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The Transatlantic Slave Trade

Driving Question: What were the causes and effects of the Atlantic slaving system?

From the sixteenth to nineteenth centuries, the transatlantic slave trade enslaved and transported over 12.5 million Africans to the Americas. Millions died on this “Middle Passage.” For those who survived, other horrors awaited as they were sold into slavery to spend their lives working on plantations.

Learning Objectives:

  1. Understand and critique the motives and justifications for the transatlantic slave trade.
  2. Practice quick sourcing to assess first-person accounts of those involved in the transatlantic slave trade.
  3. Use a graphic biography to support, extend, or challenge the overarching narratives from this time period.
STEP 1

Opener: The Transatlantic Slave Trade

The horror enslaved people endured in the transatlantic slave trade is beyond imagining. Reading the worlds written by those who survived can help you begin to understand.

STEP 2

The Transatlantic Slave Trade

Teaching Tools

Need a way to give students feedback on their sourcing skills? Check out this Sourcing Feedback Form.

In this article and source collection, you’ll see how Europeans became very wealthy—at the expense of societies in Africa and the Americas—and how enslaved people experienced this system.

STEP 3

The Middle Passage

Teaching Tools

Check out the OER Project Video Guide for help incorporating best practices when using video in your classroom.

Sometimes, when we focus on smaller scales, we can see the big picture more clearly. We’ll adjust our lenses to focus on a region in Africa and the life of one enslaved man to understand how the slave trade affected the entire continent.

Impact of the Slave Trade: Through a Ghanaian Lens External link

How did the Atlantic slave trade impact Africa? We can study a smaller region to try to determine bigger answers.

Key Ideas

As this video progresses, key ideas will be introduced to invoke discussion.
STEP 4

Closer: The Transatlantic Slave Trade