WORLD CULTURES II - Lesson Plan - Unit 8

Growing Pains & The Age of Invention

Textbook Chapters & Sections: 16 (2,3), 17 (5), 18 (2,3), 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24

Objective Test Section

KNOWLEDGE

A / B / C / D
1 / Charles Dickens / Cyrus McCormick / P. T. Barnum / Samuel Colt
2 / Charles Darwin / Victoria / Horace Mann / Edgar Allen Poe
3 / Charles Goodyear / Treaty of Nanking / Ralph Waldo Emerson / Adolphe Sax
4 / John Stuart Mill / Dorothea Dix / Samuel F B Morse / Irish Potato Famine
5 / Mexican War / Zachary Taylor / Black Bear Revolt / 54º 40’ or Fight!
6 / Brigham Young / Brook Farm / Karl Marx / Frederick Douglass
7 / Seneca Falls, NY / Sutter’s Mills / Stephen Foster / Henry David Thoreau
8 / Harriet Tubman / Harriet Beecher Stowe / Gadsden Purchase / Crimean War
9 / Florence Nightingale / Kansas-Nebraska Act / “Bleeding” Kansas / Dred Scott
10 / Louis Pasteur / Titusville, PA / Charles Darwin /

Harper’s Ferry

11 / Abraham Lincoln / Secession / Fort Sumter / Bull Run (Manassas)
12 / Clara Barton / Monitor & Merrimac / Emancipation Proclamation / Chancellorsville
13 / Gettysburg / West “by God” Virginia / Matthew Brady / Appomattox Court House
14 / John Wilkes Booth / Jules Verne / Gregor Mendel / Ku Klux Klan
15 / Reconstruction / Maximilian / Otto von Bismarck / Alfred Nobel
16 / Cholera / George M. Pullman / Impeachment / George Westinghouse
17 / Promontory Point / Suez Canal / Knights of Labor / Thomas Nast
18 /

Samuel Clemens

/ Cincinnati Red Stockings / Dmitri Mendeleèv / Franco-Prussian War
19 /

Mrs. O’Leary’s cow

/ Jesse James / Aaron M. Ward / Yellowstone
20 /

Luther Burbank

/ Silver Demonitization / Joseph Glidden / The Grange
21 /

Alexander Graham Bell

/ “Jim Crow” / Thomas A. Edison / Hayes vs. Tilden
22 /

Little Big Horn

/ Charles J. Guiteau / Hatfields & McCoys / Friederich Nietzsche
23 /

Karl-Friedrich Benz

/ Haymarket Square / Samuel Gompers / Statue of Liberty
24 /

Anne Sullivan

/ George Eastman / Jack the Ripper / Oklahoma “Sooners”
25 /

Johnstown Flood

/ Sherman Act / Wounded Knee, SD / James Naismith
26 /

Walter Camp

/ Ellis Island / Denton True Young

COMPREHENSION

1 At whom was the phrase “Rum, Romanism, & Rebellion” aimed, and what effect did it have?

2 What was the meaning of the campaign slogan, “Tippecanoe and Tyler too!”

3 How is it that great orators and statesmen like Henry Clay, John C. Calhoun, and Daniel Webster never became President?

4 What was the Donner party actually doing before they became famous?

5 How did the Wells, Fargo and Co., and the Pony Express contribute to “taming” the American West?

6 Who were the key generals of the Civil War, and how did their personalities and abilities affect the outcome?

7 The hardships of the Civil War created business opportunities through the end of the century for an amazing number of families who remain household names: Borden, Hormel, Armour, Campbell, Heinz, Welch, Libby, Pillsbury, Coors, Busch, Nestlé, Hire, Swift, Kellogg, Kroger, Oscar Meyer, Hills Brothers, Quaker, Morton, Avon, John Pemberton (Coca-Cola), Wesson, Lipton, Del Monte, Wrigley, and Hershey.

