Mrs. Slaviero's Blog

My Historians have been learning about life in the North before the Civil War. The Industrial Revolution in America meant that factories were being built in large numbers and people, especially women and young girls, were going into the workforce like never before. Students examined the pros and cons of factory life through autobiographic excerpts, video clips, and short readings. This research resulted in students creating haiku poetry to express their views on whether the dangers associated with factory work were worth the financial independence. Here are a few examples:   Poor young girls are trapped At first a new adventure Now an old prison -Bella   Some workers were kids They don't earn much for their work Smoke sometimes kills them -Brendan   Waking up early To work in the factory How this work pains me -Saloni   The life is awful Factories are not lawful It's not wonderful -Jeff   It is hard to b...

Students evaluated their knowledge of westward expansion through the creation of a concept map.  Each student generated a list of important people, places, events, and ideas from class work. Student groups then sorted their lists into concepts with the main ideas in the center of the web, less essential ideas toward the edges.  Students had to develop connections and wrote connection sentences. The final step was to have each student create a persuasive paragraph about westward expansion. This routine enables students to have a deep understanding of the topics covered in class and see how the small ideas in the chapter can create a "big picture" understanding of US History.