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7th grade · Social Studies · Unit 7 of 13

Civil War & Reconstruction

Secession, war and rebuilding

What your child practices

The central role of slavery in Texas's secession, the battles of Galveston, Sabine Pass and Palmito Ranch, Juneteenth, and the political, economic and social effects of the war and Reconstruction, through the Constitution of 1876. Told factually and neutrally.

Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) teks student expectation: 7.5(A); 7.5(B); 7.5(C) · slavery and Texas's role in the Civil War, Civil War events in Texas, and the effects of the war and Reconstruction

How we explain it

Children can open this short lesson before they practice.

  1. A convention voted to secede in 1861, and voters approved. Texas’s own declaration said it left to protect slavery.
  2. Juneteenth (June 19, 1865) marks the news of freedom reaching enslaved people in Texas.
  3. During Reconstruction, Black codes limited rights, yet African Americans like George T. Ruby were elected. The 1876 constitution limited state power.

Example: Why did Texas’s 1861 declaration say it seceded? Read what the declaration itself says. It named protecting slavery as the cause. Answer: to protect slavery

Civil War & Reconstruction in Texas

In the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS), this is unit 7 of 13 in 7th grade Social Studies, after Republic & Early Statehood and before Cotton, Cattle & Railroads.

Gradelings describes a child's practice on this unit as Beginning, Approaching, Meeting or Exceeding (Four practice steps). That reflects practice, not a report-card mark: the teacher decides the mark.

Source: Texas Education Agency (TEA)

Sample questions

A taste of this unit. In the app, questions change every time and get easier or harder to match your child.

  1. Question 1

    Presidential Reconstruction required Texas to…

    • accept the end of slavery and write a new constitution
    • become a territory forever
    • return to Mexico
    • give up all land

  2. Question 2

    The Battle of Palmito Ranch (May 1865) is remembered as…

    • the last land battle of the Civil War, fought after Lee's surrender
    • the first battle of the Texas Revolution
    • the battle that ended the Alamo siege
    • a battle of the U.S.-Mexican War

  3. Question 3

    On June 19, 1865, General Gordon Granger…

    • founded Austin
    • surrendered to the Confederacy
    • found oil
    • announced in Galveston that enslaved people in Texas were free

  4. Question 4

    The Freedmen's Bureau in Texas…

    • helped freed people with schools, work contracts and legal matters
    • ran the Confederate army
    • built railroads to Mexico
    • collected oil taxes

  5. Question 5

    The 15th Amendment said that the right to vote…

    • began at age 16
    • could not be denied because of race
    • was limited to Confederate veterans
    • belonged only to landowners

  6. Question 6

    Why did some Texans, like many German settlers in the Hill Country, oppose secession?

    • they favored the Union and opposed slavery
    • they wanted to restore the Republic
    • they owned the most enslaved people
    • they wanted to join Mexico

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