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Additional Cost Description:

None

Upon completion of this course, students will be able to...

• Describe the eight major physical regions of Africa, as well as its relationship to the major bodies of water that surround it
• Recognize the scientific evidence of Africa as the cradle of civilization
• Explain the contributions and major characteristics of Egyptian society to Africa’s place as the origin of modern civilization
• Discuss how the West African kingdoms of Ghana and Mali established themselves and contributed to the economic and cultural development of the region
• Describe the development of the slave trade within Africa and the beginnings of the transatlantic slave trade
• Identify the steps of the transatlantic slave trade, including the triangular trade route, the involvement of local chiefs, the Middle Passage, and arrival in the Americas
• Discuss how slavery developed in the different geographic areas (Chesapeake, Lowcountry, and Northern colonies as well as Spanish Florida and French Louisiana)
• Identify how the Revolutionary activities happening in the colonies affected African Americans
• Discuss how Black Americans participated in the Revolutionary War and how that participation affected them
• Analyze how revolutionary ideals affected the anti-slavery movement
• Explain how slavery changed in the North and upper South states after the Revolutionary War
• Discuss what factors contributed to the growth of slavery in the Deep South
• Describe the emergence of the cotton culture in the South, including how it fueled the economy of the United States
• Explain what a day in the life of a slave in the South was like, including the types of tasks slaves were assigned
• Discuss the slave trade—how it was created, how it worked, the role of slave traders, and the family structures it was disrupting
• Analyze the environment in which free Blacks were living, including where they settled and the difficulties they encountered
• Describe the role of Black women in the abolitionist causes, as well as the three influential male abolitionists
• Explain the four key factors that led the United States to civil war
• Describe Abraham Lincoln’s attitude toward slavery and emancipation and how that changed over the course of the 1860s
• Explain how the Fugitive Slave Laws, Underground Railroad, and the Dred Scott decision fueled the tension between the North and South about slavery
• Describe the role of Black Americans in the Civil War
• Identify and explain the role of key African American leaders and groups before and during the Civil War
• Identify the ways that freed African Americans dealt with economic and social change, including employment and education
• Discuss the role of the Freedmen’s Bureau in the Reconstruction period
• Explain the role of the Black church in the creation of community and political leaders
• Describe the reaction of white Americans to the end of the war, including violence and Black codes
• Analyze how Congress and President Johnson influenced Reconstruction through the Reconstruction Acts
• Explain how the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Amendments affected the African American community
• Describe segregation and how the Plessy v. Ferguson decision contributed to it
• Explain the role that violence played in the lives of African Americans, including race riots and lynching, during this period
• Analyze the reasons behind the migration of African Americans to Africa, the western United States, and Southern cities, and the effects of that migration
• Discuss the role of sharecropping and its consequences to African Americans
• Express how the justice system was applied to African Americans, especially in the South
• Compare and contrast the two philosophies of African American progress, represented by Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. DuBois
• Explain the role of African American soldiers in the US Armed Forces from the Civil War to World War I
• Describe the reasons behind the Great Migration
• Identify the reasons behind the race riots between 1906-1923
• Analyze the differences between the mission of the NAACP and the UNIA
• Explain the roots of the Harlem Renaissance and the Jazz Age and identify a few of the major artists associated with it
• Describe the reasons behind the resurrection of the Ku Klux Klan and the changes in the organization during the 1920s
• Explain some of the causes of the Great Depression and why African Americans were heavily impacted
• Describe the steps the NAACP took during the 1930s to challenge racial inequality in schools
• Analyze how President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First New Deal affected African Americans
• Evaluate the role of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt in the cause of racial justice
• Explain how the Second New Deal changed the United States and offered opportunities to African Americans
• Describe the state of segregation in the military at the beginning of World War II and what steps were taken during the war to integrate the military
• Explain how Brown vs. the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, changed the face of segregation
• Describe what nonviolent resistance is and how African Americans used it in the Montgomery Bus Boycott, including the role of Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr.
• Analyze the Little Rock desegregation challenge and how it reflected the white backlash to the progress of African Americans
• Describe a few of the grassroots efforts toward progress, including sit-ins, freedom rides, and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)
• Discuss how the legal changes in the 1960s offered more opportunities for African Americans
• Analyze how the Black power and Black nationalism grew out of the civil rights movement and the reasons behind inner city violence during the late 1960s
• Trace the development of an increased political voice of African Americans from the local to the national level, including those who ran for president
• Identify how No Child Left Behind, the Welfare Reform Act, and affirmative action affects the lives of African Americans
• Analyze the ways in which African Americans have not yet reached economic equality with white Americans
• Explain how incarceration and police brutality continue to be an important issue in the African American community and the nation at large
• Discuss the challenges and divisions exposed by the 2016 election, along with the protests and reactions that occurred afterward

Unit 1: Africa

Unit 2: Slavery in America from Early Colonies to Independence

Unit 3: The Expansion of Slavery

Unit 4: African Americans and the Civil War

Unit 5: Freedom and Reconstruction

Unit 6: The Jim Crow Era

Unit 7: African Americans in the Early Twentieth Century

Unit 8: The Great Depression and World War II

Unit 9: Protest and Struggle in the Civil Rights Era

Unit 10: To the Present

Students will require a computer device with headphones, a microphone, webcam, up-to-date Chrome Web Browser, and access to YouTube.

Please review the Michigan Virtual Technology Requirements: https://michiganvirtual.org/about/support/knowledge-base/technical-requirements/