The Union As It Was

Lesson Plan

Activity 1: Review Students’ Reflections on Freedom

Before students explore the materials in this lesson, it is important that they review their reflections and takeaways from Lesson 2: Defining Freedom. Ask students to review their class materials from that lesson, especially the identity chart for freedom they created on Day 2. Then have students choose one of the characteristics of freedom on the chart and write for a few minutes about how that aspect of freedom has been present in their lives, or how they are striving for it.

Activity 2: Review Johnson’s Plan for Reconstruction

Before students explore primary source documents about the experiences of freedpeople under Presidential Reconstruction, share the following information about President Andrew Johnson’s Reconstruction plan in a brief mini-lecture.

• Andrew Johnson’s Presidential Reconstruction policies addressed dilemmas over land rights and economic justice that arose from the end of the Civil War by stipulating that all land and property (except, of course, slaves) be returned to former Confederates who pledged loyalty to the Union. 
• As a result of Presidential Reconstruction policies, by the fall of 1865 most Southern legislatures passed laws severely restricting the freedom of Black Southerners to negotiate the terms of their labor. Known as “Black Codes,” these laws required all Black people, whether free or slave before the Civil War, to sign annual labor contracts with white employers. If they did not, or if they did not fulfill the terms of these contracts, they would be deemed vagrants and fined or imprisoned.
• Education was one area in which freedpeople made notable progress during Presidential Reconstruction. Freedpeople created an estimated 500 schools in the South, supporting 125,000 students, without assistance from state or federal governments. The schools were in addition to the government-funded schools, numbering more than 1,000, established in the South by the Freedmen’s Bureau in the late 1860s.

Activity 3: Explore the Experiences of Freedpeople Under Reconstruction

After reviewing the policies of Presidential Reconstruction, break into small groups of 3–4 students and assign each group one of the following readings: 

• Freedpeople Protest the Loss of their Land
• A Right to the Land
• He Was Always Right and You Were Always Wrong
• Excerpt from Mississippi Black Codes (1865)
• Freedmen’s Bureau Agent Reports on Progress in Education

Students should consider what the document tells them about whether or not freedpeople were truly free under Presidential Reconstruction. They should record in their journals evidence that shows whether or not the experiences of freedpeople were meeting their aspirations for equal rights, land, and education. When students discover that freedpeople’s experiences fell short of their aspirations, they should describe in their journals the obstacles that prevented the realization of those aspirations. When students discover that freedpeople were making progress toward their aspirations, they should describe in their journals the factors that helped them do so.

Activity 4: Lead a Barometer Activity about the Extent to Which Freedpeople Were Actually Free

After an analysis of the documents in this lesson, the Barometer teaching strategy can help students synthesize and share their thinking about what they have learned about the state of freedom experienced by freedpeople while Presidential Reconstruction policies were in place. This activity will force students to take and explain a position on the extent to which freedpeople were truly free.

Create a continuum in your classroom by posting signs that read “Strongly Agree” and “Strongly Disagree” at opposite ends of the room. Then read the following statement: Under Presidential Reconstruction, freedpeople were not free. Give students a few minutes to review the evidence from the documents that they recorded in their journals and decide on the extent to which they agree or disagree with the statement. Then have them stand along the continuum between the two signs to indicate their responses. Once students have taken their positions, call on several students to explain their position, using evidence from the documents. Allow students who are persuaded by the arguments of their classmates to change their positions throughout the activity.

Activity 5: Return to the Meaning of Freedom

Close the lesson by asking students to respond to the following prompts in their journals: 

• How did this lesson impact your ideas about freedom? 
• Did your ideas change or evolve? If so, how? 
• Were your ideas reinforced? If so, how? 

Also invite students to add to or revise the identity charts for the concept of freedom that they created in Lesson 2.