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HSI: Historical Scene Investigation - Finding Aaron (Escaped slave; 1767)
HSI: Historical Scene Investigation - Finding Aaron (Escaped slave; 1767)
In this case, students follow the life and escape attempts of an enslaved man named Aaron of the course of four years. Students utilize runaway slave advertisements from the Virginia Gazette from 1767 to 1771 to track multiple escapes by Aaron and the quest of his masters to recapture him. Although the evidence paints only a partial picture of Aaron's life, students are challenged to a plausible explanation of what happened to Aaron between December, 1767 and January, 1771
#slavery#lesson plans#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#primary source
·hsionline.org·
HSI: Historical Scene Investigation - Finding Aaron (Escaped slave; 1767)
Old Bailey Central Criminal Court
Old Bailey Central Criminal Court
Teachers can show this transcript from a criminal court in Britain and have them locate the name "Elizabeth Armstrong" alias "little Bess". Then given students three minutes to research her name. They will find that she was a young girl convicted of stealing two silver spoons. Her sentence for this crime as listed in this transcript was "transportation" - which means that she was sent to the colonies. Not all colonists were motivated by religion or the search for gold, some came to the colonies as punishment for a crime.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#5th Grade Unit 2 - Colonization and Settlement#myth canon#primary source
·oldbaileyonline.org·
Old Bailey Central Criminal Court
Indentured servants were sold - primary source reading
Indentured servants were sold - primary source reading
Indentured servants were sold at auctions like slaves. Teachers could use this to show how some who would like to make the slavery system seem less harsh than it was can explain how "whites were sold at auction as well" - which is true, but the warrant between the evidence and the claim is invalid. This particular example of an indentured servant is interesting also because he returned to Europe and tried to persuade others to avoid immigration to the colonies
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#primary source
·historymatters.gmu.edu·
Indentured servants were sold - primary source reading
Sumptuary Laws (Laws Regarding What One May or May Not Wear) - 1651 Massachusetts
Sumptuary Laws (Laws Regarding What One May or May Not Wear) - 1651 Massachusetts
Why would the colony of Massachusetts make wearing certain clothes by certain people - illegal? Teachers who can't motivate their students need to consider teaching this reality of colonial america that is ignored by the history education industry
And also to declare our utter detestation and dislike that men and women of mean condition should take upon them the garb gentlemen by wearing gold or silver lace, or buttons, or points at their knees, or to walk in great boots; or women of the same ran to wear silk or tiffany hoods, or scarves which, though allowable to persons of greater estates or more liberal education, we cannot but judge it intolerable. . . .
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#primary source
·blogs.loc.gov·
Sumptuary Laws (Laws Regarding What One May or May Not Wear) - 1651 Massachusetts
Dress Codes in Colonial Massachusetts |
Dress Codes in Colonial Massachusetts |
Another aspect of our colonial origins ignored by those entrusted to teach it to the young. Our mythic story stresses equality and liberty, yet in Massachusetts it was a crime for poor people to dress like they were rich - where does this fit in our narrative?
#myth canon#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·exhibits.law.harvard.edu·
Dress Codes in Colonial Massachusetts |
From Newgate to the New World - Archiving Early America
From Newgate to the New World - Archiving Early America
Hidden in the stories of pilgrims, cavaliers and puritans coming to the New World, are 5,000 women convicted of crimes in England, and shipped to the colonies to serve off their sentence as a servant. This well-documented article tells of the these women and teachers could use any of the individual stories to dramatize this element of America's origins as well. The documents evidencing the cases related here are found in the Old Bailey digital records
#myth canon#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·varsitytutors.com·
From Newgate to the New World - Archiving Early America
Episode 120: Marcia Zug, A History of Mail Order Brides in Early America - Ben Franklin's World
Episode 120: Marcia Zug, A History of Mail Order Brides in Early America - Ben Franklin's World

In this podcast, Marcia Zug, a Professor of Law at the University of South Carolina Law School and author of "Buying a Bride: An Engaging History of Mail Order Matches", describes early North American mail order marriage programs.

Mail order marriage programs were in colonial Jamestown, New France, and Louisiana, though they are not found in high school classrooms. Why would women be interested in participating in mail order marriage programs? What role mail order marriage play in American westward expansion?

Teachers can use this material to engage interest in the lives of people who came to this country in a manner that is largely ignored by asking, why?

