Week 3: American History 1800s–1900s: Civil War to Civil Rights
Saturday classes warm up with civics. Type your best answer, then reveal and check yourself. Score: 0 / 5
Civics & History
N-400 Interview Prep
This week's N-400 focus is your history in the United States — the sections that ask about your time as a Permanent Resident, your trips outside the U.S., and your work and school history. USCIS uses these answers to confirm you meet the continuous residence and physical presence rules. We'll go through how to list every trip that lasted 24 hours or more — nothing you need to bring in advance.
N-400 checklist for this week
- List every trip outside the U.S. since you became a Permanent Resident — start date, end date, and country
- Add up your total days outside the U.S. over the last 5 years (must be less than half)
- List every employer and school for the last 5 years, with dates and addresses
- If any trip was 6 months or longer, be ready to explain why and how you kept your U.S. ties
English Lesson
Vocabulary
- Slavery
- When one person is owned by another and forced to work
- Emancipation
- Setting people free
- Union
- The states that stayed together during the Civil War
- Amendment
- A change or addition to the Constitution
- Civil rights
- The rights of every person to equal treatment
- Discrimination
- Treating people unfairly because of who they are
- Depression
- A long time when the economy is very bad
- Terrorist
- A person who uses violence to scare people
Example sentences
- Abraham Lincoln was President during the Civil War.
- The 14th Amendment made freed slaves citizens.
- Martin Luther King, Jr. fought for civil rights.
- Franklin Roosevelt was President during World War II.
Read-aloud passage
In the 1860s, the North and the South fought the Civil War. President Abraham Lincoln freed the slaves and saved the Union. Many years later, the civil rights movement worked to end racial discrimination. Martin Luther King, Jr. led peaceful marches so that all Americans would be treated equally under the law.
Reading & Writing Practice
Read aloud
- Abraham Lincoln was President during the Civil War.
- The people fought for civil rights.
- The United States has 50 states.
Write the sentence
6 questions. Answer them and submit — you only need 4 correct once to move on, but you can retake as many times as you want. Every attempt is saved so you can track your growth.