Overview

Lesson Procedure

60-75 minutes of class time across 5 phases.

1. Warm-Up5-10 minutes
2. Direct Instruction20 minutes
3. Guided Practice15 minutes
4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes
5. Closure5-10 minutes

1. Warm-Up5-10 minutes

   Start with two words students already use in a different sense.

   Warm-Up Prompt

   "Read each pair of sentences. 'We had cake at my cousin's birthday party.' 'The senator changed her political party.' 'I keep my cereal in the kitchen cabinet.' 'The President met with the cabinet before the speech.' What does each word mean in each sentence? What words nearby told you?"

   Take answers, then name the idea: many words have an everyday meaning and a special meaning in history and government. The special meanings are domain-specific vocabulary, words with a particular meaning in one field of study (here a political party is a group that shares political goals, and a cabinet is the group of the President's top advisers). Readers find the right meaning from the context, the words and sentences around a word. Today students work out words and phrases in sources about the fight over British taxes in the American colonies, 1765-1774.

2. Direct Instruction20 minutes

   Part 1: The source. H. E. Marshall wrote This Country of Ours (1917), a history of the United States for young readers. Source 1 is her account of the Stamp Act of 1765, a British law that taxed the colonies. It is a secondary source: Marshall wrote it about 150 years after the events. Gloss before reading: "Parliament" (Great Britain's lawmaking body), "pence" and "pounds" (British money), "henceforth" (from now on).

   1All these wars which had been fought on American soil had cost a great deal of money and many lives. Now it seemed to the British Government that the best way to be sure of peace in the future was to keep an army in America. They decided to do this. They also decided that America should pay for the army. And in order to raise the money a stamp tax was to be introduced. Newspapers, marriage licenses, wills, and all sorts of legal papers were henceforth to be printed on stamped paper, the price of stamps varying according to the importance of the paper from a few pence to as many pounds.

   2But when the Americans heard that this Act had been passed without their consent they were angry.

   3"No," they said to the British Government, "you cannot tax us without our consent. It is one of the foundations of British freedom that those who pay the tax must also consent to it. We are not represented in the British Parliament, our consent has not been asked, and we deny your right to tax us."

   4The whole country was filled with clamour. In every colony young men banded themselves together, calling themselves Sons of Liberty, and determined to resist the tax. "No taxation without representation" was the cry.

   5When the first boxes of stamps arrived they were seized and destroyed. Newspapers appeared with a skull and crossbones printed where the stamp should have been. There were riots and mass meetings everywhere.

   6The Americans did not merely resist, they resisted in a body. Nothing but the idea that their liberty was in danger made them act together. Over everything else they had been divided. Over that they were united. "There ought to be no New England men, no New Yorkers, known on the continent," said one man; "but all of us Americans."

   Part 2: Four steps for an unfamiliar word or phrase. Put these on the board and keep them up all period.

   Four steps for finding what a word means in a text

   Step	What to do	Example from Source 1
   1. Read around it	Read the whole sentence and the ones before and after	"clamour" is followed by riots and mass meetings (paragraphs 4-5)
   2. Find a clue	Look for an example, a restatement, a contrast or a result	"in a body" is restated as "act together" (paragraph 6)
   3. Check the parts	Look for a prefix, root or suffix you know	"represented" has re- (again) and present
   4. Test it	Put your meaning in place of the word and reread; check a dictionary for the sense that fits	"this law had been passed" (paragraph 2)

   • An example clue (Source 1, paragraph 1)

     What are the "legal papers" that had to be printed on stamped paper, and what does "stamp tax" mean here?

     Result: The sentence lists examples before the phrase: "Newspapers, marriage licenses, wills, and all sorts of legal papers." So legal papers are official documents such as licenses and wills. A stamp tax is a tax paid by buying government-stamped paper for those documents; the price of the stamp was the tax. The stamp is not a postage stamp.

   • Domain-specific words: "consent" and "represented" (Source 1, paragraph 3)

     What do the colonists mean by "We are not represented in the British Parliament"?

     Result: Consent is agreement or permission: "those who pay the tax must also consent to it." To be represented in Parliament is to have members of your own there who speak and vote for you. The colonists elected no members of Parliament, so, they argued, Parliament had no right to tax them. The slogan "No taxation without representation" (paragraph 4) packs the whole argument into four words.

   • A multiple-meaning word: "Act" (Source 1, paragraph 2)

     In "this Act had been passed without their consent," does "Act" mean a deed, a part of a play, or something else?

