How did the Industrial Revolution impact America? Here is a fun way to teach students how the Industrial Revolution impacted the lives of many people in America during the 1800s.
First, I make my students pick the seeds out of a cotton boll. (I have friends in Texas that pick them and send them to me.)
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Next, I pass around carders and have them experiment with carding the cotton they just picked the seeds out of. I don't have a spinning wheel, but it is on my list to find. So next, I show them how it is spun just using my hands (bottom right.)
Then I pass around 2x4 "looms" that I get some of my students or a helper to make. I also bring out bags of yarn from my thrift store runs and show them how to make 8-10 wraps around the loom. This makes the warp for the weaving.
After the warp is wound around the 2x4 "loom," we use another color of yarn taped to a popsicle stick and work on the crosswise threads (the woof.)
At about this step in the process, I ask my students to think about how much time it would take to pick all the seeds out of the cotton, card it, spin it, and then weave it all into cloth -- just to make the one set of clothes they are wearing -- as it takes about two hours just to weave store-bought yarn in to a 7" bookmark. That makes the Industrial Revolution make much more sense. Those machines really were a big deal!
They then have about two weeks to finish their weaving. If they weave 7.5", they get a 100% for a participation grade.
When true learning is occurring, it gets messy. But that's okay. It's worth it.
