The French were not fighting the Indians in the French and Indian War

Sometimes when you are studying American history, it gives you a very different view than if you are studying World history.  Such is the case with this homeschool history lesson because American history does not address the larger conflict the French and Indian War is a part of.  This French and Indian War lesson isn’t going to address all of the underlying issues that caused the war.

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What started our French and Indian War lesson

There I was reading our kids our assigned reading for the day from Illuminations* from All American History 1*.  It talked all about who was fighting in the war, and what is was about, and how the French and Indian War is named after who the Americans fought, not the two sides of the war.  But I saw my kids’ eyes glazing over.

So I took a brief break to pull out our map.  It’s a bulletin board* I glued maps to using mod podge*.  On one side is a United States map*, and on the other is a world map* (it took a little bit to find the right size map, and then I trimmed it down just a hair).  This lets me stick pins in the map to show different details (when buying pins make sure to get different colored ones like the ones I linked to for showing different sides to a conflict).  I love our map, it’s awesome!

We pinned the different countries that were fighting against Britain in Europe.  Apparently being the great naval power makes you unpopular.  At that point in time, Britain was kind of like America today, a great superpower, and everyone wanted to take the big guy down.

That may be a LITTLE simplistic.  It’s before 9:00 in the morning, my brain’s not fully engaged yet. {Future Ticia here, that is a lot simplistic, and I need to write out the full reason of the true first World War soon, here it is Causes of the Seven Years War}

Than we looked at the war on the Western front.  If you notice the blue pins outnumber the red ones.  The kids certainly did, and they were quite sure this wasn’t fair.  You’re right it wasn’t.  But wars are rarely fair, that’s kind of the point, you want to win.

It’s amazingly simple, but it illustrated my point quite well.

Looking for more Early American history lessons?

• The Boston Massacre
• What caused the American Revolution
• 13 Colonies webquest

For more ideas check out my US history pinterest board, there are over 450 pins to choose from.