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We are adding inquiry-based lessons every week and constantly seeking those that are already out there by others. If you have one to contribute, email us at remedialherstory@gmail.com.
Inquiries are provided in chronological order. Click here for How to Teach with Remedial Herstory Lessons. |
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The World War I Era: Woman Suffrage
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Were women given the vote?
Teaching with film can be powerful for students. Iron Jawed Angels and PBS' The Vote both show the LONG and grueling struggle to earn the vote that over three generations of women underwent. Students will use the film to explore questions about women's role in their own liberation in order to address the question, were women given the vote? 
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Palczewski, Catherine H. Postcard Archive. "Suffragette Series no.4." University of Northern Iowa. Cedar Falls, IA. Retreieved from https://sites.uni.edu/palczews/NEW%20postcard%20webpage/Dunston%20Weiler.html.
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Why were people opposed to woman suffrage?
Women's suffrage took over 60 years of activism to achieve. It was highly controversial and was seen not only as an expansion of the franchise, but also a disruption to engrained gender roles. In this lesson, students analyze political cartoons produced in New York to more deeply understand the gendered expectations that hardened the opposition against suffrage. This lesson plan would be a great introduction to the Stanford History Education Groups Lesson on Anti-Suffrage. In this lesson, students study a speech and anti-suffrage literature to explore the reasons why so many Americans, including many women, opposed women's suffrage.
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Harris & Ewing, Washington, D.C. Miss Lucy Burns in Occoquan Workhouse, Washington. United States Washington D.C. Brooklyn New York Virginia, 1917. [Nov] Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/mnwp000011/.
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Why did Woodrow Wilson change his mind?
Sometimes what presidents say is different than what they mean. Students will examine two of Woodrow Wilson's speeches on woman suffrage, given three years apart, and place them in historical context of World War I and the suffrage movement. They will then decide if the reasons he gave in support of woman suffrage are really the reasons, or if there was something, or someone else who influenced him-- hint hint. This lesson would go well with Iron Jawed Angels or The Vote.
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Alice Paul. , ca. 1918. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/2004670382/.
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Despite her centrality to the final push for the vote-- many American's don't know Alice Paul's name. In some cases, women like Paul were intentionally excluded from historical events. Why?
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Nye, Ned, Charles Eichel, and Albert Von Tilzer. I Want to Go to the Ball Game. Monographic. Notated Music. https://www.loc.gov/item/ihas.200033396/.
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Why did Katie Casey want to go to a ballgame?
Did you know that "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" is a song about women's rights? In this inquiry, students learn from the primary material and historians why baseball was at the forefront of the suffrage movement in 1908. You can find the original song here and below.
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Harris & Ewing, Washington, D.C. Women's Voter Convention, Sept. Alva Belmont seated second from right. United States, 1915. Sept. Photograph. https://www.loc.gov/item/mnwp000282/.
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Were white suffragists racist?
In the last few decades increasing numbers of historians have begun to question the legacy of the women suffrage movement. What is it a women’s movement? Or a white women’s movement? In this inquiry students examine two articles written for the suffrage centennial celebration. Students will pull specific evidence from each and form their own conclusion. There is also a second inquiry using mostly primary sources and arguing the same question.
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Lessons from Others
- Woman Suffrage:
- C3 Teachers: This inquiry leads students through an investigation of voting rights in America. By investigating the compelling question “Was the vote enough?” students evaluate both sides of the early twentieth century quest to expand suffrage to women. The formative performance tasks build on knowledge and skills through the course of the inquiry and help students determine if getting the vote was enough to give women full social and political equality. Students create an evidence-based argument about whether or not the vote is enough.
- C3 Teachrs: This inquiry examines the emergence of the women’s suffrage movement in the 19th century as an effort to expand women’s political and economic rights, and it extends that investigation into the present. The compelling question “What does it mean to be equal?” provides students with an opportunity to examine the nature of equality and the changing conditions for women in American society from the 19th century to today. Each supporting question begins by asking about 19th-century women’s rights and then asks about contemporary gender equality. The relationship between women’s rights and gender equality is a central focus of this inquiry. Students begin the inquiry by exploring the legal limits placed on women in the 19th century and how efforts to gain rights were undertaken by women at the Seneca Falls Convention.
