make a washington dc unit study with timberdoodle's Doodle Washington DC

A Fun Washington DC Unit Study For Kids

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Washington, DC is a great place for kids! There are so many educational opportunities available, no way can you do everything in a single visit. It’d probably take weeks and weeks to even embark on half the fun Washington, DC opportunities for kids. You and the kids can go to Washington, DC to learn all about our nation’s capital – or you can bring Washington, DC to your kids! And you can do all this with Doodle Washington D.C. by Timberdoodle!

Learn about Washington DC with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of this product through Timberdoodle in exchange for my honest review. I was not required to write a positive review nor was I compensated in any other way. 

About Doodle Washington DC

Doodle Washington DC is an amazing way to learn about our nation’s capital as it provokes thoughtful doodling through prompts on every page. Throughout Washington DC, kids can learn so many new things, like the Museum of Natural History, Martin Luther King, Jr., the Old Post Office, the National Zoo, the Air and Space Museum, and just so much more. All of these places and several more are within the pages of Doodle Washington DC.

And even though you grab this book by itself, it’s also included in the Timberdoodle’s 2020 First-Grade Curriculum Kit and Nonreligious 2020 First-Grade Curriculum Kit.

2020 First-Grade Curriculum Kit Timberdoodle

The book is extremely inviting with its shiny cover and sturdy, quality pages. It’d take quite a few years of batter and dings to tear this book up. I love the clean pages because it makes doodling with colors, color pencils, and pens pop with color off the page!

Targeted towards 8-11 year olds for 2nd through 5th grades, Doodle Washington DC inspires learning about Washington DC. Even older and younger kids outside the suggested ages and grade levels would love to get ahold of this book. Of course, there’s always kids that don’t like to doodle, but the majority of kids? They’d doodle all day during school if you’d let them!

This gives kids the perfect ‘excuse’ to doodle and learn at the same time. I know when I was in school, I’d doodle all over my papers while listening to the class lectures. And then when class was over, I’d really look at what I doodled (as I’d doodled absentmindedly) and was amazing all the beauty I created fairly subconsciously! Doodle Washing DC will also inspire and amaze kids with their artistic skills while learning rich social studies history at the same time. Win/Win!

This paperback book is 120 pages long, so you have a ton of pages to doodle in about Washington DC on the front and back of every page.

Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle
Learn about Washington DC with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle
Learn about Washington DC with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

Perfect to Learn All About Washington DC for Kids

Even if the kids have never been to Washington DC, Doodle Washington DC is a superb way to learn about our nation’s capital. Also, it would be the perfect way to prepare for an upcoming Washington DC trip!

You can pull this out during a history lesson of the American Revolution or any history lesson about the birth of America, really. You can also use Doodle Washington DC for a geography lesson. And if you need a lesson for art class? You can use this book for art too!

You can also use Doodle Washington DC as the spine for a unit study, lapbook, or interactive notebook for learning about Washington DC. By using this as a unit study, you’ll have the perfect book to set the tone throughout the length of the unit study and you can easily adapt other activities to dive deeper into the educational values of Washington DC.

If you can think it, you can do it with Doodle Washington DC!

Doodle Washington DC In Our Homeschool

We pulled out Doodle Washington DC several times throughout the past month or two of using it so far. My kids loved doodling a few sheets at a time. I limit their doodling pages because

  • (1) I want to make the book last longer!
  • (2) to prevent burn out
  • (3) I want them to truly understand the significance of the page(s) they’re doodling
  • (4) to extend my social studies lessons over a longer period of time.

Instead of pulling this book out for free time or as an evening fun thing to do, which is totally cool and okay by the way, I decided to incorporate this into our everyday homeschool. By doing this, I added it at the tail-end of either a geography lesson or a history lesson. I didn’t use Doodle Washington DC for art thus far, but I still might in the near future!

Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

I’m also planning a unit study where Washington DC is the focus. I’m going to use Doodle Washington DC as the spine, as mentioned in the previous section. I’ll plan out videos, voice clips, worksheets, and hands-on activities to go along with Doodle Washington DC. Here’s how to plan out your own Unit Study and what I plan to do when we get to this point:

Steps To Plan A Unit Study

I enjoy unit studies so much, and my kids do too, because the study revolves around one focused topic, usually. I take a topic or concept and make that the basis of the study, like learning about our nation’s capital. Then, I find something that acts like a spine that drives the lessons throughout the unit study, such as Doodle Washington DC. And then I plan the activities around the spine to flesh it (the unit study) out.

