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THE SIMULATION LAB
Free printable · APUSH Topic 2.3

Jamestown Decision Cards

Fifteen cards — pressures, decisions, and consequences — plus a four-stage decision board. Students trace how a colony that nearly failed became a tobacco society built on unfree labor, one decision at a time.

Why this page exists: the Jamestown Decision Lab names a decision ledger and evidence cards that never shipped as files.

Nothing to download, no email, no account. Print straight from this page. Built for the Jamestown Decision Lab in Lesson 2.3 of APUSH Launch Control, and it works in any course that teaches the same ground.

How to print it

Each button opens your browser's normal print box with only that one piece selected — the website navigation, this text, and the teacher key never come out of the printer by accident. Choose your printer, press Print. Nothing downloads.

  1. The 15 cards — 3 pages, 6 per page. Five pressures, five decisions, five consequences. Cut on the dashed lines; one set per group.
  2. The decision board — 1 page, prints sideways. One per group. Pressure, decision, consequence, and the box that asks what else could have happened.
  3. The teacher key — 1 page, for you only. The chain each card belongs to and the contingency argument worth having.
  4. The mortality table is not included on purpose. The lesson calls for one. Use figures from a source you trust and can cite — this page will not invent numbers.

15 cards · 3 pages at 6 per page · cut on the dashed lines

Jamestown Decision CardsPressures, decisions, consequences. Cut on the dashed lines. thesimulationlabedu.com

The cards

The chip tells you what kind of card it is. Building the chain — which pressure produced which decision, and what followed — is the work.

Chesapeake Decision BoardOne per group. Build the chain, then argue the last box. thesimulationlabedu.com

The decision board

Three stages, then the box that matters most: what else could have happened. A chain that admits no alternatives is a story, not an explanation.

1. Pressure

What forced a choice.

2. Decision

What people actually chose to do.

3. Consequence

What followed, intended or not.

4. What else was possible?

The alternative that was available at the time.

Our chain, in order
The decision that mattered most — and why
One consequence nobody intended
The alternative that existed, and what would have had to change for it
Teacher key — the chains, and the contingency argument to push (click to open)
Teacher Key — Jamestown Decision CardsDo not hand to students. thesimulationlabedu.com

Kept closed by default so it is not on the board behind you.

Free from The Simulation Lab · https://thesimulationlabedu.com/history/apush/tools/jamestown-decision-cards/

Run it in one class period

  1. Opener, 5 minutes. Deal the five pressure cards. Ask what a colony under all five is likely to do, before any decision card is seen.
  2. Build the chain, 20 minutes. Groups lay out pressure, decision, and consequence in order, and must be able to say which card caused which.
  3. Contingency, 12 minutes. Fill the fourth box. What alternative existed, and what would have had to be different for it to happen?
  4. Debrief, 8 minutes. Ask directly whether slavery in the Chesapeake was inevitable. The answer they can defend is more useful than the answer they assume.
  5. Exit, 5 minutes. One because–therefore sentence connecting a decision to a consequence, naming who made the decision.

The point of the fourth box. Students narrate Jamestown as a story that had to end where it ended. Asking what else was possible — and what would have had to change — is what turns narration into causal reasoning.

These are teacher-authored decision and evidence cards, not primary sources. The lesson also calls for a mortality table and an environment map; supply those from a source you can cite. This page will not invent numbers or fake a historical map.

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Written and reviewed by Josh, classroom history teacher and Simulation Lab creator. Published and reviewed August 19, 2026. Print and copy freely for your own classroom. Not affiliated with or endorsed by the College Board.