8 How did the actions of Carpetbaggers and Scalawags influence Reconstruction?

9 Why would a major land addition to the U.S. be ridiculed as “Seward’s Folly”?

10 What is the historical significance of Hiram Revels and J. H. Rainey?

11 Why did Ferdinand de Lesseps fail in his plans for so long?

12 How was Rudyard Kipling different from other poets of his day?

13 Why was a Pledge of Allegiance originally instituted?

14 What do taxes like the McKinley Tariff and the Wilson-Gorman Tariff tell us about government policy at the time?

15 How did Wilhelm Roentgen change the practice of medicine permanently?

APPLICATION

1 When a “gag” rule is applied to an issue like slavery, what are the odds it will have a positive effect?

2 Make a chart of the Presidents from William Henry Harrison through Grover Cleveland, showing their years in office, and 3 important events or policies of each administration.

3 Describe the contributions of the well-known writers of this era: Nathaniel Hawthorne, James W. Longfellow, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Herman Melville, Edward Lear, the Brontè Sisters, Walt Whitman, Horace Greeley, Feodor Dostoevsky, Lewis Carroll, Leo Tolstoi, Horatio Alger, Henry James, and Robert Louis Stevenson.

4 Explain the changes in art created by the well-known artists of this period: Currier & Ives, Winslow Homer, Edouard Manét, Paul Cézanne, Thomas Eakins, James McNeill Whistler, and the Impressionists generally.

5 Describe the contributions of the well-known musicians of the era: Giuseppe Verdi, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt, Richard Wagner, Petr Ilich Tchiakowsky, Johannes Brahms, Franz Schubert, Modest Mussorgsky, and Gilbert & Sullivan.

6 Can we ever properly describe sports like soccer and baseball as having been “invented”?

7 How would discoveries in Germany’s Neander Valley have impact on people’s religious beliefs?

8 How might the experiences of Bernadette Soubirous have an impact on people’s religious beliefs?

9 How did the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments attempt to resolve issues that caused or were raised by our Civil War?

10 Should modern computer manufacturers pay homage to Christopher Sholes?

11 What analogy in basketball or baseball compares with Princeton vs. Rutgers in football?

12 Why do we not celebrate the accomplishments of Victoria Woodhull and Susan B Anthony more?

13 Was the Chinese Exclusion Act a direct violation of the U. S. Constitution?

14 How many provisions of the Pendleton Civil Service Reform Act are still in effect?

15 What does Ernest Lawrence Thayer’s most famous poem indicate about interests in this era?

16 Were Harry Stanley and Elizabeth Cochrane true adventurers, or harbingers of “yellow journalism”?

17 What does the popularity of Coney Island, the World’s Fairs and Expositions, and W. G. Ferris’ wheel tell us about the times?

Subjective Test Section

ANALYSIS

1 Would it have been possible to have predicted that so many veterans of the Battle of Chapultepec would eventually also be important players in the American Civil War?

2 Would C J Doppler be surprised at the applications that have been made of his noted “effect”?

3 Is Andrew Carnegie the quintessential American success story?

4 How did Henry Gray make his book, Anatomy of the Human Body, Descriptive and Surgical, revolutionary?

5 Did the discovery of the Comstock Lode help or hinder America’s monetary stability?

6 By the mid-1800’s did the actions of European activists like Giuseppe Garibaldi and Camillo Cavour affect Americans the way others had affected their Revolutionary-era predecessors?

7 What improvements were made by J. A. Roebeling to his creations that made them so special?

8 Would contemporaries have viewed the passing of native leaders Cochise and Chief Joseph in the same way?

9 What significance might we attach to the creation of new holidays like Thanksgiving Day, Decoration Day, and Labor Day?

10 Was Henry Wirz personally responsible for the events at Andersonville, and was his punishment just?

11 Among Land Grant institutions, how is West Virginia University unique?

12 How did Heinrich Schliemann’s discovery revolutionize the study of history? What about his methods?

13 Why did John Muir found the Sierra Club, and does it still serve the purpose he envisioned?

14 If the United States had presidents who alternated the way British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli and William Gladstone did, what might be the result?

