1. Now! That’s What I Call African-American MusicChoose 5 songs from different African-American musical styles throughout history. Create a play-list or design a CD sleeve/album cover listing the songs and explaining how the music has changed over time (a sentence on each track?). You might include: slave spirituals, field hollers, blues, R ‘n’ B, soul, jazz, funk, hip-hop. For some background info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/African-American_music

2. The fight for independenceResearch the story of a former British colony in the West Indies and its struggle for independence. Create a storyboard for a film that tells the story of this struggle. Your research will help you decide whether you want to focus on an individual or group, (national leaders or ordinary people?), and the events to include. You will need to make your film plot historically realistic. You can draw the storyboard or use ICT, but include both pictures and text.

3. Resistance heroesResearch the story of a person who fought against slavery in the Americas. (E.g. Nat Turner, Harriet Tubman, Toussaint L’Ouverture, the Jamaican Maroons). Design a statue that shows people what they did, what they achieved and why we should look up to them. (You need to consider what they are wearing/ holding/ doing/ and other features such as inscriptions in designing the ‘memorial’). You can draw a picture, use ICT, make a model.

4. Slave storiesRead a fiction book or short story that deals with slavery. (See your teacher for an idea about what to read, or ask in the library/in a bookshop.) Either write a book review, explaining what it does and doesn’t tell you about slave life, OR write another chapter for the book/story picking up where it left off.

5. Harlem RenaissanceCreate a short documentary about the Harlem Renaissance. In your research you might find out about Langston Hughes, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, WEB Du Bois, amongst others. Include images, titles, voiceover and soundtrack in your short film. Ideally you need to use a program like MovieMaker or iMovie but you could do it using PowerPoint.

6. Past still present?Research the tourist industry of a country in the Americas that is connected to the history of slavery. Find out what tourists could do or see that tells them about the impact and experiences of slavery in that country. Produce a tourist guide brochure giving details of possible visits in the chosen country.

Year 9 Homework: Black Peoples of the Americas (Autumn term 2011)Choose 2 homework activities for the remainder of the term from the grid below. You may choose from anywhere on the grid. Discuss your choices at home and at school before deciding. Highlight your choices and show your teacher which ones you are planning to do.

Name:

History teacher:

Homework is not always the most appealing aspect of school life. However, it is helpful to your progress and has to be done.

The idea behind this project is to make your homework a more creative and enjoyable experience. It should also allow to practise and improve your research skills at the same time.

You get to decide which tasks you do, meaning you can choose activities that best suit the way you like to work or that match the things that you are interested in.

You can organise your homework in a way that suits you, so that you can do it when you want to do it. So long as you finish all the tasks before the deadlines, it doesn’t really matter when you do the activities. You can do it in ten-minute bursts or in two-hour sessions. (Although, a good guide would be about an hour a week.) Each project should take about 4 hours to complete.

Before you finish your projects you will have a ‘seminar’ lesson. During this lesson, you will show your teacher and your classmates what you have done so far. This will be a chance to share ideas, tips on research and to ask questions about what you are doing or what you should do next.

MAKE SURE YOU HAVE SOMETHING TO BRING TO THE ‘SEMINAR’ LESSON.

You must complete 1 task – it doesn’t matter which one, but try to think about which one you will enjoy doing the most, what you are good at and what resources you have access to. You may need to use the internet for some of the activities. If you don’t have the internet at home then you can always use the computers in the Learning Resources Centre (LRC) during lunchtime.

Please ask your teacher for guidance if you get stuck in a rut. You can also work with your friends (that’s work with not copy from) if it helps.

Good luck, I hope you enjoy it!Seminar Lesson (Bring in your research notes, first drafts, problems that you have, ideas for others etc.):

Deadline (Bring in your completed projects):