Exploring the Historical Maps of Colonial New England
Lesson Plans
The following activities are by grade level and are based on the maps analyzed for this project. When conducting activities using historical maps, always begin with a few questions, such as:
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Who created this map?
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Why is it important to know who made the map?
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What does the map show?
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What doesn't the map show?
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What does the map tell us about how the territory or country was organized?
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Who was this map intended for?
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How can we use this map to learn about the past?
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Activities are copyrighted and provided by the Norman B. Leventhal Map & Education Center
Grades 2- 4
Plymouth before the Pilgrims
Fifteen years before the Pilgrims arrived in Plymouth, Samuel de Champlain, a French explorer, mapped the area and called it Port St. Louis. The village that he mapped was a Wampanoag village of Pawtuxet. Champlain and later John Smith noted the thriving village. When the Pilgrims arrived 15 years later, much of the population had been decimated by disease.
Click on map for Lesson Plan
Grades 5 - 7
Mapping 17th Century
New England
Cartographic skills began to improve during the 17th century, and the Dutch were the best. The maps were still filled with exaggerations and inaccuracies, both intentional and unintentional. This lesson plan includes a mathematical component as students will learn how early cartographers began to employ scale and proportion into their maps.
Click on map for Lesson Plan
Grades 8 - 12
Click on map for Lesson Plan
Mapping British Imperialism
British cartography changed once again as their goals in North America changed. The British engaged in a "war of maps" with the French as they argued over boundaries in the Ohio River Valley as the British looked to expand their claims westward. Cartography became a tool that produced legal visual documents that argued their land claims and attempted to legitimize their westward expansion.
All Grades - Resources
Best Practices When Teaching About Native People and Displacement
All the maps reviewed in this project were created and produced from a European or Euro-American perspective and were further sponsored by those governments seeking to exploit the natural wealth and territories of North America. When reviewing the maps and their sources, please keep in mind the power dynamics that went into cartographic expression and the politics that the maps reflected
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"The perspective of Native populations in the 19th century cannot be properly told in maps, because Native concepts about land are not two-dimensional, and qualifying ownership with a paper document was an imported European concept. During the rapid expansion of the United States, the idea of Native homeland, a multi-layered place giving life, sustenance, language, spiritual communion, and kinship, would change to a theory that land is preordained to be “improved” or “developed” for the purpose of commodification. This was a near universal change from Native land management systems that had sustained populations for millennia."
Akomawt Educational Initiative
The Invasion of America website
American Indian Removal -Lesson Plan from the Smithsonian Institute
Which tribal space do you occupy?