15 How do the scandals of President Grant compare with other famous scandal-ridden administrations, like those of Harding, Nixon, or Clinton?

16 Should we view the “Molly Maguires” as heroes of the labor movement, or radical troublemakers?

17 How would you improve the system devised by Melvil Dewey?

18 Exactly what improvements did Hiram Maxim make that caused his guns to be superior?

19 With “Wild West” events like the OK Corral and people like Billy the Kid being relatively recent, why do we have so much difficulty finding out exactly what happened with them?

20 What are the characteristics of Henrik Ibsen’s plays? What explains his popularity?

21 Did the death of William Hickok indicate the end of an era, or just another event in a series?

22 What are the elements of Rudyard Kipling’s work that gives it lasting value?

23 Is the Washington Monument a great work of architecture, or just a simple obelisk?

24 What qualities of Vincent van Gogh’s work make it so valuable today?

25 Why does the Eiffel Tower remain such an attraction when so many other structures built at the same time are considered simply obsolete?

26 Look at an outline of Alfred Thayer Mahan’s book, The Importance of Sea Power in World History, to see what elements led it to influence world leaders extensively.

27 What are the elements of Emily Dickinson’s poetry that cause it to be highly regarded?

28 When Jacob Riis wrote How the Other Half Lives, could he have anticipated the good it would do or that people would still be writing the same ideas a century later?

29 How was the boxing match of James John Corbett vs. John Lawrence Sullivan different than today’s events?

30 Are there similarities between Kaiser Wilhelm II and Tsar Nicholas II that caused them to be the last monarchs their countries have known?

31 What was the key scientific idea that led King Gillette to his revolutionary discovery?

EVALUATION

1 Should we look at Matthew Perry’s opening of Japan as progress or cultural invasion?

2 Did the original John D. Rockefeller act as a reasonable businessman, or as a “robber baron”?

3 Did William F. Cody make a caricature of Sitting Bull, or did he create social progress?

4 Can we put the eruption of Krakatoa during this era into perspective using modern measurements?

5 Compare the experience of someone working in a newspaper office when the Linotype machine was first introduced to someone adapting to a new technology today.

6 In the AC/DC debate, did Nikola Tesla or Thomas Edison have the better argument?

7 Does Louis Blanc, who coined the phrase, “to each according to his needs, from each according to his abilities” deserve some of the cultural anathema we usually heap on Marx and Lenin?

8 Is Vincent van Gogh as romantic a character as he is usually portrayed?

9 Should Auguste Rodin be considered a great artist, or is he just a hack?

10 Looking at all the actions of Cecil Rhodes, should we judge him as a ruthless businessman, clever opportunist, benevolent gift-giver, or some combination of all three?

11 Frederick Jackson Turner lamented the end of the American frontier, which he claimed had spawned individualism, self-reliance, inventiveness, and restless energy in our citizens. How does his claim hold up after a century?

12 When the Sherman Silver Purchase Act was repealed, could anyone have envisioned that it would need to be reinstated in 1933?

13 How did the Dreyfus Affair create a hostile environment for Jews in France, and what part did Emilé Zola play in the process?

14 If modern forensic techniques had been in use during this era, might the outcome of Lizzy Borden’s trial have been different?

15 Is Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage limited in any way because of the author’s lack of war experience?

SYNTHESIS

1 Write a short argument you might have had with Steven A. Douglas over the issue of Popular Sovereignty.

2 If John D. Rockefeller or Cornelius Vanderbilt were alive today, how might they view Bill Gates?

3 Teach a simple lesson by using a poem in the style of Rudyard Kipling.

4 Create your own painting in the style of Vincent van Gogh.

5 Imagine that you are a modern-day Harry Stanley or Elizabeth Cochrane – what might be your proposal to your editor?