This will call into use their skills to select and analyze data and to state information in as brief a form as possible. Step three will be conducted as a homework assignment.

4. Students will be assigned into groups of three students. Students will be assigned groups by a count-off that will place all into three-person groups. Each group will be issued three colored markers of different colors. The group will be responsible for creating a timeline that will synthesize and display the information gleaned from the reading and the Power Point presentation.

Lesson Two – Understanding Dendrochronology

Ideas for this lesson are taken from “Wild Wings Heading South,” a Public Broadcasting System Internet resource for teachers (Dendrochronology Classroom Activity). It is being adapted for this study for use as the “next step” in this unit. Students will want to know how we know about ancient climates. It will be linked to Lesson One by an explanation, “of how we know when and how Anasazi and Modern Pueblos built and how you’ll be able to find when droughts occurred and how the Anasazi and Pueblos were affected by those droughts.” This will be necessary to maintain student interest in completing the ultimate finished product and to keep their learning “in-stride with the goal of the unit.” Students will be required to use tree-ring data supplied by Wild Wings, but rewritten as data from Chaco Canyon and the San Juan Mountains. This is done because many larger logs found at Chaco Canyon were cut in the San Juan Mountains and brought into Chaco Canyon from outliers over the road system (Canby 568). Also this method creates a link between lessons one and two. This will prevent students forgetting the background of research into New Mexico’s Native American people.

Standards and Benchmarks Addressed:

Science Standards

A. Content Standard 2: Students will use evidence, models, and explanations to explore their physical world.

B. Content Standard 4: Students will understand the physical world through concepts of change, equilibrium and measurement.

2. Social Studies Standards:

(History) 5-8 Benchmark I-D—Skills: Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

3. (Geography) 5-8 Benchmark II-C: Understand how human behavior impacts man-made and natural environments.

Procedure:

Students will be assigned into groups of three. They will be expected to work in this same group throughout the completion of this unit. Provide each group with a set of four plastic drinking straws on which are drawn portions of tree-ring sequence adapted from the Figure 1 chart. The students will be told that the straws represent core samples from the following trees:

Sample 1: From a living tree, July 1992, San Juan National Forest, Colorado, began growth 1850.

Sample 2: From a tree stump in the San Juan National Forest, Colorado, cut 1880, began growing 1400.

Sample 3: From a log found near a hiking trail in the San Juan National Forest, cut 1970, began growth 1300.

Sample 4: From a floor support log today supporting an upper floor at Pueblo Bonito in Chaco Canyon, cut 1048, began growth 900.

Have students determine the age of each tree (how many years it was living) by counting the rings. Students will record their answers in the first column in the chart in Figure 3.

Have students look for patterns in the rings. Once a ring pattern has been discovered, line up all the samples. Because they know that Sample 1 was cut in 1992, they can match the patterns of all the other samples and determine what year the other trees were cut or cored, and also when they began to grow. Have students record this information in the Figure 3 chart.

Now have students make a time line. Beginning at the left end of a strip of adding machine tape, have them mark each year from the earliest year identified on the tree-ring samples through 1992. Space the years according to the ring on the imaginary core sample (they should be larger, but proportionately the same).

After the years are recorded on the strip, identify good growing years (thicker rings) and bad growing years (thinner rings) for the trees in the San Juan National Forest. Have students identify other events that happened during this time period such as their birthday, presidential elections, important scientific discoveries or record-setting achievements. Students should then create a timeline of these events. If time allows, they can illustrate the time line with drawings, photographs or newspaper clippings and articles corresponding to the years.

Lesson Three – Graphing Skills

This lesson will prepare students to use graphing skills to create a weather chart histogram of the Southwest for the last 1000 years. Since the chart is based on tree ring data, it automatically creates a link to Lesson Two.

Standards Addressed:

Social Studies Standards:

1. History Standard -- 5-8 Benchmark I-D—Skills: Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

2. Geography Standards:

A. 5-8 Benchmark II-B: Explain the physical and human characteristics of places and use this knowledge to define regions, their relationships with other regions, and their patterns of change.

B. 5-8 Benchmark II-F: Understand the effects of interactions between human and natural systems in terms of changes in meaning, use, distribution, and relative importance of resources.

3. Science Standards:

A. Content Standard 2: Students will use evidence, models, and explanations to explore their physical world.

B. Content Standard 4: Students will understand the physical world through concepts of change, equilibrium and measurement.

4. Mathematics Standard:

Content Standard 2: Students will understand and use mathematics in communication.

Students will be asked if it is possible to create a picture from bits of mathematical data. Based on responses, students will be elicited to discuss concept of a histogram chart and distinguish a histogram from a pie chart or a bar chart.

