Our lesson study
on Dorothea Dix and her contribution
to American society focused
on the following questions and
issues:
- Who was Dorothea Dix and
what did she do about the
jail and poorhouse conditions
she observed?
- What were the results of
her work?
- Given the information provided
in this reading, what kind
of person was she? Describe
some possible personal qualities
she might possess.
- How would you describe
Dorothea Dix? Is she an important
historical figure? Is she
a heroic historical figure?
With regard to
historical content, the students
learned that the mentally ill
were treated horribly; often
they were treated like criminals
or animals. The treatment of
the ill was not a primary concern
for most people; instead, it
was acceptable to mainstream
America. Students learned that
even in 19th century America
one person could affect great
change. Focusing on Dorothea
Dix allowed us to examine how
a woman could influence politicians
and, finally, the public, to
reform.
By adding additional
information on the “complexities”
of Dorothea Dix’s personal
and professional life we learned
that a person can do good work
in one area but not necessarily
b e a “good” person
in other aspects of her life.
By learning both the good and
bad aspects of a historical
persons life the students have
the tools to analyze this person’s
impact without sugarcoating.
An area the proved
problematic for some students
was maintaining a historical
focus or thinking on the times
during which Dix’s reforms
took place. Dorothea was a friend
and supporter of southern culture.
As this, tacitly, was supportive
of the institution of slavery,
many students couldn’t
see any positives outweighing
the impression (or fact) of
racism:
“For
all Dorothea did, she seemed
caring and loving. Turns out
she’s not. She is sexist,
racist, and she lied a lot
about here life. All this
information is confusing because
how can she do good deeds
but have a really bad personality.”
(April P.)
A reason for
this difficulty might be a lack
of criteria for passing judgment
on historical figures. There
exists a large gap between present
life and the historical times
we are studying. The better
able we are to connect our students
to the past, the more success
they will have in analyzing
and passing judgment on the
people and events of that time.
Additionally,
our students were very successful
at compiling lists of historical
facts gleaned from our readings.
The students were able to summarize
the major events of Dix’s
life and were mostly successful
in accessing difficult primary
source documents.
We found the
use of biography to have tremendous
potential to highlight a greater
historical subject/period. By
using an interesting person
as an axis around which a period
of history revolves, it is more
possible to authentically learn
about a historical subject/period
and for students to be more
engaged in their learning. It
is important to emphasize the
person’s point of view
and his/her connection to larger
historical issues.
Also, what criteria
are used to judge the person/event/
period? This criteria, or development
of, should be an ongoing process
in the classroom so those students
are able to compare and contrast
the evolution of morality, political
views, and pragmatism in America
throughout the year. Additionally,
we were impressed with how many
of our students came to terms
with the complexities that Dix
possessed:
Dorothea
Dix was prejudice against
the Irish and Catholics. She
believed that they were moving
into America too fast. Even
though she was mean to the
Irish She still did some good,
which was helping the mentally
ill by putting them in better
places. Studying people like
Dorothea Dix is new and old
to me. It is new to me because
she was prejudice to Irish
and Catholics but still did
something good for others.
It is old to me because she
didn’t give up on doing
or changing something she
believed was wrong. (Diane
C.)
Although many
had strong feelings toward her
for racist and prejudiced views,
they still were able to acknowledge
her contributions to mental
health reform.
Understanding
why some students were better
able to reach this mental compromise
while others could not is something
we are intrigued by. While many
students were able to summarize
and describe what Dix did, they
were unable to critically think
through these facts and develop
opinions on the historical significance
of the information learned.
Something we would like to investigate
in the future is implementing
extra steps to help students
scaffold their thinking. This
also would facilitate in the
writing process. For instance,
the use of sentence prompts
would help guide students in
their writing and learning.
An overarching question we would
use to organize their thinking
is: How exceptional or ordinary
(typical) was Dix for her time?
Some issues and
questions emerged during the
lesson which we did not entirely
anticipate. Providing more historical
context is a concern that grew
out of this lesson study. Something
we would do next time is to
give more context to what women’s
lives were like during Dix’s
time. This would make Dix a
more humane (or not) character
in the eyes of our students
as they would see her in comparison
to others and not as a stand-alone
tool for our lesson. There were
also quite a few issues with
vocabulary. To some extent we
expected this, but not enough
to have addressed it. In the
future we think a vocabulary
building activity would be beneficial.
