Lesson Plans
Immigration: Our Changing Voices
Students analyze primary sources to identify issues involved with the migration of a community or family and examine the traditional picture of immigration. After, students investigate their own family history and put it into the context of immigrant stories.
Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire and Migrant Workers
Students analyze primary sources to investigate how the press covered the treatment of sweatshop and migrant farm laborers in the early to mid-1900s. After, students plan an investigative news segment that explores how workers are treated today.
Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers’ Strike of 1909
Pair the picture book, Brave Girl: Clara and the Shirtwaist Makers’ Strike of 1909, with primary sources to have students practice close reading, build vocabulary, and investigate labor activism and one group’s fight for shorter hours, increased wages, and more sanitary working conditions. After, students may share, in words or pictures, an example of something…
The Immigrant: Acquisition or Detriment?
Students investigate historical and contemporary pros and cons of immigration and reflect on your own views of the issue.
Chinese Citizenship in Hawaii
Students analyze early 19th-century arguments against citizenship for Chinese immigrants to Hawaii and one journalist’s rebuttal to that “defense”, then investigate arguments for and against an immigrant group in America today and compare the historical and contemporary debates.