Description
Discover the true story of what happened at Salem in 1692!
How could a ghost be used as evidence in court? Why couldn’t anyone prove they were innocent? And why did it take Massachusetts more than three hundred years to clear the last name? This five-day unit study answers those questions with true stories from history, written to be read aloud and enjoyed.
Recommended for grades 5-8
Over five days, students follow one terrible year in a small farming village. They meet Tituba, an enslaved woman who described a tall man in black and a book with nine marks in it. They sit in a crowded meeting house as a seventy-one-year-old grandmother named Rebecca Nurse is questioned. They meet Giles Corey, about eighty years old, who refused to answer the court at all – and an eighth-grade class in 2022 who finished a job the state had left undone since 1693.
Along the way, students read real words from the past: arrest warrants, court depositions, a governor’s letters to London, and the confession a young accuser read aloud in church fourteen years later. They learn to ask the historian’s questions: How do we know? Who wrote this? What else was happening at the time?
Each lesson includes:
– A story-based reading with real historical images
– Lesson audio for independent listening
– Vocabulary words with kid-friendly definitions
– Key Dates to Add to Your Timeline (Link to Free Timeline inside)
– Questions to Think About
The complete unit also includes:
– A complete list of timeline dates for the whole unit
– A final quiz with answer key
– A full list of the primary sources used to check every fact
Complete one lesson a day for a meaningful week of learning, and watch your child discover how careful, serious people can talk themselves into something terrible – and what it takes to put it right.
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