     Result: Here an Act is a law passed by Parliament. The clues are "passed" (laws are passed) and the capital letter, which shows it is the name of a law, the Stamp Act. Test it: "this law had been passed without their consent" makes sense. Diagram 2 shows the two meanings side by side.

   • A phrase with a special meaning: "in a body" (Source 1, paragraph 6)

     What does Marshall mean by "they resisted in a body"?

     Result: The next sentences restate it: "Nothing but the idea that their liberty was in danger made them act together. Over everything else they had been divided. Over that they were united." So "in a body" means together, as one group, not one colony at a time. The contrast between "divided" and "united" confirms the meaning.

   • A word from what follows it: "clamour" (Source 1, paragraphs 4-5)

     What does "The whole country was filled with clamour" mean?

     Result: Clamour (the British spelling of clamor) means loud, angry protest. The clues come after the word: young men "determined to resist the tax," the cry "No taxation without representation," stamps "seized and destroyed," and "riots and mass meetings everywhere." A dictionary lists "a loud outcry or protest," the sense that fits.

   Show Diagram 1, which names the four kinds of context clue used in these examples, and Diagram 2, which shows the test for a word with two meanings.

3. Guided Practice15 minutes

   Source 2 is a primary source. In February 1766, Benjamin Franklin, then in London as an agent for Pennsylvania, answered questions in the House of Commons, the elected part of Parliament, about the Stamp Act. "Q." is a member's question and "A." is Franklin's answer. Pairs work out five phrases with the four steps: "lay taxes" (paragraph 1), "regulate commerce" (paragraph 2), "found your opinion" (paragraph 3), "act of assembly" (paragraph 5) and "unanimous" (paragraph 6).

   1Q. Was it an opinion in America before 1763, that the parliament had no right to lay taxes and duties there?

   2A. I never heard any objection to the right of laying duties to regulate commerce, but a right to lay internal taxes was never supposed to be in parliament, as we are not represented there.

   3Q. On what do you found your opinion, that the people in America made any such distinction?

   4A. I know that whenever the subject has occurred in conversation where I have been present, it has appeared to be the opinion of every one, that we could not be taxed in a parliament where we were not represented. But the payment of duties laid by act of parliament as regulations of commerce, was never disputed.

   5Q. But can you name any act of assembly, or public act of any of your governments, that made such distinction?

   6A. I do not know that there was any; I think there was never an occasion to make any such act, till now that you have attempted to tax us: that has occasioned resolutions of assembly, declaring the distinction, in which I think every assembly on the continent, and every member in every assembly, have been unanimous.

   Teacher model for the pair work: To "lay taxes" is to put taxes on people; lay here does not mean to set something down. Duties laid "to regulate commerce" (paragraph 2) are taxes used to control trade; paragraph 4 restates the idea as "duties laid by act of parliament as regulations of commerce." The word "but" in paragraph 2 sets duties against "internal taxes," so internal taxes are a different kind; Franklin explains the difference later in his answers. "On what do you found your opinion" asks on what Franklin bases his opinion; found here means base, not discover. An "act of assembly" is a law passed by a colony's own lawmaking body, since each colony had an elected assembly. "Unanimous" means all in agreement, as the restatement shows: "every assembly on the continent, and every member in every assembly."

4. Independent Practice15-20 minutes

   Students read two more sources, then answer the quiz, which uses both. As they read, they underline each word or phrase they are unsure of and write the clue they used in the margin. Source 3 is a later part of Franklin's answers. Source 4 is the next part of Marshall's chapter; it begins just after William Pitt, a British leader, spoke in Parliament against the Stamp Act. Gloss "Lieutenant Governor" (the royal official acting for the governor of Massachusetts) and "Old South Church" (a large meeting house in Boston).

   1Q. You say the colonies have always submitted to external taxes, and object to the right of parliament only in laying internal taxes; now can you show, that there is any kind of difference between the two taxes to the colony on which they may be laid?

   2A. I think the difference is very great. An external tax is a duty laid on commodities imported; that duty is added to the first cost and other charges on the commodity, and, when it is offered to sale, makes a part of the price. If the people do not like it at that price, they refuse it; they are not obliged to pay it. But an internal tax is forced from the people without their consent, if not laid by their own representatives. The stamp act says, we shall have no commerce, make no exchange of property with each other, neither purchase nor grant, nor recover debts; we shall neither marry nor make our wills, unless we pay such and such sums; and thus it is intended to extort our money from us, or ruin us by the consequences of refusing to pay it.

   [...]

