Eric Arnesen, Professor of History and African American Studies at the University of Chicago addresses the interplay between the African-American experience between Reconstruction and the Great Migration, the U.S. Constitution, and shifting democratic ideals.
Video and audio options are available.
The End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center presents the history of the Oregon Trail, one of the historically most widely used routes of migration within the United States. Its period of most concentrated use was the Great Migration of 1843, also known as the Wagon Train of 1843. The site includes a visitor's center and gardens with period plants.
The center offers interpreters in period dress, hands-on activities, exhibits, cedar carving demonstrations, and a garden.
Federal Census figures demonstrate the migration of people from state to state and from region to region over the years. Below are three maps depicting the migration rate (the rate of net domestic migration per 1,000 people), each covering a five-year period. Match each map to the period it represents.
1.
b. 1965-1970
2.
a. 1935-1940
3.
c. 1995-2000
Overall, the census data describes the following pattern of migration flow between California and the other states, showing the periods 1955 to 1960 in red and 1995 to 2000 in blue:
All of these maps are from Trudy A. Suchan et al's Census Atlas of the United States (Washington, DC: U.S. Census Bureau, 2007), available online, as well as in print. Check out Chapter 7, "Migration," for further data and visualizations on migration trends.
Interested in exploring the census further in the classroom? Teachinghistory.org's Lesson Plan Review The First Census: America in 1790 leads students to examine census data for insights into the politics behind the Great Compromise and the Three Fifths Compromise at the Constitutional Convention of 1787.
Don't be turned away by its long name—the Selected Historical Decennial Census Population and Housing Counts website houses more than 21 historical census reports and the history of each U.S. census taken. The United States Census Bureau, of course, also provides a wealth of census data and tools for accessing and assessing the data. And for census data stretching from 1790 to 1960, try the University of Virginia's United States Historical Census Data Browser.
How do societies integrate newcomers? In this workshop, participants will engage with stories of Muslim immigration to Europe and make connections to debates about difference in our own community. Among the many topics they will examine is the role of religion in public life.
Participants in this workshop will travel throughout the Delta as they visit sites where significant events occurred. They will discuss and learn about issues involving civil rights and political leadership, immigrants' experiences in the Delta, the Blues, the great migration, agriculture, and the Mississippi River, among other things. They will sample Delta foods, visit local museums, and listen to the Blues. Field trips will roam as far as Greenville, Greenwood, and Memphis, with stops in between.
Participants in this workshop will travel throughout the Delta as they visit sites where significant events occurred. They will discuss and learn about issues involving civil rights and political leadership, immigrants' experiences in the Delta, the Blues, the great migration, agriculture, and the Mississippi River, among other things. They will sample Delta foods, visit local museums, and listen to the Blues. Field trips will roam as far as Greenville, Greenwood, and Memphis, with stops in between.
From the Chicago History Museum website:
"This two-part series delves into the history of Chicago's Great Migration through compelling historical-fiction short stories based on the Museum's collection.
"Go in-depth into two stories A Bronzeville Story (elementary) and It's a Long Way from Home (middle and high school). Participate in an interactive workshop using the unit plans for each story. Enjoy time in the Museum's galleries."
NOTE: This entry is for part one of the seminar only. To view information on part two, refer to this entry. For more on the Chicago History Museum, refer to NHEC's Museums and Historic Sites listing.
From the Chicago History Museum website:
"This two-part series delves into the history of Chicago's Great Migration through compelling historical-fiction short stories based on the Museum's collection.
"Tour the historic neighborhood of Bronzeville, the center of the Great Migration in Chicago."
NOTE: This entry is for part one of the seminar only. To view information on part two, refer to this entry. For more on the Chicago History Museum, refer to NHEC's Museums and Historic Sites listing.
What pushes and pulls people into new ways of life? In this lesson, students use artifacts, documents, and photographs to help them answer this question.
The Henry Ford Museum’s "Early 20th Century Migration—Transportation: Past, Present and Future" is a thematically rich teaching unit. Through artifacts, documents and photographs, students explore the overarching question, What pushes and pulls people into new ways of life? How did the lure of jobs in U.S. factories “pull” Europeans and people of the American South to northern cities and new ways of living? The lessons are both rigorous and relevant, and continuously engage students in considering the impact of the past on the present.
Dubbed an Educator DigiKit, the unit includes extensive materials for teachers. The Teacher’s Guide includes timelines on various historic themes relevant to the lesson topics, a glossary, bibliographies, connections to Michigan and national standards, and field trip suggestions. The lesson plans introduce the assembly line concept, technological and economic forces that cause large-scale migration, fair labor issues, challenges faced by immigrants, and the ongoing changing nature of work up to the present. All of the lessons include links to primary sources in the Henry Ford Museum Online Collection and they utilize a range of activities, including simulations, math-based problem solving, and source analysis.
Teachers will want to consider supplementing this unit by incorporating a rigorous, systematic approach to analyzing primary sources. Borrowing one from another site (see possibilities here) could strengthen the individual lessons and unit. A rich resource, 20th Century Migration honors middle elementary children by challenging them to ponder and interpret significant topics in history that continue to affect their world today.
Yes
Not only are the details accurate, but the breadth of the perspectives in the lessons helps students develop an accurately complex sense of the unit topics.
Yes
Brief secondary sources provide context for the investigations. For examples, see an essay on the nature of assembly line work on page 44, or a PowerPoint on urbanization that is linked from pages 36 or 37.
Yes
Includes a few explicit writing exercises, primarily short-answer assessments. Class discussion questions might be used as writing prompts in older grade levels.
For an example, see writing prompts for primary source analysis on page 55.
Yes
Would have liked to see primary source analysis embedded earlier in the unit; it is not introduced until near the end of the unit. The unit would also be more powerful if it introduced a systematic model for source analysis.
No
The source analysis guides do not ask students to consider the author or creator of a source. The informal mini-biographies used as primary sources in Lesson 6 are intriguing; the lesson would help students better understand the nature of historical analysis if they engaged them in asking who created the biographies and why.
Yes
The lessons lend themselves to ready adaptation not only in grades 3-5, but for middle school as well.
Yes
Yes
Topical knowledge is emphasized in the unit. Nonetheless, the unit does include activities to engage children in interpreting historical documents for basic understanding. No criteria for assessment are included.
Yes
The learning goals are topical.
Yes
The learning goals are topical.