LEARN NC

K–12 teaching and learning · from the UNC School of Education

LIBERTY! The American Revolution

http://www.pbs.org/ktca/liberty/index.html

Provider: PBS

About this resource

Appropriate grades
3–12
Subjects
social studies (United States history)
Provider
PBS

Legal

Creative Commons License

This catalog record is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 2.5 License. This license applies to the content of this page only and does not apply to the referenced website.

LIBERTY! The American Revolution is an online companion to the PBS series of six one-hour documentaries. An interactive educational resource for teaching and learning about the Revolutionary War, this site can function independently from the television documentary series.

In the guise of newspaper articles from the period, visitors to the site can read hypertextual information about the Boston Tea Party, America's Declaration of Independence to Britain, the battles at Trenton, Saratoga, and Yorktown as well as the drafting of the Bill of Rights. Along the way they will meet some famous American forefathers and can consult the interactive timeline.

A collection of three activities will help bring this time into perspective:

  • Discover what rural life was like on an 18th-century Colonial farm.
  • Find out what was happening in the world at the time of the Revolution.
  • Compare the real-life differences between American and British soldiers.

A quiz called The Road to Revolution Game is a fun way to test your knowledge of the Revolution's history. And speaking of quizzes and testing, teachers will find a guide of six lessons:

  • THE RELUCTANT REVOLUTIONARIES. Examine why colonists, many of whom felt strong loyalties to the British Empire, decided to abandon their mother country and join the Revolution.
  • THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE: AN ANALYTICAL VIEW. Consider the importance of the Declaration of Independence - what it meant during the time of the Revolution, what its impact is today and how it influenced political thinking over the last few centuries.
  • THE CONTINENTAL ARMY & WASHINGTON. Gain a first-hand understanding of the conditions faced by Washington's Continental Army, and explore how Washington was able to hold his troops together.
  • FACTORS THAT HANDICAPPED THE BRITISH. Discover how the strongest military force in the world was defeated by the comparatively weak, non-professional American soldiers, and compare this surprising defeat to other military conflicts in history.
  • REVOLUTIONARY WAR MUSIC. Investigate some of the more familiar and famous songs of the Revolutionary War period and how music was used to convey messages of patriotism and highlight popular sentiments.
  • CREATING A NEW NATION. Examine the post-war tensions between Federalists and Anti-Federalists and how the evolution of their debate shaped the Constitution and government of the United States of America.