Champaign County Education from 1890 -1940:
A Comparison
2010 Fellowship, Champaign County Archives
Melissa Luffman
To download this lesson in PDF format, click here.
Lesson 3: Newspaper Analysis
This lesson involves examination of newspaper
articles, completion of graphic organizers, and forming opinions or conclusions
about the main ideas of the article on education and curriculum between 1890 - 1940.
Teacher Prep:
á
Make copies and familiarize yourself with
the following articles:
o 501 Books Bought,
Donated, Urbana
Courier, 10/35/1937
o Nickel Tells
of School Aims in Art Education, Urbana Courier, 11/02/1937
o School
Reader Used to Study Everyday Life, Urbana Courier, 10/17/1937
o School
Music : A Valuable and Necessary Thing in Public Schools, Urbana Courier, 5/14/1897
o Three RÕs
Have Been Taught in County for
Almost a Century,
Champaign paper and date unknown
á
Make copies of the following drawing
conclusions graphic organizer:
http://my.hrw.com/nsmedia/intgos/html/PDFs/Drawing_Conclusions_from_Information.pdf
Classroom Activities:
á
Pair students in good working groups based
on ability and cooperation.
á
Each article varies in length and reading
level. Pass out two-three appropriate
articles and one organizer to each pair so that reading, discussing, and note-taking
can be meaningful.
á
Students will fill out the drawing
conclusions organizer for each article:
o Nickel Tells
of School Aims in Art Education
o School
Reader Used to Study Everyday Life
o School
Music : A Valuable and Necessary Thing in Public Schools
o
Three RÕs Have Been
Taught in County for Almost a Century
á
Students will note at least 4 main ideas
from the articles and write their opinion or conclusion from what they learned.
á
When each pair is finished, regroup and
have the students discuss the articles together. Ask pairs from each article,
to define the main ideas and their conclusion and opinions from their
organizers. Allow students to
discuss and ask questions about each article.
á
After reading and reviewing the articles
together, students will write an essay explaining how the current schools have
evolved into what it is today, reviewing the key words: clothing, school, books, supplies, activities, teacher, students.
o
Students should draw in information from
articles and ideas they discussed from the newspaper articles, and other
material discussed throughout the unit.
