Lesson Plan
Library of Congress

Loc: The Grapes of Wrath: Voices From the Great Depression

For Teachers 9th - 10th
By examining primary sources, including songs, newspapers, interviews, and photographs of migrant farm workers in California during the Great Depression, students create a scrapbook from the point of view of a migrant worker, providing...
Website
Hartford Web Publishing

Hartford Black History Project: Citizens of Color: Black Society After Civil War

For Students 9th - 10th
Discusses the history of the African American community in Hartford, Connecticut, in terms of the migration of former slaves to the city right after the end of the Civil War. Also discusses a second wave of migration as African Americans...
Website
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Leaving, 1960, Making of African American Identity: V. 3,

For Students 9th - 10th
This exercise examines black migration from the South in the 1960's through the perspective of Alice Walker's "Roselily." A PDF accompanies this resource, reviewing the deeper meaning behind a passage from this text.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Making of African American Identity: Migrations: Negro Migration During War

For Students 9th - 10th
An analysis of the reasons why blacks moved north around the time of World War I. An article by Emmett J. Scott (1873-1957), who for a time served as Booker T. Washington's personal secretary, is linked to this resource.
Website
Library of Congress

Loc: African American Mosaic: Migrations

For Students 9th - 10th
The Library of Congress surveys the migration of African Americans to out of the South after the Civil War. Features include statistics, maps, and reasons for the migration.
Handout
Chicago History Museum

Encyclopedia of Chicago: Great Migration

For Students 9th - 10th
Read this historical account of events that became known as the Great Migration, the movement of African Americans from the South to the North, and the effect this had on Chicago and other urban northern cities.
Website
Other

Amistad Digital Resource: The Great Migration

For Students 9th - 10th
Read about the reasons for the Great Migration of African Americans from the Deep Sourth to northern cities in the first few decades of the 20th century. After the Great Depression, the migration numbers increased again. Find out what...
Handout
Black Past

Black Past: Mound Bayou

For Students 9th - 10th
This interesting encyclopedia article recounts the self-segregated community of Mound Bayou, Mississippi, which was founded as a place for blacks to find economic opportunity at a time of extreme racial violence in the South.
Website
PBS

Pbs: God in America: The Black Church

For Students 9th - 10th
A good look at the role of the church and religion in the history of African Americans. Find out the church's importance in the abolition movement and the civil rights movement.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Making of African American Identity: Forward:1917

For Students 9th - 10th
Letters, an article, a pamphlet, and a song that point to greater black migration from the South and black cultural achievements in the twentieth century. The texts examines how migrations north affected the relationships of African...
Handout
PBS

Pbs: The West Benjamin "Pap" Singleton

For Students 9th - 10th
From the critically acclaimed PBS series, "The West," this site provides a brief biography of Benjamin "Pap" Singleton, a leader of the "Great Exodus" which brought thousands of African Americans west from the post-Reconstruction South.
Website
Library of Congress

Loc: African American Mosaic: Chicago: Destination for the Great Migration

For Students 9th - 10th
Discusses the housing arrangements of African Americans and those with incomes in the Chicago area. Includes several pictures and links to further related information.
Handout
Black Past

Black Past: Chicago Race Riot, 1919

For Students 9th - 10th
This short encyclopedia article recounts the events that led up to the Chicago Race Riot in 1919.
Website
Other

New York Public Library: Africana Age: The Civil Rights Movement

For Students 9th - 10th
This is an extensive review of the Civil Rights movement from the 1940s to the 1960s. Read about the ways African Americans protested discrimination in employment and education over several years. Be sure to click on the images to find...
Website
PBS

Pbs: American Experience: The East St. Louis Riot

For Students 9th - 10th
Read about the shameful events and carnage in the targeting of African Americans in the East St. Louis Riot in 1917. This was truly a black mark in race relations in the United States.
Primary
National Humanities Center

National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: New Art, Making of African American Identity: V. 3

For Students 9th - 10th
Artistic expressions of the new black self image inspired by migration to the urban North. This focus of this site is "Song of the Towers", a series of four murals sponsored by the federal Works Projects Administration, outlining black...
Unit Plan
Library of Congress

Loc: African Immigration: Africans in America: Life in a Slave Society

For Students 9th - 10th
An excellent overview of the African American experience in America beginning with West Africa during the slave trade, through emancipation and reconstruction, to "New beginnings."
Website
Other

Hummingbirds.net

For Students 9th - 10th
This entire website is entirely dedicated to hummingbirds. This is a great place to learn more about different hummingbird species, attracting and feeding them, migration patterns, and more.
Website
Curated OER

National Park Service: Stories of the Westward Expansion: Exodus to Freedom

For Students 9th - 10th
Contains an article written on the African American exodus to Kansas to farm in the late 19th century.
Handout
Encyclopedia Britannica

Encyclopedia Britannica: Robert E. Park

For Students 9th - 10th
This entry from Encyclopedia Britannica features Robert E. Park, an American sociologist noted for his work on ethnic minority groups, particularly African Americans, and on human ecology, a term he is credited with coining. One of the...

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