The importance of studying the Progressive era lies in the fact that this time period shows how people banding together can create real change in the way the government addresses their needs. During this time period we have the long struggle by women to gain the right to vote coming to an end by the passage of the 19th amendment. Laws meant to protect consumers came into being due to the influence of writers and photographers who were able to affect public opinion and ultimately helped raise our standard of living. Political changes also made government more responsive to us with places like California leading the way with ideas like the initiative which allowed people to more directly decide what should become law. While all these examples seem very different from each other they share the idea that change should be in the benefit of people and in response to their needs. This idea is one that fits extraordinarily well within an U.S history course as it has shaped the way the country is today and the way people look at their political system.
This unit is also important as it contains many primary sources which were aimed to convince the reader in one way or another and interpreting them in the proper context will demonstrate proficiency in working with complex primary sources. This steams from the conflict of ideas that occurred when issues like women’s suffrage were debated where we have sources in favor and against where we need to take into account the bias and extract meaningful information to aid us in understanding what was happening that led us up to that point in time. Also equally important we get to explore sources in which we get a glimpse into what life was like for people during this time period, we get to understand what the vote meant for women, what a child laborer looked like after working in a coal mine and with this opportunity we can gain a better perspective of the changes that have occurred over time.
With this new knowledge we can have a better chance at objectively looking back at this time period and see how while things were bad so many things improved that we should be able to say that this was a time that helped a great deal of people. Many of those changes are still here today and are infinitely important to students in high school. The fact they are in school and not at work was influenced during this time period, the safe work conditions and reasonable work hours they’ll encounter once they graduate come from this time period as well and this is something they should be conscious of as it shows that if there are things they don’t agree with today they can create the change they want to see by organizing and being active participants in the political system.
The importance of studying the Progressive era lies in the fact that this time period shows how people banding together can create real change in the way the government addresses their needs. During this time period we have the long struggle by women to gain the right to vote coming to an end by the passage of the 19th amendment. Laws meant to protect consumers came into being due to the influence of writers and photographers who were able to affect public opinion and ultimately helped raise our standard of living. Political changes also made government more responsive to us with places like California leading the way with ideas like the initiative which allowed people to more directly decide what should become law. While all these examples seem very different from each other they share the idea that change should be in the benefit of people and in response to their needs. This idea is one that fits extraordinarily well within an U.S history course as it has shaped the way the country is today and the way people look at their political system.
This unit is also important as it contains many primary sources which were aimed to convince the reader in one way or another and interpreting them in the proper context will demonstrate proficiency in working with complex primary sources. This steams from the conflict of ideas that occurred when issues like women’s suffrage were debated where we have sources in favor and against where we need to take into account the bias and extract meaningful information to aid us in understanding what was happening that led us up to that point in time. Also equally important we get to explore sources in which we get a glimpse into what life was like for people during this time period, we get to understand what the vote meant for women, what a child laborer looked like after working in a coal mine and with this opportunity we can gain a better perspective of the changes that have occurred over time.
With this new knowledge we can have a better chance at objectively looking back at this time period and see how while things were bad so many things improved that we should be able to say that this was a time that helped a great deal of people. Many of those changes are still here today and are infinitely important to students in high school. The fact they are in school and not at work was influenced during this time period, the safe work conditions and reasonable work hours they’ll encounter once they graduate come from this time period as well and this is something they should be conscious of as it shows that if there are things they don’t agree with today they can create the change they want to see by organizing and being active participants in the political system.