Struggle for Women's Rights in America

Use the documents and broadsheets in this portfolio to help your students experience first-hand the struggle for women's rights, chronicled from the 1600s through the 1970s. Letters from Abigail Adams and Susan B. Anthony, a page from the 1647/48 Maryland Council Proceedings, newspaper articles on suffragist conventions and marches, political cartoons, and sheet music for ''I'm a Suffragette" are included, as well as a composite of portraits of outstanding women's rights activists of the 19th century. This portfolio is the appropriate reading level for upper-elementary and middle school students, and for high school students reading below grade level. Included are comprehensive Reproducible Student Activities, which offer vocabulary, writing, research, and creative thinking exercises, plus a teacher's response key. A timeline summarizes important dates, and a recommended reading allows for further exploration in the struggle for women's rights. 4 Illustrated Broadsheet Essays: * Reaching for Equality * The Feminist Movement Begins * The Fight for Equal Rights * At Last, the Vote 11 Primary Source Documents: * Page from Maryland Council Proceedings, January 21, 1647/1648 * Letter from Abigail Adams to John Adams, March 31, 1776 * Seneca County Courier, July 21, 1848 * Page one of the first issue of The Revolution, January 8, 1868 * Five cartoons on women's rights, 1859, 1869, 1874, and 1919 * Letter from Susan B. Anthony, February 15, 1900 * Sheet music for ''I'm a Suffragette," 1912 * Full page of photographs from The New York Times Picture Section, May 11, 1913, showing the suffrage parade on Fifth Avenue * Leaflet, "Why the Equal Rights for Women Amendment?" * Composite of portraits showing some of the outstanding women of the 19th century * U.S. postage stamps commemorating the early women's rights movement