As a side note, your spine doesn’t always have to be a book. It could be several other different things, such as a movie that you plan a unit study around or an independent reader or chapter book (literacy units . know I said “other than books” but still this works too!). You can make a unit study based on a play, a theatrical event, a concert, a person living or from history, a place (such as Washington DC!), or even food!

  1. Take a topic of concept and make that the basis of the unit study.
    In this case, we are using Washington DC as our focal point, our topic, the main thing we want to study and learn [more] about.
  2. Find a spine for the unit study. It will direct all your lessons.
    Here, our spine is Doodle Washington DC. Use this book as the vehicle to create your lessons and activities.
  3. Plan your lessons and activities around the spine.
    Doing this will create your entire unit study! You can search through teacher websites, TeachersPayTeachers shops, Etsy, and free homeschool resource sites to find and gather a cumulative stack of resources to use throughout the unit study, depending on the certain topics you’re going over.
Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle
Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

Outline & Steps For A Washington DC Unit Study

We have steps one and two down. We’re planning a unit study about Washington DC and we’re using Doodle Washington DC as our spine. Now, we just need to plan the lessons – the fun part!

Since we’re using Doodle Washington DC as our spine, we need to crack open the book and see where we want to start, which pages or topics we want to cover, and decide how long our unit study will be for. For this example, we’ll just plan a 5-day unit study, but you can easily go much longer (or shorter) if you like. There’s plenty of information in Doodle Washington DC to even do an entire year’s unit study.

I’m going to choose 5 topics, so this means 5 pages of Doodle Washington, for our 5 days of the study. Each page will present a new educational value about Washington DC. Here’s my outline of the 5-day Washington DC unit study:

  1. Introduce Washington DC
    1. Show where it’s at on the map, explaining where it’s located within the USA and which state it’s in
    2. Give an informational text about Washington DC
    3. Read a few pages of a picture book about Washington DC
    4. Doodle an extra topic page in Doodle Washington not covered in the lessons as an intro/warm-up
  2. Day 1: Museum of Natural History
    1. Open the lesson introducing the Museum of Natural History
    2. Read a picture book or short book about the Museum.
    3. Go to the Museum of Natural History website and look at various images and exhibits.
    4. Doodle the Museum of Natural History dinosaur on page ____ in Doodle Washington DC.
  3. Day 2: Martin Luther King, Jr. Monument
    1. Open the lesson where the MLK, Jr. Monument is located. Explain who Martin Luther King, Jr. is and why he’s important to American history
    2. Find background information about the event and time in history when they created and erected the monument
    3. Read a book about MLK Jr or about the country during that time period (i.e. segregations, racism, the March, etc.)
    4. Optional: If you want to include this, find a video or informational text or voice clip about the assassination of MLK, Jr.
    5. Doodle the Martin Luther King, Jr. monument on page ____ in Doodle Washington DC.
  4. Day 3: Lincoln Memorial
    1. Open the lesson about where the Lincoln Memorial is located in Washington DC. Give a quick summary of who Abraham Lincoln is and why he’s important to history.
    2. Do a worksheet about the 16th president and his famous acts as president.
    3. Explain the time period during Lincoln’s presidency, such as the Civil War.
    4. Watch a documentary on Netflix about Abraham Lincoln or about the Civil War.
    5. Doodle the Lincoln Memorial on page _____ in Doodle Washington DC.
  5. Day 4: The White House
    1. Open the lesson with what the White House is, how many presidents it housed, and various events that are held within the White House. Check out the White House website.
    2. Share about the historical event when the White House caught fire and the rebuilding of it – watch a documentary or video clip.
    3. Have the kids write a 1 to 5 paragraph essay (depending on age) about what it would be like to live in the White House
    4. Doodle the White House on page ____ in Doodle Washington DC.
  6. Day 5 – Last Day
    1. Review the topics learned: Museum of Natural History, Martin Luther King, Jr Monument, Lincoln Memorial, and the White House.
    2. Give them 2 options: Dive deeper on one of those lessons and do a hands-on project about it or pick one more topic about Washington DC to learn about.
      1. If they choose to dive deeper into one of the previous topics, add in another video to watch about it, explore the website about it, do a couple worksheets on it, or read a book about it. Also, find a hands-on project to do with that topic. Search on Google and Pinterest for inspiration.
      2. If they choose to do one more new topic, find 5 to 10 topics in the Doodle Washington DC book. Write these topics on 5-10 pieces of paper and tear them into strips. Or write one topic on one index card each. Put into a bowl and shake to mix up the index cards. Have each child draw one card out of the bowl without looking or you draw one out of the bowl without looking. The chosen index card is your new topic! Add in some activities previously mentioned. Then make sure you follow up or even begin each activity with its corresponding topic in Doodle Washington DC!
    3. If you like, let the kids doodle a couple more pages of Doodle Washington while listening to a voice clip about a previously taught topic or a brand new topic! If brand new, correspond it with one of the pages in Doodle Washington DC!

