Lesson Overview:
Using songs popular during the Civil War, students will identify songs as rallying songs, recruiting songs, popular entertainment songs, campfire songs, sentimental songs, or patriotic songs. Students will compare and contrast songs from the North and from the South, then choose a Civil War song to perform using voice or an instrument.
Length of Lesson:
Two 45-minute class periods
Notes:
This lesson is particularly suitable for grades 5-6.
Instructional Objectives:
Students will:
- compare and contrast lyrics of Civil War songs of the North and the South.
- identify if a song is intended as a rallying song, recruiting song, popular entertainment song, campfire song, sentimental song, or patriotic song.
- identify primary and secondary sources of archival material using the Internet.
- interpret a Civil War song through performance by use of voice or instrument.
Supplies:
- Sound system
- Listening examples of Civil War period music
- The words to Stephen Collins Foster's "Oh! Susanna."
- Instruments to play a tune on, such as keyboards, guitar, trumpet, harmonica, and snare drum.
- Paper or journal for note taking, pencil or pen
Instructional Plan:
Warm Up
Have students listen to and sing along to "Oh! Susanna" by Stephen Collins Foster, a popular dance duirng the Civil War.
Have students complete the True or False Quiz handout.
Distribute the accompanying Answers handout to the True or False Quiz handout to the students.
Directed Instruction
Discuss how the Civil War was the first American War to have a large amount of archival material from all groups of people. According to the Library of Congress Web site Words and Deeds in American History, nearly everyone kept journals, from soldiers and generals, to slaves and slave owners, to people in the cities, towns, and farms used as battlefields. Photographs and lithographs depicted the horrors of battles. Letters and songs were written and preserved in families as legacies of the sacrifices made. Many of these records were eventually handed over to libraries, museums, universities, historical societies, and historical sites. They became primary sources for future generations to try to understand and still debate the events of the Civil War.
Discuss "Oh! Susanna" and how music can play an important part as a messenger of the past. We can read the lyrics, hear the music, and play the songs written over 135 years ago. Through music, people separated by hundreds of years can share a special connection and discover the stories and personal journeys of each other.
Explain to students that they will explore four other songs of the Civil War: "Lincoln and Liberty," "We Are Coming Home Father Abraham," "The Battle Cry of Freedom," and "Tenting Tonight or Tenting on the Old Camp Ground."
Have students search for one of these songs using the Web sites listed in the Sources section of this document.
Have them record the lyrics and lyricist on the Civil War Music Data Sheet.
Familiarize students with the following symbols, items, and their meaning: the Union Flag, the Confederate Flag, and basic conflicts between the North and the South. Students will compare two versions of the same song, "The Battle Cry of Freedom." Both the North and South used this song during the Civil War. Compare and contrast the two versions using the interactive Venn Diagram.
Students should recognize whether the source is a primary or secondary source (real sheet or just a print of lyrics).
Some Web sites let you see the notes of the tune. Some sites will play the tune. If possible, students should try to play the tune.
Have students classify the song as a rallying song, a recruiting song, a popular entertainment song, campfire song, sentimental song, or patriotic song. Students should explain why it is one of these with two supporting points.
Have students locate four more songs. Each must be different. Students should find a Union song, a Confederate song, a song that was changed, and a song enjoyed by both. Repeart previous steps as necessary.
Have students choose songs to perform as soloists or in groups. They may be sung or performed on
instruments.
Assessment:
Use the Assessment Rubric to assess your students' works.
Extensions:
Students may perform more than one song. Each of the pieces may be recorded and used as a reference for others. Students can compare the songs of the Civil War with songs of the Revolution, World War I, World War II, or the Vietnam era.
Sources:
Print:
- Agay, Denes. Best Loved Songs of the American People. Doubleday
& Company, 1975.
- Bolotin, Norman and Herb, Angela. For Home and Country: A Civil War Scrapbook. Lodestar Books, 1995.
- Damon, Duane. When This Cruel War is Over—The Civil War Home Front. Lerner Publications, 1996.
- Hesse, Karen. Dear America: A Light in the Storm, Civil War Diary of Amilia Martin. Scholastic Press,1999.
- Naden, Corinne J.and Blue, Rose. Why Fight? The Causes of the American Civil WarRaintree Steck-Vaughn Publishers, 2000.
- Smith, Carter. Behind the Lines—A Sourcebook on the Civil War. The Millbrook Press, 1993.
Web:
Authors:
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Mary Beth Bauernschub, Teacher
Kingsford Elementary School
Mitchellville, MD