   3Q. Do not the resolutions of the Pensylvania assembly say--all taxes?

   4A. If they do, they mean only internal taxes; the same words have not always the same meaning here and in the colonies. By taxes they mean internal taxes; by duties they mean customs; these are their ideas of the language.

   1There were many against Pitt, but he won the day, and the Stamp Act was repealed.

   2There was great rejoicing in America, and the matter seemed at an end. But the very next year a new bill for taxing the Americans was brought into Parliament. This time the tax was to be paid on tea, glass, lead and a few other things brought into the country.

   3Once again the colonies were ablaze, and they refused to pay this duty just as they had refused to pay the Stamp Tax. Everywhere there were indignation meetings. But Boston seemed to be the heart of the storm, and to Boston British troops were sent to keep order.

   4The soldiers had nothing to do, but the very sight of their red coats made the colonists angry. They taunted the soldiers, and worried them every way they knew, and the soldiers were not slow to reply. So at last after eighteen months of bickering one March evening it came to blows. Two or three exasperated soldiers fired upon the crowd of citizens, five of whom were killed and several others wounded.

   5This was afterwards known as the Boston Massacre. It made the people terribly angry, and next day a great meeting was held in Old South Church. At this meeting the people demanded that the troops should be at once removed from the town. And seeing the temper of the people the Lieutenant Governor withdrew them that same day to a little island in the harbour.

   6And now finding how useless it was to try to force taxes on unwilling subjects, the Government removed all the taxes except one. King George wanted to show his power. He wanted to prove to the Americans that he had the right to tax them if he liked. So he insisted that there should still be a tax on tea.

5. Closure5-10 minutes

   Exit ticket: On an index card, choose one word or phrase from Source 1 or Source 2 that you did not know before today. Write its meaning as it is used in the source, the clue that helped you, and one sentence of your own that uses it the same way.

   Teacher note on the sources and their language: The passages are quoted exactly, with Marshall's British spellings (clamour, harbour, centre, organised) and the 1806 edition's spellings ("Pensylvania"). The words in quotation marks in Source 1, paragraph 3, are Marshall's summary of what the colonists argued, not a quotation from a document. The "one man" in paragraph 6 is usually identified as Christopher Gadsden of South Carolina, speaking at the Stamp Act Congress in 1765. The taxes on tea, glass and lead in Source 4, paragraph 2, are the Townshend duties of 1767, and the shooting in Source 4, paragraph 4, took place on March 5, 1770. Marshall wrote for children in 1917 and states some judgments as facts, for example about what King George "wanted"; discuss these as her interpretation. None of the passages contains a slur.

   Homework passage. Source 5 opens Marshall's next chapter, on the first Continental Congress of 1774 and the months before the war.

   1All the colonies now felt that they must unite in truth, and that they must have some centre to which all could appeal. So a Congress of all the colonies was called at Philadelphia. This is called the first Continental Congress, and to it all the colonies except Georgia sent delegates.

   2This Congress drew up a Declaration of Rights. They also sent an address to the King in which they declared that they had no wish to separate from Britain.

   3But the King called the Congress an unlawful and seditious gathering, and would not listen to anything it had to say. Still, far-seeing statesmen with Pitt at their head struggled to bring about a reconciliation.

   4"I contend, not for indulgence, but for justice to America," he said. "The Americans are a brave, generous and united people, with arms in their hands, and courage in their hearts. It is not repealing this act of Parliament, it is not repealing a piece of parchment, that can restore America to our bosom. You must repeal her fears and her resentments. And you may then hope for her love and gratitude."

   5But few people listened to Pitt, the bill which he brought into Parliament was rejected with scorn, and the great struggle which was to last for eight years began.

   6Already in America, men's minds had begun to turn to war, and on every village green the farmers might be seen drilling every evening. Bands of minute men, that is, men who would be ready at a minute's notice, were organised. All sorts of war stores were gathered.

Differentiation Strategies

Assessment Guidance

1. Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   In Source 3, paragraph 1, the questioner says that "the colonies have always submitted to external taxes." What does "submitted to" mean here?

   ASent in, as a form is sent in BAccepted without refusing CArgued loudly against DInvented for themselves

2. Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Franklin says an external tax is "a duty laid on commodities imported" (Source 3, paragraph 2). What are commodities?

   AComfortable things that are not needed BGroups of people in the same town CGoods that are bought and sold DCommittees of the colonial assembly

3. Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Franklin writes of an external tax: "If the people do not like it at that price, they refuse it; they are not obliged to pay it" (Source 3, paragraph 2). What does "not obliged" mean here?

