Abstract/Rationale
As a math teacher, my original intention was to create a MS Excel lesson related to population data on the movement of African-Americans over roughly a 75-100 year period. I soon realized that data in isolation is as useless as math operations without a story.  So, my objective expanded to include fostering an understanding in my students of the events and conditions under which the movement North took place. This new objective resulted in the development of Lesson 1, Shall  Be..Forever Free slideshow and refelction journal. My goal was to keep primary source images the centerpiece of the show. With this in mind I tried to include only a minimal amount of text...hopefully, just enough to set the scene for the images. Lesson 2, requiring the creation of a journal cover, is the culminating activity for the slideshow experience and incorporates the graphic elements of MS Word.  This lesson also provides a great opportunity for the students to experience for themselves the host of primary sources available at the Library of Congress website. Finally, in the Lesson 3 the students view actual population statistics using primary sources from the U.S. Department of Census as well as the Library of Congress. They design and create a spreadsheet that includes formulas and use a MS Excel Wizard to create an appropriate graph from their data. You may access each lesson plan from the links below.