Student Resources
Teacher Resources


Mid-Nineteenth Century Reforms

 

Research Scenario

 

You are a member of a student rights group that wants to reform local schools, by convincing the school system to eliminate homework. While one team of students conducts research on the issues surrounding homework and its impact on students' lives, your research team will need to find the most effective way to change long-established current homework policies. Your team has decided that the best way to find out how to really make an impact is to learn from past reform efforts, by researching the reform movements of the mid-nineteenth century. You will need to find out what the nineteenth-century reformers wanted to change, what strategies they used, and whether they were successful at bringing about reform.

Essential Question:

How did life in the Unites States change as a result of
the reform movements of the mid-19th century?
Task and Product

Individual members of your research team will investigate one of the following reform movements to gain an understanding of their impact on American life in the mid-nineteenth century.

  • Education Reform
  • Hospital and Prison Reform
  • Second Great Awakening
  • Temperance Movement
  • Women's Rights
  • Workers' Rights

As you research , you will complete the "Research of reform movement" chart. You will locate necessary information by using the print and electronic resources in Student Resources.

After you have gathered the information on your movement, you will be the expert in that area. You will share your information from your "Research of reform movement" chart to the other members in your new group. You will also be responsible for completing "Making Life Better" chart.

Once you have gotten information on all six reform movements, you can start on your assignment. For your assignment, you will either:

  • Create a drawing of a town depicting at least five changes from the reform movement.
  • Write a diary entry as yourself and how the reform movements have impacted you. Describe at least three changes.
  • Write a Content Constructed Response to answer the essential question.

Your teacher will instruct you as to which assignment you are to complete.

The most difficult part of a research assignment is knowing where to begin! You may feel overwhelmed by the assignment, the vast amounts of information, all the reading you will need to do, and the decisions you must make in order to ace this assignment.

Check out the the Information Literacy Process Model for a step-by-step guide.
Assessments
 The following scoring tools may be used or adapted by your teacher to evaluate your research process and your final product and presentation.

Research Process Assessments:

Final Product Assessments: 

Choose one of the following OR follow instructions of the teacher.

  • Create a drawing of a town depicting at least five changes from the reform movement.
  • Write a diary entry as yourself and how the reform movements have impacted you. Describe at least three changes.
  • Write a Content Constructed Response to answer the essential question
Questions
 Essential Question:

How did life in the Unites States change as a result of
the reform movements of the mid-19th century?

Subsidiary Questions:

  • What did the reformers want?
  • Who lead the reform movement?
  • Why did they want the reform?
  • How did they try to achieve their goal?
  • To what degree were they successful?
Gather and Sort

Use this Research of reform movement chart to gather information about your movement from a variety of resources. Visit the student resource page to link to print and non print resources.

Be sure to avoid plagiarism and remember to cite your references. Check a research guide for details about the proper citation of sources. For MLA guidelines and examples, click here.

Organize

Analyze your research notes to determine if you have adequate information to answer how the reform movements of the mid-nineteenth century impacted America. Ask yourself:

  • Did I use my textbook to gather background information on my topic?
  • Did I use all the resources available to me including the Fee-based databases, the web pages provided, and books in the library?
  • Did I use different Keyword searches to learn all about my topic?
  • Did I stay within my time period?

Synthesize your findings by acting as the expert to report your findings to your fellow classmates. Make sure you also fill in your Making Life Better chart to accurately complete the assessment piece.

Evaluate the effectiveness of your research for the task and create your final products. Ask yourself:

  • Did I include the required amount of changes?
  • Is my assessment accurate?
  • Were these reforms movements really successful?
  • If so, what laws or changes were they able to make?
Conclusion

Presentation:

Organize your assessment into a thoughtful diary, reflection, or constructed response. For the drawing, there may not be five successful reforms so please label which reforms were successful and which were not in your drawing.

Be sure to review it for errors or have a friend, parent, or guardian review it. Hand in your final draft on the due date.


Reflection:

Make sure you answered the essential question:

How did the reform movements of the mid-nineteenth century impact America?


Extension Activity:

Now that you have learned about the reform movements of the mid-nineteenth century, you can inform the student group about what strategy or strategies will work and which will not work to eliminate homework from school. Write the student group a letter to educate them on your findings.