American Civil Rights: Freedom Summer and Civil Rights Act 1964.

The Purpose of this lesson is to conduct an investigation into the events and impact of the Freedom Summer of 1964 and how this led to the introduction of the Civil Rights Act.

Lesson begins with a trailer for the film 'Freedom summer' as pupils enter class they will be handed the Louisiana literacy test to take when they sit down. This is a purposefully confusing text to stop black people from registering to vote.

Pupils are then introduced to the Mississippi murders though a clip from "Mississippi Burning' embedded - pupils are encouraged to write a series of questions they would like answered about these murders (they will then be able to answer these later in the lesson).

Pupils study the original information booklet appealing for volunteers to enrol in the freedom summer before using this to summarise what it was about. (extension activity included here for more-able pupils) Pupils reflect upon a source of evidence to see what they can infer from it about the events of the campaign.

After reflecting upon the evidence pupils will try to answer they questions they set themselves about the murders and how this again gained national attention - pupils will reflect upon an audio clip from part of a speech by President Kennedy to then discuss if he supported the Civil Rights Movement.

this can then lead the way for introducing the civil rights act of 1964 - pupils are set a homework to reflect upon to what extent it was successful (linked in with GCSE exam criteria)
All videos are embedded (links provided) further advice can be found in the description of the presentation.