The Great Depression word search, scramble and crossword puzzle

The Great Depression word search, scramble and crossword puzzle

I made this Great Depression puzzle set for my 4th graders during our social studies unit. The kids had heard that times were hard but had no idea what caused the Depression or what life was like for families back then. So I put together a word search, a word scramble, and a crossword using words like Depression, stock market, crash, bank, jobless, unemployed, poor, soup kitchen, dust bowl, drought, farmer, Roosevelt, New Deal, recovery, and hope. Nothing fancy — just puzzles to help the vocabulary finally make sense.

The PDF is four pages. Three puzzles plus one answer key page. The word search works well for quiet time after recess. The scramble gets them talking because they argue about whether the Dust Bowl was caused by weather or farming. The crossword I use for partners. I added a couple simple dust cloud and soup kitchen line drawings but nothing too busy.

Works for 4th through 5th grade. Print and go. Sometimes I have early finishers name one thing the New Deal created on the back. The kids actually ask for these now.