Before, During, and After the Emancipation Proclamation Lesson Plan: A Slave's View
By Debbie Dickerson

Overview

This lesson challenges students to investigate the Emancipation Proclamation, the events that led to it, and the cultural climate that followed it. Students will analyze the ramifications of these events while gaining background information about the Civil War and President Lincoln. After reading personal accounts from slaves who survived these events, students will write a journal containing three entries reflecting different time periods: one before, one during, and one after the legal abolition of slavery. Students also will experience the "Roads to Freedom Online Exhibit" for more information on emancipation and other paths to freedom taken by the enslaved.

Curriculum Standards

For a list of standards that this unit addresses, click here.

Time required

Approximately one week, depending on computer accessibility and the depth of the students' research.

Materials

• Access to the Internet for students


• Roads to Freedom Online Exhibit

The Lesson

1. First, have students experience the "Roads to Freedom Online Exhibit", as they will need some background knowledge to begin the lesson.



2. Discuss the various paths the enslaved took to gain their freedom. Students then should go to the Civil War Battles link at:
   http://www.worldbookonline.com/wb/Article?id/=ar117060&st=Civil+War
   --click on 1863, then click on Gettysburg to learn about this three-day battle.



3. So they can learn more about Lincoln himself, have students click on the Civil War Leaders link on the left side of the screen. This is a great biography of Lincoln and gives some insight into the political and social climate during his lifetime.



4. Then, ask students go to the site http://www.nps.gov/ncro/anti/emancipation.html to see the actual text of the Emancipation Proclamation, which will help them understand what Lincoln was trying to accomplish.



5. At these sites, students will gain the information they need to learn more about the cultural climate before, during, and after the Emancipation Proclamation. These sites act as a textbook or other traditional resource in helping students get the background knowledge they need to understand and complete their assignment.

Procedures

1. After completing the "Anticipatory Set," outline the assignment for students. First, have a brief discussion about the information they learned. Make sure these topics are discussed:


• The North entered the Civil War to reunite the nation not to end slavery.



• Lincoln was torn between his view that slavery was wrong and the fact that four slave-owning border states--Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri--would secede if he adopted a policy against slavery.



• Lincoln issued an earlier proclamation stating that, if the rebelling states didn't return to the Union by January 1, 1863, their slaves would be "forever free." The states didn't return, so Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation that same day.



• As Lincoln had hoped, the Emancipation Proclamation strengthened the North's war effort as many slaves fled the South and joined the Army and Navy from the North. About 200,000 black soldiers and sailors, many of them former slaves, served in the military for the North.



• Some states, like Texas, just ignored the Emancipation Proclamation and didn't enforce it until two years later on "Juneteenth," the oldest known celebration commemorating the ending of slavery in the United States.


2. Have students go to the following web site containing personal narratives from slaves living during this time: http://www.spartacus.schoolnet.co.uk/USASrunaways.htm. Direct students to read the narratives (by clicking on that person's link) and choose one of the following people to write about:
   
   
   • Walter Hawkins
   • Henry Bill
   • Moses Grandy
   • Francis Fredric
   • Moses Roper
   
   
3. After they have chosen whom to write about, direct students to write three journal entries in first person perspectives--as if the student is the journal writer--as follows:


• Date the first entry before the Emancipation Proclamation and briefly include the person's history and some insight into their experiences at that time.


• Have the second entry be during the time of the Emancipation Proclamation. The writer could be hearing of it from another slave, from a newspaper account, or from Lincoln himself.


• Date the third entry after the Emancipation Proclamation and be sure to include some of the effects of the new policy, as well as how the writer's life has changed because of it. Students will have to build on the person they have read about and add other historical facts they have learned, as it would have happened. Some of it will have to be fictional, but the historical information should be based on documented facts.

Assessment

Journal entries need to follow the format for writing a journal entry and be written in complete paragraphs using good word choice, organization, sentence fluency, and conventions. Students also need to record their sources in a bibliography.

Related Works

The following books could be used to further the study of the Civil War:

• Civil War: A Narrative by Shelby Foote
• Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation by Allen C. Guelzo
• When I Was a Slave: Memoirs from the Slave Narrative Collection by Norman R. Yetman (editor), Federal Writers' Project

This lesson was submitted by Debbie Dickerson, a Government teacher in Topeka, Kansas.