Women | EDSITEment

Women's Suffrage: Why the West First?

Students compile information to examine hypotheses explaining why the first nine states to grant full voting rights for women were located in the West.

Pioneer Values in Willa Cather's "My Antonia"

Students learn about the social and historical context of Willa Cather’s My Antonia and work in groups to explore Cather's commentary on fortitude, hard work, faithfulness, and other values that we associate with pioneer life.

Lesson 3: A Debate Against Slavery

Sometimes, people will fight to keep someone else from being treated poorly. Disagreement over slavery was central to the conflict between the North and the South. The nation was deeply divided.

Lesson 4: Life Before the Civil War

Students demonstrate their knowledge of life before the Civil War, with an emphasis on differences between the North and South.

Lesson 5: Women's Lives Before the Civil War

What was life like for women in the first half of the 19th century in America? What influence did women have in shaping the attitudes towards slavery? Towards women's suffrage?

Lesson 1: Factory vs. Plantation in the North and South

Students develop a foundation on which to understand the basic disagreements between North and South.

Lesson 2: People and Places in the North and South

Students develop a foundation on which to understand the basic disagreements between North and South.

Lesson 3: Emulating Emily Dickinson: Poetry Writing

In this lesson, students closely examine Dickinson’s poem “There’s a certain slant of light” in order to understand her craft. Students explore different components of Dickinson’s poetry and then practice their own critical and poetry writing skills in an emulation exercise. Finally, in the spirit of Dickinson’s correspondences, students will exchange their poems and offer informed critiques of each others’ work.

Lesson 2: Responding to Emily Dickinson: Poetic Analysis

In this lesson, students will explore Dickinson’s poem “Safe in their Alabaster Chambers” both as it was published as well as how it developed through Dickinson’s correspondence with her sister-in-law Susan Huntington Gilbert Dickinson.

Lesson 1: In Emily Dickinson's Own Words: Letters and Poems

Reading Emily Dickinson’s letters alongside her poems helps students to better appreciate a remarkable voice in American literature, grasp how Dickinson perceived herself and her poetry, and—perhaps most relevant to their own endeavors—consider the ways in which a writer constructs a “supposed person.”

Search