The Cycles in the Civil War

Imagine you are a soldier in the Civil War. What are you wearing? What do you need to carry with you? Examine the life of a person during the Civil War, from drummer boys to powder monkeys to musket-toting soldiers. Elementary learners...

Explore how the Civil War impacted the Civil Rights Movement. Class members complete a series of projects for a unit that uses a layered curriculum approach to learning. 

Raise the curtain to a class play that depicts the Civil War through both factual information and literary devices. The performance showcases the Battle of Antietam (Battle of Sharpsburg) and brings attention to women's roles, as well as...

Young historians demonstrate creativity and critical thinking skills in a project about the Civil War. Working in partners or groups, they design a board game that reviews information from the war, including causes of the war and...

Caring, trustworthiness, and responsibility—these are only a few character traits in focus of a lesson based on stories from the Civil War era. Class members explore several influential lives while reading biographies that highlight...

A pet can offer comfort, friendship, and loyalty in the most stressful of situations. Here is a lesson plan that explores the important role animals played during the Civil War. Class members read informative texts, complete a KWL chart,...

Introduce a lesson on Civil War slang to your class of fresh fish. After looking at pictures from the Civil War and examining the list of slang terms, young historians write a letter to a family member as if they are a Union soldier or a...

Encourage class members to add expression and put themselves back in time during the Civil War with a reader's theater activity. The scripts include dialogue on what it was like for the Union and Confederate sides during this time.

To broaden their understanding of both the short term and long terms effects of the Civil War, class groups examine primary source materials and then assume the role of a family member and draft a letter to a soldier describing life at...

What is the sharecropping system? What role did it play in the post-Civil War economy of the South? Who were the sharecroppers? Who employed them? How were they paid? To answer these questions, kids examine a series of sharecropper...