This lesson contains 29 slides, with interactive quizzes and text slides.
Items in this lesson
Slide 1 - Slide
The history of the United States
How did the United States originate?
Slide 2 - Slide
How did the US originate?
Slide 3 - Mind map
Before Columbus
Native Americans
Slide 4 - Slide
Native Americans
Indigenous people of the North America. Arrived from Asia at least 15,000 years ago. Many different tribes, such as Cherokee, Chickasaw, Apalachee and Navajo. Millions of Native Americans lived in America before Europeans came over. Nowadays, Native Americans only make up around 2% of the United States' population.
Slide 5 - Slide
Cliff Palace (1190-1260)
Slide 6 - Slide
European expeditions
Conquistadores
Christopher Columbus
Slide 7 - Slide
Conquistadores
Spanish "conquerors." They were the first to explore the Americas. They conquered areas such as contemporary Florida and New Mexico. They were also very present in the South American continent.
Slide 8 - Slide
St. Augustine, Florida
Slide 9 - Slide
Christopher Columbus
Italian explorer that worked for the Spanish monarchs. He was looking for a western route to India, hoping to profit from spice trade. He thought he reached India when he first arrived in 1492 (that is why he and many others called its indigenous inhabitants Indians).
Slide 10 - Slide
Fun fact
Horses were extinct in America. Christopher Columbus and Spanish conquistadores were the first to bring horses to the continent again.
Slide 11 - Slide
European settlements
British settlements
French settlements
Spanish settlements
Dutch settlements
What happened next?
Slide 12 - Slide
British settlements
Founded the first permanent settlement in 1607, called Jamestown. They called the surrounding area Virginia, after the British queen. They shared the area with a Native American tribe called Powhatan.
Slide 13 - Slide
Jamestown
Slide 14 - Slide
Fun fact
Pocahontas was actually a real person. She was the daughter of the Powhatan chief. She eventually married an Englishman and travelled with him to England. f there was ever a true romance between Pocahontas and John Smith, like in the Disney movie, is still undecided.
Slide 15 - Slide
French settlements
Made different attempts at buiding settlements, but often failed because of food or weather issues. Eventually they did settle throughout the west, including Louisiana and big parts of contemporary Canada, such as Quebec.
Slide 16 - Slide
Spanish settlements
Spain settled in the South West, in areas we now call Florida and New Mexico. They also settled in parts of South America.
Slide 17 - Slide
Dutch settlements
New Netherland was founded in the 1600s. A lot of the area the Dutch had then, is now part of New York City. We can see a lot of Dutch influence in street or borough names.
Slide 18 - Slide
Harlem
Brooklyn
Flushing
Broadway
Bushwick
Haarlem
Breukelen
Vlissingen
Breede Wegh
Boswijk
Slide 19 - Drag question
What happened next?
Native Americans and Europeans fought wars, as well as traded goods. A huge number of Native Americans died because of the arrival of the Europeans, through war and Europeans brought with them many "new" diseases such as measles.
Slide 20 - Slide
What happened next?
Europeans brought African slaves to the Americas, to work on plantations for products such as sugar and cotton. These plantations were mostly located in the Caribbean and the South of North America, because of the weather.
Slide 21 - Slide
What happened next?
There were a lot of wars between the European colonies. Eventually the British took over most of the areas. The Thirteen Colonies were born and wanted independence from the British crown.
Slide 22 - Slide
American independence
Why did they want independence?
Declaration of Independence
Independence War
Slide 23 - Slide
Why did America want independence?
Slide 24 - Mind map
Why did American want independence?
The British raised taxes tremendously on products such as sugar and paper in the 1760s. American also thought that the Brits couldn't represent them properly, because of their differences: for example, the Americans thought it was unfair for them to pay for wars that British were waging in Europe.
Slide 25 - Slide
Declaration of Independence
Written by representatives of the Thirteen Colonies in 1776. It stated that they want independence from the British monarchs. They explained that they wanted independence by stating that they have the right to have independence, because "all men are created equal."
Slide 26 - Slide
Independence War
The British didn't want to give America up, so a war began. European countries such as France, Spain and the Netherlands supported the Americans. In 1781, the British surrendered. In 1783, the Treaty of Paris was signed and America was officially independent.