Identify the effects of industrialization on living and working conditions; analyze social issues including child labor; apply concepts such as status and social class in describing the connections and interactions of individuals, groups, and institutions in society.

Middle class Americans of the late 19th century cultivated the notion that childhood was a time of innocence and fragility, a time during which parents should nurture and shield their children from harsh realities of the outside world. However, members of the working classes harbored no such illusions. Working in arenas from mines to textile mills to the urban streets where they hawked newspapers, children of the lower classes were obligated to contribute to their families’ livelihoods. The 1890 census estimated that one and a half million children between the ages of ten and fifteen were employed. While child labor was an innovation of neither this time nor place, working children of the American Industrial Age faced new dangers, including factory accidents, exposure to toxic substances, exhaustion, and exclusion from the education that would all but ensure them a higher standard of living in the future.

• CA  10.3: 2; 11.2: 1
• TX  113.32(2): b, c; 113.33(24): a
• FL  SS.A.5.4:1
• NCSS  IV(HS): c; V(HS): a; VII(HS): a

2 class periods

• Activity Sheet, Children of the Industrial Age
• Timeline, Chronology of the Industrial United States, 1870-1900 
• Graphic Organizer, Compare/Contrast Chart
• Writing Rubric

Students have the opportunity to write a Research Report (see Extension below).

What were children’s lives like during the Industrial Age?

Point of View Students will write a journal entry in which they assume the point of view of an Industrial Age child. Students will research the social and economic factors which shaped children’s daily lives in late 19th century America.

Have students research the topic using the provided links. Encourage them to use the suggested graphic organizer as they read the articles.

These “Breaker Boys” worked in a Pennsylvania mine, separating slate from coal.

To start students thinking about the lives of children during the Industrial Age, have them examine the photograph.

Key questions students should answer are:

• What does the photograph reveal about the age and social class of these mine workers?
• Why might companies have considered it advantageous to hire children?

Distribute the Student Activity sheet. Tell students that they will research the following topics in preparation for writing their journal entries.

• Class Differences
• Changing Ideas about Childhood
• Education
• Working Conditions
• Health Issues
• Social Control
• Play/Leisure Time

Remind students that their journal entry will be shaped by the background of the person from whose perspective they are writing; therefore, they should decide whether their subject is middle or working class before they begin to write.

Use the Writing Rubric to assess students’ performance.

Have students reflect on their performance and use the list of expectations to judge how well they met the criteria.

Ask students: How did issues of class and social status affect children’s experiences?

Expository Writing Have students use Daily Life through History to research and write about child labor in another country during a different historical period.

Critical Thinking: SYNTHESIZE