#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·benfranklinsworld.com·
Episode 120: Marcia Zug, A History of Mail Order Brides in Early America - Ben Franklin's World
The Journal of Reverand Charles Woodmason | Teaching American History
The Journal of Reverand Charles Woodmason | Teaching American History
Woodmason describes the colonists that students never hear about and few teachers know. But in reading this primary documents, students would have a more complete sense of the period. Documents like this are most effective in breaking assumptions about human nature - that certain types of behavior are only linked with certain periods
They are very poor — owing their extreme indolence for they possess the finest country in America, and could raise but everything. They delight in their present low, lazy, sluttish, heathenish, hellish life, and seem not desirous of changing it. Both men and women will do anything to come at liquor, cloths, furniture rather than work for it. Hence their many vices — their gross licentiousness wantonness, lasciviousness, rudeness, lewdness, and profligacy they will commit the grossest enormities, before my face, and laugh at all admonition.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#primary source
·teachingamericanhistory.org·
The Journal of Reverand Charles Woodmason | Teaching American History
Colonel William Byrd on Slavery and Indented Se...
Colonel William Byrd on Slavery and Indented Se...
In this 1739 from a aristocratic slave owner to a Trustee of the colony of Georgia, teachers and students can look into the complexity of slavery in the 1730s. How can a plantation owner who profits from slavery complain about the system and wish that Britain would end slavery in the colonies? How can a slaveowner express such disgust for slave traders (who, he claims, would paint their wives and children's faces black if they could get away with selling them)? If you look close enough, you can see his prediction of John Brown's dream of a slave insurrection in the mountains.
#slavery#primary source#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·archive.org·
Colonel William Byrd on Slavery and Indented Se...
Blackhead Signpost Rd - Google Maps
Blackhead Signpost Rd - Google Maps
History teachers wanting to invest students in an authentic experience should direct them to this road in southwest Virginia with the simple question - how did this road get this name? and perhaps more importantly, why does it still have this name?
#lesson plan#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·google.com·
Blackhead Signpost Rd - Google Maps
Thanksgiving History | Plimoth Plantation
Thanksgiving History | Plimoth Plantation
Thanksgiving is a particularly American holiday. The word evokes images of football, family reunions, roasted turkey with stuffing, pumpkin pie and, of course, the Pilgrims and Wampanoag, the acknowledged founders of the feast. But was it always so? This article explores the development of our modern holiday.
#5th Grade Unit 2 - Colonization and Settlement#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#Thanksgiving
·plimoth.org·
Thanksgiving History | Plimoth Plantation
America's True History of Religious Tolerance | History | Smithsonian
America's True History of Religious Tolerance | History | Smithsonian
As much as we want to turn away from simply teaching factoids, telling students about the the killing of French Lutherans fifty years before the Mayflower and the hanging of Four Quakers in Massachusetts helps dispel the myth of the freedom narrative that pervades the US History canon
1564 at Fort Caroline
The much-ballyhooed arrival of the Pilgrims and Puritans in New England in the early 1600s was indeed a response to persecution that these religious dissenters had experienced in England. But the Puritan fathers of the Massachusetts Bay Colony did not countenance tolerance of opposing religious views. Their “city upon a hill” was a theocracy that brooked no dissent, religious or political.
Four Quakers were hanged in Boston between 1659 and 1661 for persistently returning to the city to stand up for their beliefs.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·smithsonianmag.com·
America's True History of Religious Tolerance | History | Smithsonian
America's Founding Fictions
America's Founding Fictions
This Washington Post opinion piece is far more effective at introducing students to the discipline of history than one would find in any textbook - and still provide the adequate content knowledge to have a contextual understanding of colonization.
Our founding is not a storybook Pilgrim fable. It's something hardier and more complicated.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#5th Grade Unit 2 - Colonization and Settlement
·washingtonpost.com·
America's Founding Fictions
Engaging with Multiple Narratives and Exploring Historical Bias – Ed Methods
Engaging with Multiple Narratives and Exploring Historical Bias – Ed Methods
This University of Portland student shares a Native American lesson that splits a class into three groups, has each explore a primary or secondary source, then brings them back into whole group for a reflective discussion. There is a significant different in having students analyze specifically chosen materials rather than having them do "research" and look for their own materials to fill a need determined by the teacher (i.e. "find lifestyles")
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#native americans#lesson plan
·edmethods.com·
Engaging with Multiple Narratives and Exploring Historical Bias – Ed Methods
Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Ground Zero for any teacher or student investigation of slavery and the slave trade. This database aggregates the statistics of the slave trade from Africa. Teachers can simply let student loose in this site and let them craft their own understandings. Then their peers and teachers could subject those conclusions to critical thinking questions and analysis.
#slavery#US I Unit 1 - Colonization
·slavevoyages.org·
Trans-Atlantic Slave Trade
Columbian Exchange - 1493 (Charles Mann) excerpts reading lesson
Columbian Exchange - 1493 (Charles Mann) excerpts reading lesson
There are three excerpts, each with close reading questions from the book 1493, by Charles Mann. The first excerpt is a general overview of the Exchange, in the second students will explore a specific example of unintended consequences of the Columbian Exchange, when settlers thought they were simply bringing in an enjoyable food, but they wound up with an invasive pest. Finally, in excerpt three you can see the devastating effects of the Columbian Exchange upon the Taino Indians, the residents of Hispaniola before Columbus arrived.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#lesson plans#secondary sources#WS Unit 3: Empires & Encounters
·americainclass.org·
Columbian Exchange - 1493 (Charles Mann) excerpts reading lesson
1491 - The Atlantic
1491 - The Atlantic
This immense article by Charles Mann, author of "1491", should be required reading for every teacher who ever stands up in front of a room of students and says anything about Native Americans. The native population was larger and more sophisticated before European contact than is commonly acknowledged.
#US I Unit 1 - Colonization#WS Unit 3: Empires & Encounters
·theatlantic.com·
1491 - The Atlantic