Provide hands-on activities for practice and mastery. Check for understanding of concepts and skills by using relevant standard materials, i.e. worksheets, text problems, workbooks, teacher prepared exercises, etc.

Teacher and student selected investigations of Antebellum Society.

Objective: To reinforce the unit concepts and to provide opportunities for students to engage in historical research.

Activity: 1) Teacher selected activities structured to provide opportunities for students to practice the skills of information acquisition, information processing, and historical interpretation. For example: a) Visit a plantation site, e.g., Somerset Place located in Creswell, N.C. and/or b) Explore life on the Chicora Wood Plantation using the primary source documents contained in an activity packet compiled by Fay Metcalf. See bibliography. c) Read Abraham Lincoln's essay, "On Defining Liberty" and his speech, "A House Divided"; have students construct a graphic organizer comparing the divergent viewpoints of an abolitionist and a proponent of slavery. 2) History Lab Establish a variety of learning stations supplied with learning materials that will allow students in small work groups or individually to expand their conceptual knowledge and to experiment with the work of history. The stations should include a wide selection of materials and questions or discussion starters such as: a) A collection of maps depicting the concentration of slave populations from 1820 to 1860 and the areas where various crops such as rice and cotton were produced. Ask students to draw conclusions about the relationship between the concentration of slave populations and the production of a given crop. b) Statistical data such as population distribution charts for each state showing the percentage of white, slave, and free black inhabitants. Based on this data, which states would most strongly favor the preservation or abolition of slavery? c) Diaries, letters and other personal items representing a particular point of view, e.g., slave narratives and the diary of Mary Chesnutt. d) Public and private estate documents, e.g., copy of the slave codes for various slave states, bills of sale for slaves bought and sold. e) Photographs depicting various aspects of slave culture. f) Recordings of spirituals and other period music. g) Literary collections, e.g., fictional and non-fictional accounts of slavery and plantation life, e.g., Uncle Tom's Cabin, published speeches of various abolitionist and proponents of slavery. As students work through the materials, facilitate their exploration through open-ended questions. Provide opportunities for brief mini-conferences in which you encourage your student historians to share some new insight or interest gleaned from the history lab. Student choice is paramount in lab activities to ensure balance between teacher direction and student initiative. 3) In cooperative groups, students construct web charts on slavery and antebellum society. Students post and share web charts.

Assessment: Quality of individual and group work, individual contributions to the web charts, and engagement of students with choice activities.