ABSTRACT
Patricia Seymour is an eighth-grade teacher in an inner suburb of a large East-coast city. Her classroom consists of a diverse student body, with a pretty balanced mix of African American, Puerto Rican, and students whose parents came to the United States from Europe in the late nineteenth century. She teaches in a self-contained classroom that is in a newly designed K-8 elementary school. Today, she is beginning a history lesson that will focus on the “industrial period” of American history. She wants her students to understand this critical period in American history, but she also holds another important goal. She wants them to develop an understanding and appreciation of the role of primary sources for interpreting and understanding history.
