Who keeps our food fresh on its way to the store, and how do we know? This ready-to-teach packet turns a short song into three lessons on reading, history and engineering.
In Somebody Before Me: Frederick McKinley Jones & the Refrigerated Truck, a curious child meets Frederick McKinley Jones, a Black inventor and self-taught mechanic. Trucks once kept food cold with ice, which melted on long trips. Fred built a cooling machine sturdy enough to ride on a bumpy truck, and he went on to earn more than 60 patents. Students then look at his real 1942 patent to find out how we know.
What's inside (24-page printable PDF):
3 sessions of 30–40 minutes each: Who Made This?, How Do We Know? and What Will YOU Make?
A Patent Detective page built on the original patent drawing. Students find the maker, date and place, like real historians.
Two reading levels (K–1 and grades 2–3) with comprehension questions
Keep It Cool: a hands-on test. Which ice cube lasts longer, open or wrapped?
Sing-along lyric sheet, word cards, a problem-and-solution page, a timeline to cut and sort, and a then-and-now page
My Invention Plan and a Classroom Patent certificate
Standards: Common Core RI.2.1, RI.2.3, RI.2.7, W.2.2 and SL.2.1; NGSS K-2-ETS1-1, K-2-ETS1-2, K-2-ETS1-3 and 2-PS1-4; C3 Framework D2.His.2.K-2 and D2.His.11.K-2
Teacher background, teaching-with-care notes (including the often-misquoted patent date), differentiation, a family page, an answer key and full source links
Works with the free video on Teach Between the Lines TV (about 1½ minutes, captions on screen).
License: one teacher, for use with their own students. Please do not share, post publicly or resell.