- C3 Teachers: This inquiry leads students through an investigation of the women’s suffrage movement in New York State as an example of how different groups of people have gained equal rights and freedoms over time. Through examining the role women played in society before the 20th century and the efforts made by women to gain the right to vote, students will be prepared to develop arguments supported by evidence that answer the compelling question “What did it take for women to be considered ‘equal’ to men in New York?” Subsequent inquiries could be developed around other groups who have struggled to gain rights and freedoms, including, but not limited to, Native Americans and African Americans.
- Gilder Lehrman: Over the course of two lessons, students will analyze primary source documents in order to examine the factors that contributed to the exclusion of American women from the right to vote and the battle for full enfranchisement. They will read and interpret complex documents, engage in discussions, and, in order to demonstrate comprehension, answer critical thinking questions.
- National Women’s History Museum: Was the woman suffrage movement inclusive? This lesson seeks to explore the role of Black women in the Women’s Suffrage Movement and their exclusion from the generally accepted Women’s Suffrage narrative. Students will examine primary and secondary sources to explore some of the unsung heroes of the Women’s Suffrage Movement and the contributions of these unsung heroes to the movement. As a summative assessment, students will create an exhibit detailing the contributions of a Black Suffragist.
- Gilder Lehrman: The American women’s suffrage movement has always been identified with its two founders, Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, whose strong, enthusiastic leadership defined the movement. When they retired from active participation in the cause, the loss of that personal connection naturally affected the movement’s future. The transition was not an easy one. As the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA), the organization that Stanton and Anthony had led, headed into the twentieth century, it lost the dynamism and direction of the nineteenth-century association. Successors had difficulty measuring up to Stanton and Anthony, and the organization was unable to develop a focused plan for its difficult campaign. Alice Paul joined the fray in 1910. Did she pick up where Stanton and Anthony left off? The answer to that question is not obvious. Almost anyone familiar with the suffrage movement has a notion of Stanton and Anthony’s leadership, but most people know far less about Alice Paul, whose contributions are not often remembered in the movement’s history. Investigation into Paul’s life and contributions reveals that she had a very different approach to the battle for the vote; that she was a radical compared to the NAWSA leaders who succeeded Stanton and Anthony; and that she devoted her life to winning the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment and, later, to the effort to secure the enactment of the Equal Rights Amendment. Any history of the women’s suffrage movement that fails to take into account Alice Paul and her organization, the National Woman’s Party, is incomplete. Using the classroom as a historical laboratory, students can use primary and secondary sources to research the history of Alice Paul, her associates, and the NWP. The students can be historians; they can discover the history of Alice Paul and her fight for women’s suffrage.
- Edcitement: An article originally published in the 1991 Session Weekly of the Minnesota House of Representatives recalls the arguments put forth in objection to the Minnesota Equal Suffrage Association's decision, early in the 20th century, to push for the right of women to vote in presidential elections. One lawmaker declared that all-male voting was "designed by our forefathers." Later, Rep. Thomas Girling argued that "women shouldn't be dragged into the dirty pool of politics." Approving such a measure, he said, would "cause irreparable damage at great expense to the state." When the Senate took up the bill, one member asserted that "disaster and ruin would overtake the nation." Suffrage would lead inevitably to "government by females" because "men could never resist the blandishments of women." Instead, he recommended that women "attach themselves to some man who will represent them in public affairs." Though such arguments may now sound rather ridiculous to some, they are closely related to entrenched views of women that took more than a century to overcome (assuming one agrees they have been overcome). Understanding the positions of the suffrage and anti-suffrage movements—as expressed in archival broadsides, speeches, pamphlets, and political cartoons—will help your students better appreciate the struggle for women's rights and the vestiges of the anti-suffrage positions that lasted at least through the 1960s and, perhaps, to the present day.
- PBS and DPLA: This collection uses primary sources to explore the campaign for women's suffrage through the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment. Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets are designed to help students develop their critical thinking skills and draw diverse material from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States. Each set includes an overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide. These sets were created and reviewed by the teachers on the DPLA's Education Advisory Committee.
