This activity asks students to match documents to individuals based on the reasons these people came to and were living in the United States. The photographs and documents are attached to government forms in some of the millions of federal immigration case files.
When finished matching, students can use Google Earth or Google Maps to follow each person on their journey around the world.
Suggested Teaching Instructions
Learning ObjectivesStudents will analyze six documents and photographs, each representing a person. They will gather information to decipher why each person was in the United States - whether they were an immigrant from a foreign country, or were born in America, as in one case. Students will also engage with the geography of North America, Europe, Asia, and the Pacific through either Google Earth or Google Maps as they visualize the distances these people traveled around the world and where they landed.
For grades 7-12. Approximate time needed is 30 minutes.
InstructionsMillions of men, women, and children immigrated to the United States from the 1880s through World War II. Entering, leaving, or staying in America—their stories were captured in these documents, now held in the National Archives.
This activity is intended as an individual or small-group activity to give students the opportunity to interact with primary sources and geography during a unit on immigration. It could also fit into a geography unit.
After discussing the fact that U.S. immigration policies have changed over the course of history, project the activity for the entire class and choose one document from the grid with which to model document analysis. You may also wish to discuss the difference between immigration "push" and "pull factors" and instruct students to identify examples of each.
Ask students to complete the activity on their own, performing similar analysis with each document they click on. The activity will instruct students to match each document with the reason that that person was in the United States. Students should determine that:
- Richard Arvay came to escape religious persecution and genocide during the Holocaust.
- Mary Yee was a native-born citizen who married a Chinese merchant, and was therefore declared a Chinese citizen.
- Minezo Araki worked as a farmer and a fisherman in the U.S. for more than 30 years after immigrating from Japan. He went from being an alien to being an enemy alien during World War II.*
- Stephan Bondareff left Russia to escape political persecution after the Russian Civil War, since he had served in the White Russian Army that was defeated by the Red Army (Bolsheviks).
- Carmen Wienke came from the Philippines when she married a U.S. serviceman, then left the U.S. to return to the Philippines. She was detained when she tried to return, but was eventually able to come into the country following WWII.
- Maria Garcia accompanied her husband, a Mexican government official, then returned to Mexico to get her visa and walk back across the border on foot.
After students match each document to a reason, they will see a photograph of President Lyndon B. Johnson Signing the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, that represented a significant change in American immigration policies and eliminated the national origins quota system that was in place since 1924.
Students should click "When You're Done" to follow links to either a
Google Map or
Google Earth file. They can open these maps in one of these two programs and click through the travels of these eventual Americans around the world. Each person is represented in a different color and the steps of their journeys are numbered.