Using an overhead projector and a transparency of regular ¼” graph paper, teacher will demonstrate the term horizontal value and vertical value in preparing a histogram. Grades based on percentages of 0-100 will be plotted vertically, and quarterly grading periods will be plotted horizontally.
Teacher will use supposed quarterly grades of 95%, 70%, 85%, and 87% and demonstrate plotting each, and then connecting the values on the histogram.
Teacher will then ask class to make guesses as to why grades began high, then fell, then rose slowly throughout the school year. Teacher can encourage answers such as, “The student was excited in the fall and got a 90%. They started thinking about Christmas, and their grades fell. They had to work hard to raise their grade back during the second semester after their parents and teachers helped the student improve their study skills and work harder.”
The teacher will give different students a new and different set of grades to plot on the overhead, and the class will again guess as to why grades rose and fell.
Teacher will post a new set of grades. Also, a set of values will be posted that will work out to animal shapes. Students will be given two sheets of graph paper and be told to work out the histograms as homework, then write a three-paragraph essay describing how to create histograms. For extra credit, students will be encouraged to work out a histogram for high or low weather temperatures for a week. Such information can be collected from newspapers or from the Internet.

Lesson 4 – Paleoclimate Web Quest

This will be the final preparatory lesson before students a large Paleoclimate and Anasazi Development Histogram with which to conclude the unit. Lesson 4 will set students to finding weather data of their own from the Internet. They will be allowed to find and interpret paleoclimatic data from a variety of suggested sites, and/or sites they find on their own. Students will use their histogram and writing skills to interpret data they recover from sites I suggest and sites they find themselves.

Standards Addressed:

1. Social Studies Standards:

A. 5-8 Benchmark I-A—New Mexico: Explore and explain how people and events have influenced the development of New Mexico up to the present day.

B. 5-8 Benchmark I-D—Skills: Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

2. Science Standards:

A. Content Standard 2: Students will use evidence, models, and explanations to explore their physical world.

B. Content Standard 4: Students will understand the physical world through concepts of change, equilibrium and measurement.

3. Language Arts Standards:

A. Listen to, read, react to, and interpret information.
B. Gather and use information for research and other purposes

Procedure:

Students will be taken to the computer laboratory.
A list of dendrochronology web sites from the bibliography of this work will be placed on the board. Those web sites will be the ones from which the Shepard and Swetman papers were taken. Also listed will be Henri Grissino-

-Mayer’s Ultimate Web Page. It is expected that this particular page will provide links that the students can use to expand their data base. Students will be instructed to actually look at and write a review of four web sites related to dendrochronology. They will be allowed to use only two of the suggested sites, but they must find two others on their own. They may find their own sites by using a search engine, or through links from a suggested site.

Students will be supplied with a Web Site Review Form, see Figure 4. On that form they will be required to list the data base or link from which each site was found, the URL of each site, the name and principal pages of the site, and to give a list of the web pages they worked from or used in finding the reviewed web site.
Once they find the site they will be required to print and attach to the review page (Figure 4) the home page of each site. They will be given a 3.5” floppy disk on which to download and store information they find relevant to the Southwest’s paleoclimatology.
As a homework assignment, students will write a five-paragraph summary review of any one of the four web sites they reviewed and explain how they plan to use information they downloaded in Lesson 5.

Lesson 5 – Preparing a History and Climate Histogram and Making Conclusions

In this activity students will bring together the four strands of climate data, historical data, graphing skills, and understanding of climate tree ring data into a climate-history histogram from which they make conclusions on the relationship between Southwestern people and the environment.

Standards Addressed:

1. History Standards:

A. 5-8 Benchmark I-A—New Mexico: Explore and explain how people and events have influenced the development of New Mexico up to the present day.

B. 5-8 Benchmark I-D—Skills: Research historical events and people from a variety of perspectives.

2. Science Standards:

A. Content Standard 2: Students will use evidence, models, and explanations to explore their physical world.

B. Content Standard 4: Students will understand the physical world through concepts of change, equilibrium and measurement.

3. Language Arts Standards:

A. Listen to, read, react to, and interpret information.

B. Gather and use information for research and other purposes

Objectives:

Students will demonstrate an understanding of histograms by creating a histogram using information taken from different sources.

Students will demonstrate critical thinking skills by preparing a paper and a presentation explaining their data, process, and conclusions.

