Although several European nations had claims in America, it was England who eventually took control over the area.

By 1733, there were 13 colonies in America under England’s control.A colony is a group of people in one place who are ruled

by a parent country elsewhere. These colonies were organized into three different

areas: New England Colonies, Middle Colonies, and Southern Colonies. Each one of these areas were extremely different from one another, and they were divided amongst themselves because of their differences.

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Click on one of the areas below and find out about that colonial region. We need to find out why people moved to each of these regions and what life was like for them when they got there. Since each region was so different, the motivation for moving to a region or the way of life in each region was also different. Eventually, you will learn about all three areas. Fill out the worksheet as you travel through these areas.

Click here to find out about the New England Colonies

Click here to find out about the Middle Colonies

Click here to find out about the Southern Colonies

Click here when you have viewed all three regions and finished your worksheet.

The states that made up the New England Colonies or Northern colonies were Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, and Connecticut (Maine was still part of Massachusetts).

In 1620, a group of people from England known as Puritans traveled across the Atlantic Ocean on a ship called the Mayflower to start a new life.

The Puritans were religious dissenters which means that they followed a religious different than the official religion of England. They were called Puritans because they wanted to purify, or reform, the Anglican Church. They were persecuted (or treated badly) in England because of this, and wanted to move to New England where they could practice their beliefs.

Puritans wanted to create “a city upon a hill” in America. They wanted to create an example for everyone to follow on how to live life. They are still known today for their hard work ethnic.

They landed in Plymouth, Massachusetts. However, before their ship even landed, they realized that because they were so far away from England, they would need their own rules to govern themselves if they were going to survive in a new land. England would be too far away to help them right away if they had problems.

Puritans wrote down rules for how they wanted to live and how they would govern themselves in the Mayflower Compact. A compact is an agreement, or contract, among a group of people.

This set the standard in New England for a tradition of democracy. Everyone on the Mayflower, the Puritan’s ship, worked together to decide the rules and laws that they were going to live by. From that point on, people living in New England felt like they should have a say in government.

Throughout the colonial period, and even still today, citizens held town meetings. This was a place to talk about problems and issues they were having, and discuss possible ways to solve these problems.

Puritans did not practice religious toleration, which means they did not accept religious beliefs other than their own. People who believed different things than the Puritans created other colonies, such as Rhode Island and Connecticut, so that they could have more religious freedom.

Other groups of people besides those who moved to Connecticut and Rhode Island suffered as well.

An example of this is the Salem Witch trials. In the late 1600’s, Puritans in

Salem, Massachusetts and other towns held trials accusing people of witchcraft. In Salem alone, 19 people were convicted and hanged, and five died in prison before the trial was over.

Most people in New England lived in towns. Long winters and rocky soil made farming difficult.

Many New Englanders worked in small businesses milling grain, sewing clothes, or making furniture. Some worked as blacksmiths, shoemakers, or shopkeepers.

Shipbuilding was also an important industry.

The Puritan religion emphasized hard work, modest living, and personal virtues such as honesty, thriftiness, and obedience. All of these values stemmed from the idea of creating “a city upon a hill.”

Click on one of the areas below and find out about that colonial region. We need to find out why people moved to each of these regions and what life was like for them when they got there. Since each region was so different, the motivation for moving to a region or the way of life in each region was also different. Eventually, you will learn about all three areas. Fill out the worksheet as you travel through these areas.

Click here to find out about the New England Colonies

Click here to find out about the Middle Colonies

Click here to find out about the Southern Colonies

Click here when you have viewed all three regions and finished your worksheet.

The states that made up the Middle Colonies were New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.

The first Middle Colony was New York, which was originally owned by the Dutch. The English took over New York from the Dutch in 1664.

New York became what is known as a proprietary colony. This means that the owner, or proprietor, owned the land and controlled the government.

New Jersey, another middle colony, was once part of New York, but it became it eventually became its own colony.

New Jersey became a royal colony. This means that the colony was directly owned and ruled by the King of England.

• Another colony in the middle colonies that became a proprietary colony was Pennsylvania.

• William Penn started this colony to make a place based on his Quaker beliefs.

• Quakers have religious beliefs that guide them on how they should live. They believe in peace, equality, and justice.

The climate in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Delaware allowed the economy to be based on agriculture, or farming.

Farmers grew large amounts of wheat and other crops which they sold in markets in Europe.

Also, industries such as sawmills, mines, and ironworks developed in the region.

Click on one of the areas below and find out about that colonial region. We need to find out why people moved to each of these regions and what life was like for them when they got there. Since each region was so different, the motivation for moving to a region or the way of life in each region was also different. Eventually, you will learn about all three areas. Fill out the worksheet as you travel through these areas.

Click here to find out about the New England Colonies

Click here to find out about the Middle Colonies

Click here to find out about the Southern Colonies

Click here when you have viewed all three regions and finished your worksheet.

The colonies that made up the Southern colonies were Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Georgia.

The first permanent English settlement in North America was Jamestown, Virginia. It was founded in 1607 by the Virginia Company. Other attempts to settle America by the English were unsuccessful,,

such as Roanoke Island, and so were therefore not permanent.

Eventually, in 1619, the colonists at Jamestown formed the House of Burgesses.

This was the first representative assembly, or legislature, in the English colonies.

The House of Burgesses had little power, but it marked the beginning of self-government in colonial America.

Maryland became known as a safe place for Catholics to live because their beliefs were respected there.

Although Carolina was originally one colony, the two colonies developed so differently that they became two colonies: North and South Carolina.

Georgia was formed because the jails in England were getting too full. England sent criminals who had been sent to jail for being too poor to pay their debts or who had committed other small crimes to Georgia to have a new start.

People who settled in the South mostly came for economic reasons: they wanted to make money.

In Virginia, colonists grew tobacco.

In the Carolinas, people grew mostly rice and indigo, a valuable blue die.

The colonists grew these items on places called plantations, or large farms.

They need a lot of people to work on these plantations.

At first colonists used indentured servants. Indentured servants were poor people living in England who were paid to come and work for people in America. Their ship ride to America was paid for, and they received food, clothing, and shelter (which usually wasn’t very good) from the people they worked for.

Eventually, after 3-7 years of work, depending on the time they originally agreed upon, these people were set free and could start their own life in America.

Small farmers outnumbered the large plantation owners in the South.

However, the plantation owners had greater power and more influence.

Eventually, it became cheaper for plantation owners to use slaves from Africa than buy indentured servants from Europe.

Africans were protected by no law or tradition, and while some plantation owners treated their slaves well, others were abused and were treated as animals, not humans.

Click on one of the areas below and find out about that colonial region. We need to find out why people moved to each of these regions and what life was like for them when they got there. Since each region was so different, the motivation for moving to a region or the way of life in each region was also different. Eventually, you will learn about all three areas. Fill out the worksheet as you travel through these areas.

Click here to find out about the New England Colonies

Click here to find out about the Middle Colonies

Click here to find out about the Southern Colonies

Click here when you have viewed all three regions and finished your worksheet.

The differences among the colonies caused deep divisions. Although its easy for us to see them coming together as one because we know this eventually happens, it wasn’t easy for them to see. The colonies were not unified. The only thing that connected them was that they were all trying to start a new life in a new land controlled by their mother country, England.

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