Lesson by John McNamara and Ron Nash
Essay by Peniel Joseph, University of Texas at Austin
Grade Level: 9–12
Number of Class Periods: 6
Primary Theme: African American History
About This Lesson Plan Unit
In the lessons in this unit, students will learn and practice literacy skills that will help them develop knowledgeable and well-reasoned points of view on the experiences of African Americans as they fought against discrimination and for freedom and equality after slavery was abolished in 1865. The students will demonstrate what they have learned through their analysis and assessment of the primary and secondary sources orally in small-group and whole-class discussions and by completing activity sheets.
Lesson Plan Author: John McNamara and Ron Nash
Historical Background Essay by: Peniel Joseph, University of Texas at Austin
Additional Information About This Unit
Common Core State Standards
Common Core State Standards
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.1: Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis of primary and secondary sources, connecting insights gained from specific details to an understanding of the text as a whole.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a primary or secondary source: provide an accurate summary that makes clear the relationships among the key details and ideas.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.7: Integrate and evaluate multiple sources of information presented in diverse formats and media (e.g., visually, quantitatively, as well as in words) in order to address a question or solve a problem.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.9: Integrate information from diverse sources, both primary and secondary, into a coherent understanding of an idea or event, noting discrepancies among sources.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.9-10.4: Determine the meaning of words and phrases as they are used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone (e.g., how the language evokes a sense of time and place; how it sets a formal or informal tone).
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.1: Cite strong and thorough textual evidence to support analysis of what the text says explicitly as well as inferences drawn from the text, including determining where the text leaves matters uncertain.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.1.C: Propel conversations by posing and responding to questions that relate the current discussion to broader themes or larger ideas; actively incorporate others into the discussion to broader themes or larger ideas; actively incorporate others into the discussion; and clarify, verify, or challenge ideas and conclusions.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.11-12.1: Initiate and participate effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on [grade-level] topics, texts, and issues, building on others’ ideas and expressing their own clearly and persuasively.
CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.9-10.1 and 11-12.1: Write arguments to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or texts, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.
Essential Questions
Essential Questions
How have African Americans maintained a sense of community?
How have African Americans advocated for freedom and equality?
What legislation has expanded African Americans’ rights?
What obstacles have constrained African Americans’ freedom and equality?
How have African Americans clarified the meaning of “freedom”?
What political causes and civic values have unified Americans of different races?
Documents
Documents
The Reconstruction Amendments (Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments) and the Civil Rights Act of 1875
“The Georgetown Election—The Negro at the Ballot Box” by Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, March 16, 1867
“The Fifteenth Amendment signed by President Grant, March 1870,” lithograph published by C. Rogan, Savannah, GA, 1871
The Black Code of the Parish of St. Landry, Louisiana, 1865: Excerpts from “Ordinance Relative to the Police of Negroes Recently Emancipated Within the Parish of St. Landry”
A Report on the Freedmen of Louisiana, 1865: Excerpts from Thomas W. Conway, The Freedmen of Louisiana: Final Report of the Bureau of Free Labor, Department of the Gulf, to Major General E. R. S. Canby, Commanding
A Report on the Colfax Massacre in Grant Parish, Louisiana, 1873, excerpts from Reports of Committees of the House of Representatives, for the Second Session of the Forty-third Congress, 1874–’75
“The Union as It Was” by Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, October 24, 1874
“Is This a Republican Form of Government?” by Thomas Nast, Harper’s Weekly, September 2, 1876
The Majority Opinion by Justice Joseph P. Bradley in the US Supreme Court’s Civil Rights Cases, 1883
The Dissenting Opinion by Justice John M. Harlan in the US Supreme Court’s Civil Rights Cases, 1883
Frederick Douglass’s “Lessons of the Hour” Speech
The Majority Opinion in the US Supreme Court’s Decision in Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896
The Dissenting Opinion in the US Supreme Court’s Decision in Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896
Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Mob Rule in New Orleans: Robert Charles and His Fight to Death, 1900
Ida B. Wells-Barnett, “Lynching Our National Crime” Speech, Proceedings of the National Negro Conference 1909
Excerpts from W. E. B. Du Bois, “Returning Soldiers,” The Crisis 18 (May 1919)
Excerpts from Alain Locke, “Enter the New Negro,” Survey 53 (March 1925)
Langston Hughes, “Let America Be America Again,” 1938
Claude McKay, “Enslaved”
Walter Ellison, Train Station, 1935
Allan Rohan Crite, School’s Out, 1936
Palmer Hayden, The Janitor Who Paints, ca. 1937
Josh White, “Defense Factory Blues” from Southern Exposure, 1941
Woody Guthrie, “The Blinding of Isaac Woodard,” 1946
Excerpts from “The Courier’s Double ‘V’ for a Double Victory Campaign Gets Country-Wide Support,” Pittsburgh Courier, February 14, 1942
Charles Alston, “Backing the Attack on All Fronts!!!” 1943
Excerpts from the Unanimous US Supreme Court Opinion in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, et al., 1954
Excerpts from the “Southern Manifesto on Integration,” March 12, 1956, (statement of Rep. Howard Smith on Brown v. Board of Education)
Excerpts from the Civil Rights Act of 1957
Excerpts from the Civil Rights Act of 1964
Excerpts from the Voting Rights Act of 1965
Excerpts from Malcolm X, “The Ballot or the Bullet,” April 3, 1964
Excerpts from Martin Luther King Jr., “Nonviolence: The Only Road to Freedom,” May 4, 1966
Excerpts from Stokely Carmichael, “Black Power” Address, University of California, Berkeley, October 29, 1966
Martin Luther King Jr., “Beyond Vietnam—A Time to Break Silence,” Speech at the Riverside Church in New York City, April 4, 1967
Alfredo Rostgaard, “Black Power,” Organization of Solidarity with the People of Asia, African and Latin America, 1968
Emory Douglas, “Don’t Support the Greedy,” Oakland, California, 1968–1969
Declan Haun, “Where Are White Civil Rights?” Housing Demonstration in Chicago, Illinois, 1966
“The Combahee River Collective Statement,” April 1977
Melle Mel and Duke Bootee (Edward G. Fletcher), “The Message,” 1982, performed by Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five
Elsa Barkley Brown, Debra King, and Barbara Ransby, “African American Women in Defense of Ourselves,” New York Times, November 17, 1991
Cecilio Ricardo, Barack Obama is sworn in as the 44th President of the United States by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr., January 20, 2009, US Air Force photo
Claudia Rankine, “VI: I knew whatever was in front of me was happening, October 27, 2014,” from Citizen: An American Lyric
Caroline Randall Williams, “You Want a Confederate Monument? My Body Is a Confederate Monument,” Op Ed, New York Times, June 26, 2020