Lesson Plan
PBS

Pbs American Masters: Scientific American: Following Muddy's Trail

For Teachers 9th - 10th
This site has a lesson plan on Muddy Waters focused on the American Masters documentary about him. Parallels the Great Migration with the growth of the blues music movement in America. Click on Muddy's name to access a detailed biography...
Website
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Senegambia, Making of African American Identity: V. 1

For Students 9th - 10th
Drawings of West Africans and two accounts of Africans before enslavement, one by an African of Gambia, one by a French traveler to Senegal. They examine how Africans lived in freedom before enslavement.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Labor, Making of African American Identity: V. 1

For Students 9th - 10th
Selections of original accounts either written during slavery or recorded in the 1930s that depict work as a plantation laborer, house servant, shipyard worker or boatman.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Resistance, Making of African American Identity: V. 1

For Students 9th - 10th
Recollections of slave resistance by observers like Frederick Douglass, narratives of slave resistance collected during the Depression, and mid-nineteenth century accounts by former slaves calling for resistance to and overthrow of the...
Website
Curated OER

National Park Service: Boston African American National Historic Site

For Students 9th - 10th
A tour and commentary about the many sites in Boston where abolitionists lived and worked. Click on the links to find out about these brave souls, both black and white, who fought against slavery.
Unit Plan
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Capture, Making of African American Identity: V. 1

For Students 9th - 10th
Several narratives of the capture of West Africans, including the famous autobiography of Venture Smith, from the eighteenth century, two accounts of conditions on slave ships, and an audio recording of the memories of the descendants of...
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Enslavement, Making of African American Identity: V. 1, 1500 1865

For Students 9th - 10th
Twenty-eight primary sources-historical documents, literary texts, and visual images-that explore plantation life, the qualities and conditions of slavery, work, and resistance to oppression.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: An Enslaved Person's Life, Making of African American Identity

For Students 9th - 10th
Various photographs of slaves from the pre-Civil War era, an autobiographical narrative of slavery, and three accounts recorded in the 1930s of the lives and conditions of former slaves are included in this large set of information...
Website
PBS

Pbs: This Far by Faith

For Students 9th - 10th
Follow the spiritual journey of African Americans as you move along a timeline of major events and eras. Excellent coverage of the importance of spiritualism, religions, and faith in the African American community. Major religious...
Primary
Library of Congress

Loc: African American Odyssey: Abolition, Anti Slavery Movements

For Students 9th - 10th
This site provides primary source documents and commentary that give an overall look at many different aspects of abolition, the antislavery movement, and the rise of division between North and South. From the Library of Congress.
Unit Plan
PBS

Wnet: Thirteen: Slavery and the Making of America: Slave Responses to Enslavement

For Students 9th - 10th
Using primary documents, oral histories, and other historical resources, learn how African Americans responded to enslavement prior to the Civil War. Includes interactive exercise.
Handout
Khan Academy

Khan Academy: Ap Us History: 1844 1877: Reconstruction: Life After Slavery

For Students 9th - 10th
Discusses what life was like for African Americans who were freed from slavery after the Civil War. Includes questions for students.
Graphic
Other

The Spread of u.s. Slavery, 1790 1860

For Students 9th - 10th
Presents population maps of enslaved and free African Americans before the Civil War based on census population.
Lesson Plan
Stanford University

Sheg: Document Based History: Reading Like a Historian: Reconstruction Sac

For Teachers 9th - 10th
[Free Registration/Login Required] Students use primary source documents to investigate central historical questions. In this structured academic controversy, students examine constitutional amendments, a Black Code, a personal account...
Website
Smithsonian Institution

National Museum of American History: Slave Life and the Underground Railroad

For Students 3rd - 8th
A brief summary of the history of African American slavery and the Underground Railroad. Activities and books pertaining to slave life, plantations, and the Underground Railroad are suggested.
Primary
University of North Carolina

Documenting the American South: The New Slavery in the South

For Students 9th - 10th
This autobiography of an African-American man relates his experiences as a free laborer in Georgia after the Civil War. You will see that he felt his conditions were not unlike the slavery that existed before the Civil War. From the...
Lesson Plan
Library of Congress

Loc: Lesson Plans: Civil Rights

For Teachers 9th - 10th
A rich resource on civil rights from the early struggles of African Americans during slavery on through to today. Includes seven lesson plans for multiple grade levels, with information on standards.
Website
Digital History

Digital History: Compensation for Slavery [Pdf]

For Students 9th - 10th
Read the arguments for and against giving reparations to today's African Americans to atone for the slavery their ancestors endured in 18th and 19th century America. Also included are results from a poll conducted by the magazine, Black...
Website
Columbia University

Columbia University: Columbia University & Slavery Post 1865: Students

For Students 9th - 10th
African American students began to matriculate at Columbia in significant numbers by the 1920s, but they remain all but invisible in the university's archival records. This site highlights several early black students that continued on...
Article
University of Groningen

American History: Essays: The Black Lost Cause: Examples of Colored Service

For Students 9th - 10th
African American slaves are known to have fought for the Confederacy during the Civil War, which many people may not realize. Why they would fight on the side of slavery, and the evidence that they did, are discussed in this section of...
Article
Texas State Historical Association

Texas State Historical Association: Slavery

For Students 9th - 10th
Find out why Texas was the last frontier of slavery in the United States during the middle of the nineteenth century.
Interactive
PBS

Wnet: Thirteen: Slavery & Making of America: Imagining Freedom During/after Civil War

For Students 9th - 10th
In this interactive game, students are presented with a political drawings and cartoons from the period 1860-1877, and they must choose which historical event related to the end of slavery best matches each image.
Unit Plan
Annenberg Foundation

Annenberg Learner: American Passages: Race and Identity in Antebellum America

For Students 9th - 10th Standards
This unit features authors of Antebellum America and how they portray the American identity through their literature. Click on the tabs to explore the various resources available to enhance this unit.
Primary
University of North Carolina

Booker T. Washington, 1856 1915 Up From Slavery: An Autobiography

For Students 9th - 10th
Read the complete text from the book "Up from Slavery: An Autobiography", by Booker T. Washington, in which he explores his journey from slave to educator. Includes illustrations, biographical facts, and links to further information on...