   ANot thankful BNot allowed CNot able DNot forced

4. Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Franklin says the stamp act is "intended to extort our money from us" (Source 3, paragraph 2). What does "extort" mean?

   ATo get by force or threats BTo lend for a short time CTo count very carefully DTo give back to its owner

5. Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Franklin says that under the Stamp Act colonists could not "recover debts" unless they paid the tax (Source 3, paragraph 2). What does "recover debts" mean?

   AGet well after an illness BGet back money others owe you CPay what you owe to others DForgive what others owe you

6. Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   What point does Franklin make when he says "the same words have not always the same meaning here and in the colonies" (Source 3, paragraph 4)?

   AThe two sides use the words "taxes" and "duties" differently BColonists spoke a different language from people in Britain CThe Pennsylvania assembly made spelling mistakes in its resolutions DColonists did not understand the words in the stamp act

7. Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Franklin says, "by duties they mean customs" (Source 3, paragraph 4). What does "customs" mean in this sentence?

   AHabits and traditions of a people BStores that sell imported goods CTaxes on goods brought into a place DClothing worn by people in the colonies

8. Question 8 of 20 · Short Answer

   Using Source 3, paragraph 2, explain in your own words the difference between an external tax and an internal tax. How do the prefixes ex- (out) and in- (in) fit the two terms?

   Show model answer

9. Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice

   Source 4, paragraph 1 says that "the Stamp Act was repealed." What does "repealed" mean?

   APassed again by a larger vote BEnforced more strictly than before CTaken to a higher court for a new trial DCanceled by the lawmakers who made it

10. Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    In Source 4, paragraph 2, "a new bill for taxing the Americans was brought into Parliament." What is a bill here?

    AA proposed law BA statement of money owed CA piece of paper money DA list of goods for sale

11. Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Marshall writes, "Once again the colonies were ablaze" (Source 4, paragraph 3). What does "ablaze" mean here?

    ABurning, with many houses on fire BBrightly lit for a celebration CFull of angry excitement and protest DReady to go to war with Britain

12. Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    What were the "indignation meetings" in Source 4, paragraph 3?

    AMeetings to plan a celebration BSecret meetings of the royal officials CMeetings to vote for members of Parliament DMeetings of people angry at something unfair

13. Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    Marshall says that "Boston seemed to be the heart of the storm" (Source 4, paragraph 3). What does this phrase mean?

    ABoston had the worst weather of any colony BBoston was the center of the protests CBoston was the town most loyal to the King DBoston was the only town that paid the tax

14. Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    "So at last after eighteen months of bickering one March evening it came to blows" (Source 4, paragraph 4). What does "bickering" mean?

    AQuarreling over small things BFighting a battle with guns CTrading goods at the market DMarching in military drills

15. Question 15 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    "Two or three exasperated soldiers fired upon the crowd of citizens" (Source 4, paragraph 4). What does "exasperated" mean?

    AVery tired BVery annoyed CVery skilled DVery afraid

16. Question 16 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    "And seeing the temper of the people the Lieutenant Governor withdrew them that same day" (Source 4, paragraph 5). What does "temper" mean here?

    AThe hardness of a metal blade BThe weather in the town that day CThe angry mood of the crowd DA sudden fit of anger by one person

17. Question 17 of 20 · Multiple Choice

    "And now finding how useless it was to try to force taxes on unwilling subjects" (Source 4, paragraph 6). Who are the "subjects" here?

    ATopics that students study in school BSoldiers sent to Boston to keep order CPeople taking part in a science test DPeople who live under a king's rule

18. Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer

    Marshall writes, "This was afterwards known as the Boston Massacre" (Source 4, paragraph 5). What does the word "massacre" usually mean? Using the facts in paragraph 4, explain why people might have chosen this word and why a reader might question it.

    Show model answer

19. Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer

    In Source 4, paragraph 3, Marshall says the colonists "refused to pay this duty," a tax on "tea, glass, lead and a few other things brought into the country" (paragraph 2). Using Franklin's explanations in Source 3, would colonists have called this an internal or an external tax? Explain, quoting both sources.

    Show model answer

20. Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer

    "The soldiers had nothing to do, but the very sight of their red coats made the colonists angry" (Source 4, paragraph 4). Why would red coats make the colonists angry? Explain what the red coats stand for in this sentence.

    Show model answer

These standards connect to RH.6-8.4: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.

Standard text: Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts & Literacy. © Copyright 2010. National Governors Association Center for Best Practices and Council of Chief State School Officers. All rights reserved.