Mapping the United States during The Civil War

I did an inquiry unit teaching students what states were part of the south or the confederacy and what was a part of the north or the union. We talked what state Wisconsin would be and how on record Wisconsin only had 1 slave but, it is still considered a free state. We talked about how California and Oregon was a union state. This was a huge challenge for students!

I gave students a double sided worksheet with the same exact map from 1861 on it. On the front I told my students to work in their pods and collaborate with one another about which states would be considered a part of the north and apart of the south. Again California and Oregon was the main debate for my pods. Then after giving my students time to color and talk about each state as a whole group we went through the states.

I created a large version of their map to color along with them and show them the correct states. I colored northern states blue and southern states red (I gave these same directions to students as well. So as I colored my states in the students did the same on the back of their worksheet so then they had a correct map of the United States during 1861.

So I would point to states and have students volunteer and tell me what they thought the state was. Again this led to GREAT discussions as a whole group. Many students thought that California was both and split down the middle. I then explained how they did not want to expand slavery anymore so any new states like California and Oregon would be free states and apart of the union. My students totally understood this concept once I explained it to them.

My students really enjoyed this lesson and were able to ask tons of questions and correct any misconceptions they had. We also compared our map of 1861 to our current map of the united states and talked about what states were missing. I personally loved teaching this lesson and again my students asked so many great questions :)