Task

We just finished reading Little Women by Louisa A. Alcott in English. We're learning about the Civil War in Social Studies. While you were reading Little Women, did you notice any similarities between what you were studying in Social Studies and what was in the book? I hope so! The time period of the book is the same time period that we are studying in Social Studies!

Little Women's setting was in a small town in Massachusetts around 1863, right in the heart of the Civil War. Mr. March, as we know, was in the Army during the most of the book and he left behind his wife and four daughters: Mrs. March (a.k.a. "Marinee"), Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy. His girls promised that by his return, they would live the life of pilgrims and help all of those around them while their husband and father risked his life for their country to make it a better place for them to live.

Think about the many different types of families the March family dealt with during the story: their wealthy neighbors the Lawrence's, the poor Hummel family, all of the girls that Meg and Jo went to parties with that were much more well off than the March's. All of these types of families existed then and, in some way, still exist today. Each family had a different affect on the March family, some in a positive way and some in a negative way, but the March family learned a lot not only about the community that they live in, but about themselves as well.

Now, many questions probably came up either during your reading of the book or learning about the Civil War. What was life like for families before the Civil War? Were society "boundary lines" really that obvious? These are just two of about a million different questions that came up. What we are going to see is how different families acted and reacted during this period of time that changed not only our country, but the way that people were viewed forever.

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Authors: Amy Garbellano & Richard Murek