Download this Doodle Washington DC Outline for your own Doodle Washington DC or Washington DC Unit Study!


Of course, you can edit out, modify, add-to, and take-away anything in this outline that fits your homeschool. Add in lengthier and deeper activities if you have older kids, like doing a research paper. If you have very young children, they can substitute write with coloring – or doodling! Just find and print out some coloring sheets that go with the topic you’re covering.

Finding Resources For Your Activities and Lessons

When finding resources for your lessons about Washington DC for kids, here are two ways to flesh out your unit study:

  1. Create an outline and then go find resources for the outline (like we’re doing here), or
  2. Find resources for your topic and make your lessons and activities from what you find.

I need structure and direction when making unit studies. I need some sort of an idea on what topics we’ll be going over too. Now I’ve done it both ways but for two different reasons.

  1. I create an outline first if I have prior knowledge about the topic.
  2. I hunt for resources first if I have no clue about the topic.

This makes gathering supplies and resources so much easier if you follow those two rules. I eventually learn as I hunt for resources when I have no clue about a topic, and then I get an idea of what the outline will look like and the big-picture view of the unit study.

But I make an outline first if I already have the spine chosen and have prior knowledge about the topic. This way, I can refer to the spine first to see which topics I want my kids to learn. After the topics are chosen, I’ll go find matching resources for said topics.

Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle
Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

The outline we created up above is a “working document,” of course, but I’ll print it out and refer to it throughout the study. It’s a working document because after making the outline (putting in the worksheet ideas and lesson ideas), I’ll go hunt for these resources on several of my favorite teacher websites.

If I happen upon a resource that I didn’t include in the outline, I may switch out topics or simply add one more. If I add one more, then my unity study schedule is going to have to be finagled too! I try not to do this after creating the outline, but sometimes you really like the resources for a particular topic and it would be in the kids’ best interests to include it in the unit study!

I like the teacher websites that I am a paying member of/subscribed to, and I also like TeachersPayTeachers. But I plan to resort to buying anything as a last resort – I’m sure there’s plenty of information out there about Washington DC and its educational places for free! And if you’re anything like me, Teachers Pay Teachers is worse than the social media vortex! I can truly get lost in Teachers Pay Teachers and chase rabbit trails all day long! Must. Stay. Away.

Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

Create A Fun Unit Study – Washington DC For Kids

As you can see by now, you have unlimited possibilities to incorporate Doodle Washington DC in your homeschool. The unit study was merely an example. You can make lapbooks and interactive notebooks about the pages you doodle in Doodle Washington. How fun it would be to make those pages interactive!

Doodle Washington DC is one of Timberdoodle’s amazing products. You can get the book by itself or you can get the 2020 1st Grade Curriculum Kit that includes Doodle Washington DC. I loved the uniqueness of this book, so I bet there’s plenty of other great resources within the curriculum kit too!

Jump over to check it out by going to the Doodle Washington DC Timberdoodle website or click on the image below!

Learn about Washington DC for kids with Doodle Washington DC by Timberdoodle

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Create a fun Washington DC unit study with Doodle Washington DC! And grab this free Washington DC Unit Study and unit study planner! Washington DC for kids #washingtondc #timberdoodle #doodlewashingtondc  #washingtondcforkids
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