Grades 9-12: Disability in the Progressive Era | Emerging America
The Color of Law: Creating Racially Segregated Communities | Teaching Tolerance
This lesson uses Richard Rothstein's research to drive a lesson into the reality of structural racism in the United States, showing how local, state and federal policies promoted the segregation that we think of today as "De Facto",
Riis Redux: Seeing the Light
Jacob A. Riis' photographs of New York's lower east side at the turn of the twentieth century have become iconic images of immigrant poverty. Historian Vincent DiGirolamo uses them to teach students to look and think harder about photography as a tool of social reform.
Imaging Americans
Shawn Michelle Smith discusses Frances Benjamin Johnston's photograph of Whittier primary school students as a historical inquiry into African-American education, citizenship, "uplift" campaigns, and visual propaganda.
The Triangle Fire: From Industrialism to Progressivism
This lesson starts with a quick poll to gauge students' views of the role of government in protecting workers before diving deep into the record of the fire itself
From Abolition to Progressivism: Women in Public Life
This assignment introduces students to the history of women's suffrage in the context of other nineteenth and twentieth century reform movements using a combination of photographs and written documents. The goal is to teach "form" along with "content," so that students will look at both the images and the written documents for their uses of gendered rhetoric in addition to their more obvious content. The project starts with a "slideshow" that students can either do at home or that the teacher can show in class (or both) and finishes with group discussions and an individual writing assignment.
eTalks - The Secrets of Food Marketing - YouTube
This seven minute video works in two ways - first, it gives you a modern twist on "the Jungle", secondly it shows students how the food industry still operates. Watch their faces while you show them this video.
“It takes more than that to kill a Bull Moose”: The Wounding of Theodore Roosevelt : We're History
This site as an x-ray picture of Roosevelt's wound. It's just this sort of unbelievable ephemera that makes any history class lively. Yet, it can also be extended for an NCIS-Detective lesson. Have students build conspiracy theories behind the failed assassin. Schrank was locked up in a mental hospital for the rest of his life - why? Students could immerse themselves in the politics, culture and economy of the early 1900s by compiling evidence against a person or persons who could have been behind this failed assassination.
From Abolition to Progressivism: Women in Public Life
"This assignment introduces students to the history of women's suffrage in the context of other nineteenth and twentieth century reform movements using a combination of photographs and written documents. The goal is to teach "form" along with "content," so that students will look at both the images and the written documents for their uses of gendered rhetoric in addition to their more obvious content. The project starts with a "slideshow" that students can either do at home or that the teacher can show in class (or both) and finishes with group discussions and an individual writing assignment."
Progressivism in the Factory – America in Class – resources for history & literature teachers
This lesson from the National Humanities Center comes with a narrative understanding of the Progressive Era that is seldom, if ever, taught. Sharing it with students can help facilitate learning in this lesson which has students reading from Frederick Winslow Taylor's "Scientific Management" . THis lesson provides the text and questions annotated to the text itself
Modern America: Radical Labor Movement: Radical Labor in the Age of Reform (1877-1920) - Emerging America
Not only does this lesson put students in front of primary source documents, the documents are well-chosen and the questions, brief and to the point. More importantly, this lesson draws material across decades, exposing students to broader trends of events across time.
The 1905 Movement to Reform Football - Topics in Chronicling America (Newspaper and Current Periodical Reading Room, Library of Congress)
The linked articles at this site provide a wide selection of newspaper articles concerning safety in collegiate football at the turn of the century. This can be used as material for a progressive era lesson with material that has never been used for such.
Progressivism in the Home – America in Class – resources for history & literature teachers
The strength in this lesson lies in using something as mundane as washing dishes to learn more about Progressivism. students, and many teachers will broaden their understanding of Progressivism though this lesson
6. Child Labor | Stanford History Education Group
This lesson asks students to think critically about Hine’s photographs and their usefulness as evidence of the past.
Court Instruction to Jury in the Case of United States vs Susan B. Anthony
"The 14th by gives no right to a woman to vote, and the voting by Miss Anthony was in violation of the law." This quote is from the judge's instructions to a jury empaneled to determine whether Susan B Anthony violated the law by voting.
Mulberry Street NYC c1900 LOC 3g04637u edit - History of New York City (1898–1945) - Wikipedia
Easy "Do Now" activity - have students play "hide and seek" by describing a detail in the image to the rest of the class and having the rest of the class look to find it. i.e the person farthest from the camera still looking at the camera, (note - click on the image for a much larger version)
Investigative Journalists - Lesson Plan from PBS Newshour Extra
Well-designed and presented lesson with explanation and primary source documents of Ira Tarbell, Sinclair Lewis and Jacob Riis
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire and Immigrants - PBS Newshour Extra
There are many lessons on the Fire - this one takes the approach of focusing on immigrant labor, linking it to immigrant labor today
Rise of the Populists and William Jennings Bryan | Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History