Lesson Plan
Stanford University

Stanford History Education Group: The Middle Passage

For Teachers 9th - 10th
[Free Registration/Login Required] Lesson plan on the Middle Passage includes PowerPoint presentation and primary source documents from which students explore original material.
Unit Plan
CommonLit

Common Lit: Olaudah Equiano Recalls the Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
A learning module that begins with "Olaudah Equiano Recalls the Middle Passage" by Olaudah Equiano, accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. The text can be printed as a PDF or assigned...
Unit Plan
PBS

Pbs: Cet: Africans in America: The Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
This website contains pictures and descriptions of the Middle Passage voyage. Click on Teacher's Guide for teacher resources.
Activity
Other

Juneteenth: The Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
Moving description of the Middle Passage and African American trauma through the perspective of the artist, Tom Feelings.
Primary
Hanover College

Hanover College: Slave Narrative of Olaudah Equiano Vol. 1

For Students 9th - 10th
The complete text of a famous slave narrative from the late 18th century (1789), it tells the story on how Equiano is captured in Africa, transported to the Americas and his experiences as a slave. It provides rich details about the...
Primary
PBS

Pbs: Cet: Africans in America: The Threat of Fasting During the Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
Description of how slaves tried to starve themselves to death on slave ships as a form of resistance, and how the slave traders forced them to eat so they would not lose money. Click on Teacher's Guide for teaching resources.
Article
Digital History

Digital History: Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
The number of Africans who died or were enslaved as a result of slave trading both across the Atlantic and into the Arabian peninsula is truly shocking. Read about the Middle Passage which brought millions of slaves to the New World, see...
Website
Independence Hall Association

U.s. History: African Americans in the British New World: The Middle Passage

For Students 5th - 8th
A description of the Middle Passage, the leg of the triangular trade that brought slaves from Africa to America. Read descriptions of the way slaves were transported in the ships across the ocean.
Unit Plan
Mariners' Museum and Park

Mariners' Museum: Captive Passage: The Transatlantic Slave Trade

For Students 9th - 10th
Online exhibition from the Mariners' Museum chronicles the plight of African slaves from the beginning of their journey when they are torn from their homeland all the way to the shores of the Americas. Caught up in the lucrative...
Activity
Constitutional Rights Foundation

Constitutional Rights Foundation: The Slave Trade

For Students 9th - 10th
Article and questions for discussion on the slave trade. Students read about how Europeans captured, transported, and sold African men, women and children into slavery.
Handout
The History Cat

The History Cat: Us History: The Middle Passage

For Students 9th - 10th
A detailed look at the trans-Atlantic slave trade that lasted from the 1500s to the 1800s.
eBook
OpenStax

Open Stax: African Americans in the Antebellum United States

For Students 11th - 12th
This section of a chapter on "The Antebellum South" discusses the similarities and differences in the lives of slaves and free blacks and describes the independent culture and customs that slaves developed.
Activity
Other

Liverpool and the Slave Trade: The Triangular Slave Trade

For Students 9th - 10th
Information is provided on the three routes of the triangular slave trade: the middle passage, the outward passage, and the return passage.
Website
Digital History

Digital History: The Slave Trade [Pdf]

For Students 9th - 10th
Read Olaudah Equiano's account of being captured in his village in Africa, and placed on a slave ship to be taken to America. He describes the middle passage of the triangular trade route, as well as the leg from Europe to Africa. [pdf]
Handout
British Library

British Library: The Slave Trade

For Students 9th - 10th
An article describing the historical background to the Abolitionist movement in England, giving details on the slave trade and more.
Handout
Understanding Slavery Initiative

Understanding Slavery Initiative: Atlantic Crossing

For Students 9th - 10th
Discover the period some refer to as "Middle Passage," when enslaved Africans were transported across the Atlantic Ocean to the Caribbean or America. Read first-hand accounts of the torture and deprivation experienced by thousands of...
Article
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History

Gilder Lehrman Institute: History Now: African Immigration to Colonial America

For Students 9th - 10th
An interesting essay on the forced migration of Africans to America by way of the Middle Passage. Read where the slaves were off-loaded, how the population of slaves increased, and the inhumanities inflicted on the slaves both on the...
Activity
Other

Read Works: West Africa: West African Slave Trade [Pdf]

For Teachers 4th
An informational text about the West African slave trade. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.
Unit Plan
C3 Teachers

C3 Teachers: Inquiries: Slavery

For Teachers 5th
A comprehensive learning module on slavery that includes three supporting questions accompanied by formative tasks and primary source materials, followed by a summative performance task. Students will examine the role of sugar production...
Article
PBS

Africans in America: Interior of a Slave Ship

For Students 9th - 10th
This site describes how slaves were packed in the ships with barely enough room to sit or move, to maximize capacity.
Lesson Plan
Georgetown University

Georgetown: Putting a Human Face on the Domestic Slave Trade

For Students 9th - 10th
This unit will introduce young scholars to the history of the domestic slave trade through the lens of the "GU272," the community of people sold south by the Maryland Jesuits in 1838 to help finance Georgetown College. This unit consists...
Interactive
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: The African American Migration Story

For Students 9th - 10th
From the transatlantic slave trade to today's New Great Migration, learn about the major African-American migrations and how those movements changed the course of American history.
Primary
PBS

Pbs's Africans in America: Equiano's Autobiography

For Students 9th - 10th
Chapter two of "The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano," the autobiography of a man abducted from Africa and forced into slavery before later obtaining his freedom. This chapter details his capture and eventual journey...
Handout
Understanding Slavery Initiative

Understanding Slavery Initiative: Resistance and Rebellion

For Students 9th - 10th
Enslaved Africans fought hard to win back their freedom through resistance, rebellions, and uprisings. Rebellions along the Middle Passage and in places like the Caribbean were important to the retention of African culture.

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