Curated OER
Slave Life on George Washington’s Mount Vernon Plantation
Eleventh graders investigate slave life on the Mount Vernon Plantation. In this slavery instructional activity, 11th graders examine photographs of and documents about George Washington's home as they participate in classroom station...
Curated OER
Southern Society during the Civil War: Black Society
Students research and discuss the societal changes during the Civil War as it relates to various parts of southern society. In this southern society during the civil war lesson, students examine what life was like for slaves during the...
Curated OER
Harriet Tubman Integrated Unit: Lesson 3
Students explore African spirituals. In this slavery lesson plan, students listen to and analyze the spiritual song "Wade in the Water" line by line. Students share their interpretations with their classmates.
University of Virginia
Virginia Center for Digital History: The Geography of Slavery in Virginia
A digital collection of advertisements for runaway and captured slaves in the period before the American Civil War. In addition, there are historical documents related to slavery. Gives the option of browsing or doing a detailed search....
PBS
Pbs: Scientific American Frontiers: Unearthing Secret America
The fun part of history is finding the clues that unlock the secrets of the past. This is the companion site to the TV show with Alan Alda that features archeological discoveries. Students will find interesting lessons from the past on...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: America in Class: Slavery and the Family Life of the Enslaved
A lesson that looks at how slavery impacted on the slaves' family lives in the United States.
Google Cultural Institute
Google Cultural Institute: A Slave Pen Journey
Take an online journey through a Kentucky slave pen in the 1830s.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: An Enslaved Person's Life, Making of African American Identity
Various photographs of slaves from the pre-Civil War era, an autobiographical narrative of slavery, and three accounts recorded in the 1930s of the lives and conditions of former slaves are included in this large set of information...
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: The Enslaved Family, Making of African American Identity: Vol. 1
This site offers two letters and a memoir from the mid-nineteenth century, and interviews from the early-twentieth century, about the importance and the roles of enslaved families.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Emancipation: Death as Freedom
A poem, narratives, and newspaper selections that examine black suicide and death generally as the only dependable source of freedom for slaves. This grim resource provides links to two separate accounts of these experiences.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Toolbox Library: Harriet Jacobs: "Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl," 1861
Several chapters from a slave narrative by Harriet Jacobs examining her abuse, her integrity, and her eventual escape from brutality, all of which raise important questions about power, equality, and gender roles in the mid-nineteenth...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Neh: Edsit Ement: Slave Narratives: Analyzing Primary Sources
The main focus of this lesson plan is to help students gain more knowledge about slavery and understand that no. There are links to sites with slave narratives that can be copied and analyzed in class.
National Humanities Center
National Humanities Center: Teacher Serve: How Slavery Affected African American Families
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill professor Heather Andrea Williams discusses the lives of enslaved African American families and how slavery made their lives different from other families.
Independence Hall Association
U.s. History: Slave Life and Slave Codes
A description of what life was like for slaves on plantations in the South. See the difference in treatment betwee field slaves and domestic slaves. and find examples of laws enacted under slave codes in several states.
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation
Colonial Williamsburg: To Live Like a Slave
A great article written by a modern African American woman who reenacted her ancestor's life of slavery. Pictures and great insight into the life of a slave.
PBS
Wnet: Thirteen: Slavery & Making of America: The Slave Experience: Men, Women & Gender
Learn about issues related to slave gender roles at this PBS series site that features illustrations and documents dating back to the Colonial, Antebellum, and Reconstruction periods in American history.
Other
Antebellum Slavery: Non Plantation Slavery
Resource provides information on slave life outside of the traditional plantation life, and discusses slave labor and their occupations.
Texas State Library and Archives Commission
Texas State Library and Archives Commission: The 1860s: To Be a Slave
Here is a very brief description of what life was like for slaves before the Emancipation Proclamation. Includes a photo of a slave named Washington Edwards, who was brought to Texas before the Mexican War.