Unit Central Questions:
What do primary and secondary sources teach us about the characteristics of “everyday life” of individuals living in Deerfield at the three turns of the centuries? What do these characteristics reveal about changes in the town since its beginning as an English settlement?
Key Content Ideas
English settlers were concerned with elemental survival on the frontier. Daily life was influenced by ever-present concerns for security from attacks by Indigenous warriors and the French.
Intended Learning Outcomes
Understandings:
Students will understand:
- That Deerfield was on the frontier of English settlement, that the town was directly involved in the conflicts between the English, French, and Native Americans , and that Deerfield was the site of an attack in 1704, when some of the residents were captured by Indigenous soldiers allied with the French, and taken on foot to Canada.
Skills:
Students will be able to:
- Read and extract information from background reading materials.
In Preparation for Teaching
1. Read and copy Relationship between the English, the French, and the Native Peoples
Activities
- Distribute background essay and instruct students to read the first paragraph without taking notes. Then ask them to re-read the paragraph, underlining key ideas.
- Instruct students to write down and then look up any words or phrases that are unclear.
- Instruct students to read the rest of the essay, following the steps above.
- Discuss the reading and ask them to assist with creating a list of key ideas.
- Ask them to think of questions that they might want answered about what everyday life was like for the English settlers. Create a poster listing these questions. Have students copy these into their social studies notebooks as well, leaving a space after each to fill in an answer when they find one.
- Instruct students to keep a separate page in their notebooks for listing any other questions that occur to them during work on the activities.
Homework Assignment
- Instruct students to reread the essay.
- Ask students to make lists in their social studies notebooks of five important ideas they found.
Assessments
social studies notebooks, artifact drawings and labels, and the final version of the diary entry
