Virginia and United States History

Virginia and United States History

VUS.2 The student will describe how early European exploration and colonization resulted in cultural interaction among Europeans, Africans, and American Indians (First Americans).

SOURCE Mintz, S.A. Excerpts from Slave Narratives
http://vi.uh.edu/pages/mintz/primary.htm

This source is a website providing links to excerpts from slave narratives. These narratives include the individual first-hand accounts of slave-traders and Africans during the 17^th and 18^th centuries. I chose this website as I feel that these primary sources depicting the voices of both the Africans and Europeans are invaluable in helping students gain a better understanding of why slave-traders from the beginning felt justified in enslaving the Africans and what the experience was like for the Africans. Plus, I don’t think much time is often spent on the beginnings of the slave trade in history classes, but the roots of slavery are just as important to examine as the institution itself. This website has accounts from this early time period and helps provide a multi-cultural perspective that is often not found in history texts.

I would incorporate this website into my class by devoting a day to having groups read a handful of these excerpts and draw their own conclusions about what it was like for Africans to be taken from the homeland, the conditions of the passage across the Atlantic, and their arrival in the New World. At the same time, students should think about how the Europeans justified enslaving the Africans. Through this website, students will hopefully be able to look through both the eyes of the Africans and the European enslaving them, before reaching their own conclusions about the early slave trade of the 17^th and 18^th centuries.

VUS.4 The student will demonstrate knowledge of events and issues of the Revolutionary Period by: c) analyzing reasons for colonial victory in the Revolutionary War

SOURCE Wilson, Capt. B.A. USAF (ret.) American Women in Uniform, Veterans too! http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/femvets.html

This source is a website devoted to women who fought in the Revolutionary War. It tells the stories of five women (Deborah Samson, Rachel Martin, Grace Martin, Anne Bailey, and Molly Pitcher) who disguised themselves as men and took up arms against the British. I chose this particular source because I feel that women are often overlooked when one is studying early American history. Because of this, I think it is often easy to forget that anyone except white, male colonists existed in the colonies on the eve of the Revolutionary War. This source would hopefully help change that limited perspective and offer a more multicultural perspective.

I would use this source in conjunction with the stories and/or writings of male foot soldiers while I was teaching the Revolutionary War itself. I might ask students to read about one of the females on this website and the experiences of a particular male soldier (hopefully on another website) and have them work in groups to compare the stories of the two people and how different or similar their experiences were. This would help students see at least a portion of the female perspective at a time when women had little voice and power. The website also has links to women who fought in all of the wars America has been involved with. Another way to integrate this information into lesson planning and to relate it to more modern events that students might have more knowledge of and be more interested in, is to have students compare the women who fought in the Revolutionary War with those who Bosnia (or with any other war that is of interest to the students).

VUS.6a The student will demonstrate knowledge of the major events during the first half of the nineteenth century by identifying the economic, political, and geographic factors that led to the territorial expansion and its impact on the American Indians (First Americans).

SOURCE Unknown. The Cherokee "Trail of Tears" 1838-1839. :
http://rosecity.net/tears/

The Index includes images, first hand accounts, maps, timelines, newspaper articles and poems describing the Cherokee experience during their forced removal from Georgia to Oklahoma. The site is a link from a tourism site from Cape Girardeau County, Missouri, but offers the opportunity to understand the Trail of Tears from the perspective of Native Americans. The site is a manageable size, including about 20 links to pertinent sources.

In the classroom, the teacher would have to give students a background to the history of the Cherokee tribe in Georgia (Discovery of Gold in Georgia, Cherokee claims of sovereignty, the Federal Government’s evolving treatment of the Cherokees). The teacher could ask students to write a journal entry from the perspective of a Cherokee during his/her forced removal. In order to do this, the students could get a better understanding of the Trail of Tears by exploring the index.

VUS.7c The student will demonstrate knowledge of the Civil War and Reconstruction Era and its importance as a major turning point in American history by examining the political, economic, and social impact of the war and Reconstruction, including the adoption of the 13^th, 14^th, and 15^th Amendments to the Constitution of the United States.

SOURCE Ayers, E. et al. The Valley of the Shadow. http://valley.vcdh.virginia.edu

The Valley of the Shadow is a rich archive of primary source documents from the Civil War and Reconstruction periods. The site includes newspapers, letters, diaries, images, and student projects from two neighboring counties: Franklin County in Pennsylvania and Augusta County in Virginia. In terms of multicultural content, the sources provide a unique opportunity to compare the African-American experience in the North and the South.

In the classroom, the teacher could structure an activity (a paper, poster, drama production) comparing the northern and southern experience of African-Americans during the period. Because the site is vast, it would be important for the teacher to specify the scope- the students could examine the experience of an African-American soldier, suffrage, the Freedmen’s Bureau or opportunities for labor. The teacher could also suggest some of the particularly relevant aspects of the site, such as the Demus letters (between an African-American soldier and his wife) and a student project on the Freedmen’s Bureau. In the activity, the students would be able to examine how the adoption of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments played out in practice.

VUS.10 The student will demonstrate knowledge of World War II by c) describing the role of all-minority military units, including the Tuskegee Airmen and Nisei regiments.

