Sixth Grade
Worksheets
The Birth of a Nation
Caption: Portrait of Sir John A. Macdonald, the first Prime Minister of Canada
When Jacques Cartier first came to the land that he would claim as New France, the native people kept saying the word Kanata. He thought the Iroquois word was the name of the place. Instead it was the word for village. Soon though, it became the name for much of the land north of the St. Lawrence River: Canada.
Though Canada started out in French hands, it became British territory after the Seven Years War. By 1791, the land was divided into two provinces, Upper and Lower Canada. Upper Canada was the region just north of the Great Lakes and near the upper end, or source, of the Saint Lawrence River. Lower Canada was farther east on the lower end of the Saint Lawrence River and the Gulf of Saint Lawrence.
