Introduction
This Teacher's Guide accompanies our free PDF resource, The Story of the United States in 12 Songs. The content in the PDF, including background information and lyrics for each song, is not duplicated on these Teacher's Guide pages.
If you don't already have The Story of the United States in 12 Songs, just enter your name and email address in the box on the right sidebar of this page to download your free copy.
The 12 songs address many important concepts from the history of the United States, roughly in chronological order. They can be used to introduce, reinforce, or dive deeper into these issues. Each page of this Teacher's Guide includes the following resources:
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- Audio Investigation Slides - ready-to-use slides that include music and response prompts; perfect for distance learning or classroom use
- Recommendations - general information about how the song fits into United States history curriculum and ideas for how you can leverage it to enhance student understanding
- Vocabulary - terms and references in the song lyrics that may be unfamiliar to students
Note that the second page of The Story of the United States in 12 Songs PDF contains a link to an image-free, print-friendly version of the document, as well as playlists for Apple Music, Spotify, and YouTube.
Please let us know if you have any questions about this resource, or suggestions for how we can help you use music in your teaching. We'd also love to hear about your experiences using our materials in your classroom. We invite you to join the free Ballad of America Educators Group on Facebook to share ideas with your colleagues.
Songs
1. Young Ladies in Town
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on the response of the colonists to the new taxes on numerous goods that were imposed by Great Britain to pay for the French and Indian War, and how it affected the relationship between the mother country and the colonies.
2. The Wisconsin Emigrant
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on early westward expansion, Manifest Destiny, or even the roots of Free Soil politics.
3. Go Down, Moses
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on slavery at any point in the post-Revolutionary period through the start of the Civil War.
4. Worried Man Blues
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on the experiences of freedmen and African Americans generally in the South during and after Reconstruction.
5. The Battleship of Maine
This song is useful in introducing a unit on imperialism or a lesson on the Spanish-American War.
6. The Suffrage Flag
This song is useful to introduce a lesson on the women’s suffrage movement as part of a unit on the Progressive Era.
7. I Don’t Want Your Millions, Mister
This song is useful to introduce a lesson on labor unions during the second industrial revolution of the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
8. How Can a Poor Man Stand Such Times and Live?
This song is useful to introduce a lesson about economic conditions in the United States during and after the First World War, and the causes of the Great Depression.
9. Deportee (Plane Wreck at Los Gatos)
This song is useful to introduce a lesson on the changing sources of immigration to the United States during and after the Second World War.
10. If You Miss Me From the Back of the Bus
This song is useful to introduce a lesson on the Civil Rights movement.
11. Little Boxes
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on post-World War II prosperity and the conformity of Cold War suburban culture.
12. Changes
This song is useful for introducing a lesson on economic, social, and cultural developments in contemporary United States, particularly those that concern ongoing inequality and inequity based on race and the emerging movements that seek to address those disparities.