SOURCE Nakatsu, R. Photographs Page. http://www.kent.k12.wa.us/KSD/SJ/TuskegeeAirmen/Photographs_html

This image is representative of an all-minority military unit that fought during World War II, the Tuskegee Airmen. While the website does not claim to be a complete factual knowledge base, the image was chosen as more powerful and intimate than some others that were available, showing the Airmen marching in formation or practicing landings. The teacher would definitely need to provide additional sources of information and background about the Tuskegee Airmen, perhaps using this image only to begin or end a discussion of the use of all-minority military units.

Potential activities are many and varied for the use of this image. This image could be used at virtually any point in a unit on World War II, including as a question starter for an assessment. In particular, the teacher could tie the plight of the Tuskegee Airmen, who fought as a segregated unit in a war to ensure greater individual political determination and freedom, to the harsh reality of unchanged and unequal conditions that persisted in the United States following the conclusion of the war. Would these war veterans be regarded as heroes, given greater community stature and recognition? Or would they return, as changed individuals, into a society that was not yet ready to extend the equality they were fighting so wholeheartedly for abroad, to its own citizenry. This image could certainly be used to spark intellectual debate and stimulation.

VUS.11 The student will demonstrate knowledge of the effects of World War II on the home front by c) explaining the interment of Japanese Americans during the war.

SOURCE Library of Congress. The Manzanar Collection.
http://memory.loc.gov

Taken from the Library of Congress’ vast website, this image was found among the Ansel Adams Manzanar collection section of the site. Adams said of his photographs, "The purpose of my work was to show how these people, suffering under a great injustice, and loss of property, businesses and professions, had overcome the sense of defeat and dispair [sic] by building for themselves a vital community in an arid (but magnificent) environment. This powerful statement by the artist is indicative of the lens that the teacher could encourage the students to look through when examining and evaluating this period in American history. Beginning a search for information at this source, students could view the powerful images and in turn delve deeper into research of the human effects of internment.

This infusion of multicultural perspective into the curriculum goes both hand in hand with the discussion of the complete mobilization of the United States mentioned in VUS 11a while it is simultaneously juxtaposed. Students could be encouraged to explore the political, social, and economic motivation for cordoning off a segment of the population while attempting to unite the remaining citizenry into a “war machine”. Hopefully moving students to the point of becoming epistemologically curious, examination of public sentiment supporting as well as questioning internment would be a worthwhile and feasible activity. Was it popular to be sympathetic to the plight of the Japanese? What were some possible ramifications for the citizen that was opposed to internment? Beyond the obvious study and discussion of the demoralizing and negative effects of Japanese-Americans themselves, this issue could be the center point of a debate to take place in class.

SOURCE Instructional Media Unit. University of Southern Mississippi Documentation Project. http://www-dept.usm.edu/~mcrohb/

Oral history bibliography. This site offers an easy to use bibliography with information on how it is organized. It offers sections which explain how the resources were compiled, links to related sites, and transcripts of oral histories themselves. This site also includes interviewee, subject and collection/archival indices. There is contact information for further resources as well. Access to the transcripts themselves is facilitated by clear and manageable pages which include a link to the Mississippi digital archive. The transcripts are protected by copyright.

In the classroom, this site will be a useful way of connecting students to the first hand emotions of the civil rights movement. The interviews are moving and can a bring a student immediately to higher levels of thinking. Each transcript includes a bibliography—connecting the students to the interviewee. This can spark a social-action level of multicultural education, but at the very least surpasses the lower of Banks’ four levels by including the reflections of everyday people on this very emotive content in a way that is familiar and accessible. One idea for a lesson plan using this site is to look at one specific subject covered by the site—for instance Massive Resistance, or Violence, and develop an oral presentation/ play based on the reflections of the interviewees on this subject.

VUS.12 The student will demonstrate knowledge of Unites States policy since WW II.

SOURCE Wilson, Capt. B.A. USAF (ret.) American Women in Uniform, Veterans too! http://userpages.aug.com/captbarb/femvets.html

This site is a resource list of Women’s participation in all U.S. Military action. It includes significant information about participation in Korea and Vietnam. Both of which are included in SOL V.US.12. The site itself portrays the author’s anger at the exclusion of women in the records of these wars, but gives a lot of information regarding the duties, numbers, and operations of women in the conflict. It also offers links to interesting articles and oral histories of veterans.

The first wife and mother was made a General in the United States Marine Corps very recently, so looking at the history of women in military service is connected to the news right now. However, to avoid this as an addition to the curriculum as opposed to an integral part of it—This site should be a resource for looking a the participation of women throughout each part of military history. At the top of the home page for this site, interesting trivia questions are flashed with the answer (ex: Were women ever prisoners of war?) This would be a good way of incorporating this history into a DO NOW or similar reflection activity.

SOURCE Johnson Lewis, J. Women’s History Picture Gallery. http://womenshistory.about.com/library/pic/bl_p_index.htm

About’s Women’s History pages include a basic resource list, which links users to primary sources and articles. The picture gallery lists graphics chronologically and includes artifacts like Executive Order 10980 dated December 14, 1961 as well as pictures, portraits and paintings. The site also includes links to related topics beneath the pictures for further research.

In the classroom, this would be a good resource for a DO NOW or other reflective exercise. Also this could be a resource for decorating the classroom itself—Portraying women as a part of history as integral as other representations on the classroom wall.