State Standards

Kansas

  • History
    • 5.2.5
    • 5.4.2
    • 8.4.2
  • Writing
    • 5.1.4.1
    • 5.1.4.11

Missouri

  • Communication Arts - Writing
    • 3.C.7.3
  • Social Studies
    • 6.D.7,8

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Lesson 4: Remembering Slavery

Background

Though students may have studied slavery, few have had an opportunity to hear slaves' stories first-hand. In this lesson, students will listen to former slaves tell their own stories or they will hear actors read transcripts from conversations with slaves. Listen to their experiences from field work to house work, from joy to despair.

Allow students to immerse themselves in these stories. You may find that strong feelings arise. Allow time for students to work through them through class discussions.

Objectives

After completing this lesson, students will be able to:

  1. Describe one aspect of the life of slaves;
  2. Evaluate that aspect expressed through a letter written to a slave.

Materials

Internet Access
Access to computers connected to the Internet with good quality sound or with headphones that allow students to hear the slaves' voices.

Voices of Slaves from the Web site:
http://rememberingslavery.si.edu

Written transcripts from the Web site:
http://rememberingslavery.si.edu

Optional:
Book and audio tape set with these and additional slave stories: Remembering Slavery available from the Library of Congress. Published by The New Press, New York, 1998.

Time

2-3 class periods

Procedure

  1. Tell students, "Today you will hear the real-life stories told by American slaves. Listen carefully. You will be responding to them from the future through a personal letter."

  2. Divide your class into 5 groups. Depending on the size of the groups, let students go to the computers in groups of 2 to 3 students. On the Web site http://rememberingslavery.si.edu go to the "Hearing Their Voices" tab. That will take you to a page with five stories. Assign one of the stories to each group.

    Have each group listen to the sound clip. They are about 5 minutes in length. Tell the students to listen to the whole clip and try to picture what the slave was talking about. They may even want to close their eyes as the slave is talking.

    Have students listen to the clip again and take notes about things they want to write in a letter to the slave.

  3. Let the students talk about their story with those in their group. They should review what they heard, share their notes, decide on what they would like to say to that slave, and then write a group letter to the slave. Some of the audio clips have more than one slave talking. Students may choose to write more than one letter, or write a general letter to all of them.

  4. When the letter is written, let the groups report to the class. They should tell what their clip was about and read their letter to the class. Allow the class to provide feedback to the group that is reporting. Encourage them to tell two things they liked about the letter and one thing they would like to have heard about. If there are questions, let the group answer them.

  5. Students may have heard about slavery from other sources. This activity may have provided them another perspective on slavery. Have the students write a page about what they previously knew about slavery and how this assignment supported or disputed what they had understood.

  6. If students know about primary and secondary sources, have them evaluate this information as to its accuracy based on the source. Some of these clips are told by the slaves themselves (primary source). Others are read from transcripts of interviews of slaves (secondary source). You may want to talk about the problems of developing transcripts of interviews (some words not heard, dialects may not have been translated accurately, intonation must be inferred, etc.) Have students add to this list. They may remember the game, "Telephone," from their youth. This will help them understand how a message can get decoded and the meaning changed through multiple people hearing incorrectly.

    Ask the students if they would trust what they hear the slaves say directly or what was provided in transcripts from these recordings. If there is time, you may want the students to try to transcribe one of these recordings so they can see where sources of error can arise.

Extension

Older students may want to pursue additional research into the lives of slaves in the big house or in the field. One book by Missouri authors, Patricia and Fredrick Mckissack with John Thompson, is Christmas in the Big House that tells the story of Christmas in both the plantation house and the slave quarter. This can be purchased online from Amazon for as little as $2.50.

Other resources include Masters of the Big House: Elite Slaveholders of the Mid-Nineteenth-Century South by William Kauffman. Back of the Big House: The Architecture of Plantation Slavery by John M. Vlach has pictures of the slave quarters behind the plantation house and will provide a setting for discussing differences. The narrative at this Web site depicts slave life beyond the ordinary narrative: http://www.oah.org/pubs/magazine/family/schwartz.html. The slave narrative at http://www.rootsweb.com/~msgenweb/xslaves/mcgaffey-xslave.htm provides another first-hand narrative about the use of slaves for the benefit of the white family.

Other resources can be found by doing a Google search and are readily available.

Essay Contest

Encourage your students to participate in the Lyric Opera of Kansas City Essay Contest. You can find more about it by visiting www.kcopera.org/About/johnbrowneducation/essay.

Lesson created by Martha A. Henry and Keith S. Murray, M.A. Henry Consulting, LLC.