Procedure:

Students will get back into the groups formed in Lesson Two.
Groups will be provided with a sheet of colored butcher paper approximately 2 feet wide by 8 feet long. They will also be provided broad tipped colored markers of three different colors.
Students will be instructed to create a two part histogram that will first incorporate as much climate data as they found and also the data that the teacher provided on Figure One. To prevent direct copying, instead of being given a copy of Figure One, A list will be made of each date on Figure One and each date will be accompanied by the amount of moisture as shown by Figure One. The students will also be asked to place on the chart a timeline of activity by the Anasazi or their antecedents from as far back as they could find in Lesson One to the present. This information should also focus on the rise and fall of Anasazi at Chaco Canyon and Mesa Verde, The Pueblo Rebellion, to the present.
Students should be monitored and assisted to see that they remain on task, and that the data they are trying to use is relevant and properly interpreted.
When histograms are finished, groups will be asked to review the data, and prepare a presentation in which they will give answers for the following questions:

Give the years in which there were high amounts of moisture.
Give the years in which there were below-average amounts of moisture (droughts).
Tell which groups of years and Anasazi developmental periods in which there were high amounts of moisture in which could have caused human populations and cultures to thrive.
Tell which groups of year, and Anasazi developmental periods in which there were droughts that could have caused changes in populations and cultures.
Describe periods of sustained drought and sustained moisture within the last 200 years. Describe changes that could have taken place in human populations and cultures.
Describe a time of high moisture or drought that you, the student, remember. Show where those times falls on the histogram, and describe how you remember people being changed by that moisture or drought.

Documentation

Allen, Bruce and Anderson, Roger. “A Continuous, High Resolution Record Of Late
Pleistocene Climate Variability From The Estancia Basin, New Mexico.” Geologic Society of
America Bulletin 112, Number 9. September, 2000. Pages 1444-1458.

Canby, Thomas. “The Anasazi, Riddles in the Ruins.” National Geographic, November 1982. Pp. 562-592.

“Classroom Activity: Dendrochronology – Log of Straws.” Wild Wings Heading South. June
27, 2002. PBS.org <http://www.pbs.org/audubon/wildthings/dendro.html>.

Ferguson, William; and Rohn, Arthur. Anasazi Ruins of the Southwest in Color.
Albuquerque, New Mexico: The University of New Mexico Press.

Freidman, Irving; Carrara, Paul; and Gleason, Jim. “Isotopic Evidence of Holocene Climatic
Change In the San Juan Mountains, Colorado.” Quaternary Research 30, Number 3. 1988. Pages 350-353.

Grissino-Mayer, Henri D. “Henri Grissino-Mayer’s Science of Dendrochronology Web Pages.” 2002. June 27, 2002. http://web.utk.edu/~grissino

“Laboratory of Tree Ring Research Home Page”. July 2001. University of Arizona. June 27, 2002. www.ltrr.arizona.edu.

McKee, Jennifer. “History Calls This Rainy.” Albuquerque Journal, May 1, 2002, Final Edition. Pp. A1, 2.

Nelson, Margaret C. and Hegmon, Michelle. “Abandonment Is Not As It Seems: An Approach To The Relationship Between Site and Regional Abandonment.” American Antiquities, Volume 66(2), 2001. Pages 213-235.

Osborne, Douglas. “Solving the Riddles of Wetherill Mesa.” National Geographic, February 1964. Pp 155-195.

Phillips, Fred; Peeters, Leslie; Tansey, Michael; and Davis, Stanley. “Paleoclimatic Inferences From An Isotopic Investigation Of Groundwater In The Central San Juan Basin, New
Mexico.” Quaternary Research 26, Number 2. 1986. Pages 179-193.

Roberts, Calvin A; and Roberts, Susan A. A History of New Mexico, Second Revised Edition, 1998. Albuquerque, New Mexico: The University of New Mexico Press.

Sheppard, Paul; Comrie, Andrew; Packin, Gregory; Angersbach, Kurt; and Hughes, Malcolm.
“The Climate of the Southwest.” www.webcrawler.com. June 21, 1999. Laboratory of Tree                ring Research. Department of Geography and Regional Development, The University of
            Arizona. June 27, 2002. <http://www.ltrr.arizona.edu>.

“Standards and Benchmarks For New Mexico Elementary and Secondary Schools.” New Mexico State Department of Education (NMSDE).1999. June 27, 2002. www.sde.state.nm.us.

Swetman, Thomas; and Betancourt, Julio. “Dendrochronology and Dendroclimatology, Adapted              from Mesoscale Ecologic Responses to Climatic Variability in the American Southwest.”
            Northern Arizona University. February 16, 1999. June 27, 2002.
            http//www.cpluhna.nau.edu.

Taylor, R.E. “The Contribution Of Radiocarbon Dating To New World Archeology.”
Radiocarbon, Volume 42, Number 1. 2000. Pages 1-21.

“The Anasazi”. DesertUSA. 1996-2002. June 27, 2002. www.desertusa.com.

Wenger, Gilbert. “The Mesa Verde Story.” Mesa Verde Museum Association. 1990. June 21, 2002. June 27, 2002. http://www.nps.gov/meve/.

Figure 1: 1000 Year Dendrochonology and Affected Human Behavior in the Southwest