Lesson 5: Founding of the Laurel Grove School and Other "Colored" Schools in Fairfax County, 1860-1890

Objectives

Students will: 

1.    Use secondary sources to identify the people who founded the Laurel Grove School, their motivations, and their resources.

2.    Identify both the barriers they faced in establishing these schools and how they dealt with these barriers.

3.    Examine and analyze primary sources including: a deed, a map, photos, a drawing, and first hand accounts to understand these “colored” school experiences.

Grade Level

4, 6 or 7, and 11

Duration

Estimated time is one, 1-hour lesson, but feel free to adapt this lesson to your needs.

NOTE to ES and MS teachers: Before teaching this lesson, look in your local (town, city or county) newspaper for articles, editorials, or letters to the editor about local school funding.  It will be useful to compare your local school funding issues to those of the Laurel Grove School and other "colored" schools in Fairfax County in the late 1800s.

Standards

Grade 4: Virginia Studies

VS.1 The student will develop skills for historical and geographical analysis and responsible citizenship, including the ability to: (a) identify and interpret artifacts and primary and secondary source documents to understand events in history; (e) make connections between past and present.

VS.8 The student will demonstrate knowledge of the reconstruction of Virginia following the Civil War by: (b) identifying the effects of segregation and "Jim Crow" on life in Virginia.

Grade 6 or 7: United States History II – 1865 to the Present

USII.1 The student will demonstrate skills for historical and geographical analysis and responsible citizenship, including the ability to: (a) analyze and interpret primary and secondary source documents to increase understanding of events and life in United States history from 1865 to the present; (b) make connections between past and present.

USII.4 The student will demonstrate knowledge of how life changed after the Civil War by: (c) describing racial segregation, the rise of "Jim Crow," and other constraints faced by African Americans in the post-Reconstruction South.

Grade 11: Virginia and United States History 

VUS.1 The student will demonstrate skills for historical and geographical analysis and responsible citizenship, including the ability to: (a) identify, analyze, and interpret primary and secondary source documents, records, and data, including artifacts, diaries, letters, photographs, journals, newspapers, historical accounts, and art to increase understanding of events and life in the United States; (g) apply geographic skills.

VUS.8 The student will demonstrate knowledge of how the nation grew and changed from the end of Reconstruction through the early twentieth century by: (c) analyzing prejudice and discrimination during this time period, with emphasis on "Jim Crow."