This is a dynamic moment in history! This Phyllis Wheatley "LETTER TO REVEREND OCCUM" [Letter & Lesson Activities] resource provides students a chance to experience a variety of topics that cause reflection. Wheatley's popular LETTER, 20+ discussion questions/essay prompts, a sample LITERARY & ANALYSIS Chart, LESSON ACTIVITIES, Black & White Version, Projects, 10 MULTIPLE CHOICE QUESIONTS, cover page for independent student packet possibility, and a Biography. This historical document allows students to read and analyze WORKS of literary merit. 10th - 11th Graders will love this RESOURCE. Check it out!

Summary:

Despite spending much of her life enslaved, Phillis Wheatley was the first African American and second woman (after Anne Bradstreet) to publish a book of poems.

Born around 1753 in Gambia, Africa, Wheatley was captured by slave traders and brought to America in 1761. Upon arrival, she was sold to the Wheatley family in Boston, Massachusetts. Her first name Phillis was derived from the ship that brought her to America, “the Phillis.”

The Wheatley family educated her and within sixteen months of her arrival in America she could read the Bible, Greek and Latin classics, and British literature. She also studied astronomy and geography. At age fourteen, Wheatley began to write poetry, publishing her first poem in 1767. Publication of “An Elegiac Poem, on the Death of the Celebrated Divine George Whitefield” in 1770 brought her great notoriety. In 1773, with financial support from the English Countess of Huntingdon, Wheatley traveled to London with the Wheatley's son to publish her first collection of poems, Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral—the first book written by a black woman in America. It included a forward, signed by John Hancock and other Boston notables—as well as a portrait of Wheatley—all designed to prove that the work was indeed written by a black woman. She was emancipated her shortly thereafter.

Her firsthand account of history [primary sources] in the form of letters/historical documents have been used in education, specifically English classes, for decades because of their strength of diction and composition, but the content pretexts motherhood, wifehood, and blacks and women's fight for equality and recognition.

This 9th - 11th grade canonized set of letters allows students to understand the need to reflect.

This RESOURCE Includes:

1. Letter to Reverend Occum

2. Who was Phyllis Wheatley? Written Biography

3. Each letter has 3 -9 Discussion Questions [25 questions]

4. Wheatley's Wit

5. Literary and Participation Chart [Blank & Printable]

6. 10 Multiple Choice Questions

7. Group letter Presentations and much more to make your classroom GREAT!

You may also appreciate:

ABIGAIL ADAMS' "4 LETTERS" [LETTERS & LESSON ACTIVITIES]

SOJOURNER TRUTH'S "TWO SPEECHES" [UNIT DOCUMENTS & WORKSHEETS]

MALCOLM X'S "NECESSARY TO PROTECT OURSELVES" [TEXT]

"THE MYTH OF LATIN WOMEN" [BUNDLE]

FINDING ARGUMENTS [Analyzing Arguments]

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