Your students will have some sense of the American Revolution, but most likely one informed by the mythology that surrounds the nation's founding moment. Therefore you might want to begin this unit by surveying what they think they know—and then return to that inventory at the end of the unit to see how their conceptions have changed. 

The image exercise we've included will help with this concluding assessment, but you may be able to modify it to help survey your students' knowledge before beginning the unit.