Students create a database to show information about events in history. In this database lesson, students create and analyze information on the slave trade. Students answer questions based on the information collected.

Eighth graders describe in detail a time in their life when they were the most afraid, causes of the fear and how they overcame it. This experience is compared/contrasted to the actual circumstances behind slave auction blocks. They read...

You're going to wish you had a watermelon for this lesson! Class members read about watermelons and make a salad in class to sample. They also perform estimates, measurements and calculations on a watermelon. They predict what percentage...

Students forge a compassionate link to the large numbers of people who were the victims of slavery as opposed to thinking of them simply in terms of numbers. They perform a math exercise to put the number of people in slavery into...

[Free Registration/Login Required] Lesson plan on the Middle Passage includes PowerPoint presentation and primary source documents from which young scholars explore original material.

This website contains pictures and descriptions of the Middle Passage voyage. Click on Teacher's Guide for teacher resources.

A learning module that begins with "Olaudah Equiano Recalls the Middle Passage" by Olaudah Equiano, accompanied by guided reading questions, assessment questions, and discussion questions. The text can be printed as a PDF or assigned...

Moving description of the Middle Passage and African American trauma through the perspective of the artist, Tom Feelings.

A description of the Middle Passage, the leg of the triangular trade that brought slaves from Africa to America. Read descriptions of the way slaves were transported in the ships across the ocean.

Description of how slaves tried to starve themselves to death on slave ships as a form of resistance, and how the slave traders forced them to eat so they would not lose money. Click on Teacher's Guide for teaching resources.

A detailed look at the trans-Atlantic slave trade that lasted from the 1500s to the 1800s.

The complete text of a famous slave narrative from the late 18th century (1789), it tells the story on how Equiano is captured in Africa, transported to the Americas and his experiences as a slave. It provides rich details about the...

This section of a chapter on "The Antebellum South" discusses the similarities and differences in the lives of slaves and free blacks and describes the independent culture and customs that slaves developed.

The number of Africans who died or were enslaved as a result of slave trading both across the Atlantic and into the Arabian peninsula is truly shocking. Read about the Middle Passage which brought millions of slaves to the New World, see...

Online exhibition from the Mariners' Museum chronicles the plight of African slaves from the beginning of their journey when they are torn from their homeland all the way to the shores of the Americas. Caught up in the lucrative...

From the transatlantic slave trade to today's New Great Migration, learn about the major African-American migrations and how those movements changed the course of American history.

Information is provided on the three routes of the triangular slave trade: the middle passage, the outward passage, and the return passage.

Read Olaudah Equiano's account of being captured in his village in Africa, and placed on a slave ship to be taken to America. He describes the middle passage of the triangular trade route, as well as the leg from Europe to Africa. [pdf]

Article and questions for discussion on the slave trade. Students read about how Europeans captured, transported, and sold African men, women and children into slavery.

An interesting essay on the forced migration of Africans to America by way of the Middle Passage. Read where the slaves were off-loaded, how the population of slaves increased, and the inhumanities inflicted on the slaves both on the...

A comprehensive learning module on slavery that includes three supporting questions accompanied by formative tasks and primary source materials, followed by a summative performance task. Students will examine the role of sugar production...

An informational text about the West African slave trade. A question sheet is available to help students build skills in reading comprehension.

An article describing the historical background to the Abolitionist movement in England, giving details on the slave trade and more.

A chapter from a history text that looks at the development of the Southern Colonies. It discusses the Southern agricultural economy that relied on slave labor, tobacco as a cash crop, Southern society, indentured servitude, Bacon's...