- C3 Teachers: This inquiry leads students through an investigation of voting rights in America. By investigating the compelling question “Was the vote enough?” students evaluate both sides of the early twentieth century quest to expand suffrage to women. The formative performance tasks build on knowledge and skills through the course of the inquiry and help students determine if getting the vote was enough to give women full social and political equality. Students create an evidence-based argument about whether or not the vote is enough.
- Women’s Sports:
- National Women’s History Museum: Did involvement in basketball help improve women's sports? In the late 19th and early 20th centuries women had a much different role in society than they do today. Women were expected to raise children, take care of the household, and not question the male figures in their lives. Women were expected to act in a respectable, “ladylike” way. Women were advised against participation in athletics by men and doctors due to their “frail” bodies and “weak demeanor.” Furthermore, the competitive attributes that came out while participating in sport were deemed “unladylike” by society.
- National Women’s History Museum: Did involvement in basketball help improve women's sports? In the late 19th and early 20th centuries women had a much different role in society than they do today. Women were expected to raise children, take care of the household, and not question the male figures in their lives. Women were expected to act in a respectable, “ladylike” way. Women were advised against participation in athletics by men and doctors due to their “frail” bodies and “weak demeanor.” Furthermore, the competitive attributes that came out while participating in sport were deemed “unladylike” by society.
- World War I:
- Gilder Lehrman: This unit examines the complexity of women’s contributions to World War I. Together, these resources shed light on World War I in a compelling and very human way. The students will demonstrate what they have learned through their analysis of the various primary sources by writing a response to an essential questions posed for the unit.
- National History Day: Juliette Gordon Low (1860-1927) was nicknamed “Daisy” as an infant and the moniker stuck; her friends and family used it her whole life. Low’s childhood was marred by the outbreak of the Civil War; her mother’s family fought for the Union while her father served as a Confederate soldier. She enjoyed adventures in the Georgia countryside and her love of nature, wildlife, and sports shaped the organization she founded. A series of childhood ear infections and a botched operation left her with significant hearing loss. She married William Low in 1886 and set up homes in Georgia and England. Searching for purpose after her husband’s 1905 death, a chance 1911 meeting with Sir Robert Baden-Powell in London changed her life. Baden-Powell, the founder of Boy Scouts, recommended that Low become involved with the Girl Guides, the female equivalent of his organization. After working with female troops in England and Scotland, Low returned to Georgia to replicate the organization in America. On March 12, 1912, Low hosted the inaugural meeting of Girl Scouts of the USA. Low spent the rest of her life leading the organization, stressing leadership, community involvement, and outdoor activities. The Girl Scouts thrive today, boasting 2.6 million participants in 92 countries and an alumnae network of over 50 million women.
- National History Day: Jeannette Rankin (1880-1973) was born and raised in Montana. While studying social work at the University of Washington, she joined the woman suffrage movement. Soon after, she became a field secretary for the National American Woman Suffrage Association (NAWSA). She traveled across the United States, advocating for suffrage. In 1916, she was elected as the first woman in the U.S. House of Representatives. Just three days after being sworn in, she cast one of two votes that would define public memory of her service - a vote against the American declaration of war on Germany in World War I. Rankin introduced a voting rights amendment that passed the House in 1918, and was the only woman in Congress to cast a vote for woman suffrage. She unsuccessfully ran for U.S. Senate in 1918, and spent the next two decades advocating for peace and social welfare. In 1940, she was again elected to the House, and in 1941, cast the only vote against the declaration of war on Japan. She left Congress in 1942, and remained active in anti-war movements and the philosophy of nonviolent protest for the rest of her life. She died in California in 1973.
- Unladylike: Learn how Jeannette Rankin became the first woman in United States history elected to the U.S. Congress, representing the state of Montana in the U.S. House of Representatives, in this video from Unladylike2020. As a suffragist and life-long pacifist, Rankin fought tirelessly for women’s right to vote, and voted against United States entry into WWI and WWII. Utilizing video, discussion questions, vocabulary, and teaching tips, students learn about Rankin’s role in securing women the vote nationally, and her enduring commitment to ending war.
- Gilder Lehrman: This unit examines the complexity of women’s contributions to World War I. Together, these resources shed light on World War I in a compelling and very human way. The students will demonstrate what they have learned through their analysis of the various primary sources by writing a response to an essential questions posed for the unit.
