M IT Year 1,

Winter, 2004

HISTORY PROJECT

ROLES OF WOMEN AND MEN IN 19TH CENTURY SCHOOLS

 

GUIDING QUESTION: How did ethno-centrisim, racism, sexism, class and religious values, democracy, and a developing capitalistic economy affect the evolution of public schools in America?

 

Your task is to research roles of men and women in the development and functioning of 19th century schools. Pay careful attention to the ways in which views of the family and of gender roles affected the schools.

 

1. Each person will need to seek information from at least 3 sources, BEGINNING with The American School, Chapter 7 by Joel Spring. Take thorough notes about the issues that affected the development and content of schools during this period.
2. After gaining an overview of the issues from Spring, meet as a group and decide on particular issues to focus on as each of you pursues your next two sources (see linked websites for possible source material). For example, some of you might want to learn more .about frontier and one room schoolhouses, others might be interested in teacher education and normal schools, others might want to investigate Pestalozzi and his method of instruction, some might want to explore the development of bureaucracy, while others might want to research McGuffey's Readers and capitalism.
3. Each person will hand in an individual annotated bibliography of her/his sources.
4. Next, your group needs to meet and decide how to create a time-Iine of the time period from 1820 to approximately 1860. Include events pertaining to education, politics, the economy, and society that you discovered in your research.
5. Then, as a group, create a poster that provides a visual representation of

• key features related to gender and schools discussed in Spring's book, and,
• the particular topics each of you investigated.

You could use a concept map or bullets for the features. For example, if you compare and contrast Pestalozzi and McGuffey or depict the relationship of MCGuffey's readers to capitalism, you could use an H-map or a Venn diagram.

6. Then, decide together how you will present your findings to the program. You will have 40 minutes to teach your peers about the issues you researched. Review the models of teaching, select an approach, and write your lesson plan. Be sure to connect the information you researched to the functions of schooling that education in this time period served and to the guiding question.
7. Finally, write three assessment questions (and their answers) that could be used to assess your peers' understanding of the information you will be presenting. Before writing your questions, revisit Arends' section on Bloom's taxonomy. Only one question can be at the knowledge or comprehension level.
8. On Tuesday, Jan. 27, you will teach your section and hand in

·        An annotated bibliography from each group member

·        The group's timeline

·        The group's poster

·        The group's lesson plan

·        Three assessment questions, with answers, developed by the group

·        Assessments by each person of each of the group members