CKHG Unit 8: Industrialization and Urbanization in America
NOTE: The resources for this unit are in the second part of The Making of America: Immigration, Industrialization, and Reform.
Focus:
In this unit, students explore the significant demographic and economic shifts that took place in the United States during the late 1800s and early 1900s as the rise of big business ushered in an era of industrialization and urbanization across the country.
During this period, the country became an industrial giant, with vast numbers of Americans moving to the cities for factory jobs, capitalist entrepreneurs becoming exceedingly rich tycoons of big business, and inventors changing the way ordinary people lived for the better. Students also learn, however, that the benefits of industrialization and invention were not shared by all. In particular, unskilled workers struggled to find work. When they did, they often worked long hours in difficult and sometimes dangerous conditions. Eventually workers formed unions to fight for better pay and working conditions. Americans tried to rein in the power of big business and stop corruption in cities, but these efforts initially met with limited success.
Number of Lessons: 10
Instruction Time:
45 minutes (Each lesson may be divided into shorter segments.)
Additional Search Terms:
social studies • nonfiction • informational text • geography • map skills • Samuel Slater • transcontinental railroads • Cornelius Vanderbilt • market economy • Alexander Graham Bell • Thomas Alva Edison • Andrew Carnegie • John D. Rockefeller • Bessemer furnace • Standard Oil Company • robber barons • monopoly • trust • The Gilded Age • free enterprise • the Machine Age • child labor • Samuel Gompers • labor union • American Federation of Labor • urbanization • skyscraper • political machine • Boss Tweed
