Monday, September 17, 2007

Takaki Ch 3

It turns out that before the slavery that we all commonly study in our history classes, slavery in the United States has not always been tied to race. In fact for a long time, as Takaki explains in Chapter 3, it was tied to religion. I think that students would be very surprised to hear about the Irish slave trade, and more specifically, the differences and similarities between European and African slaves in the early days in the colonies. To teach this, I think it would be effective to have students re-read with this in mind. What was different about the lifestyle of European and African slaves? Students will go back through the first 10 pages of Chapter 3 and in one color, highlight all of the statements that pertain only to European servants and slaves, then all of the important statements that pertain to only African servants and slaves in another color, and finally in a third color, highlight all of the important statements that pertained to the lifestyle and treatment of both European and African servants and slaves. I would then have the students break up into groups in and discuss the different things they highlighted for the three groupings, and then come to a consensus as a group. We would then, as a class, make a large venn-diagram (Europeans on one side, Africans on the other, and the commonalities in the middle). I think this would provide the students with an interesting look at how slavery started in this country and how it became a racist institution through a progression of events in the early years, which is documented well by Takaki. This is using to some extent the learning process of Aaron Barnett when it comes to separating the reading by topics and then understanding each before you move on.

2 comments:

Dr. Adrea said...

Like the idea of having them highlight in different colors according to group. Is there any supporting evidence to get students to promote the progression? -Scott has found particular quotes to highlight commonalities between groups.

Dr. Adrea said...

Graphic organizers also work well.