The Grand Tournament of Reformism

The Grand Tournament of Reformism

Background: Reform movements were numerous during the Reform Era, but many of the reform movements had similar goals for more freedoms, liberties, or the abolition of vices. Many of these movements had a great deal of success, while others met with failure.

Your Task: Since the key to any successful political movement is widespread support, our class will envision a hypothetical situation in which every reform movement is competing for universal support. Only one movement will be deemed worthy of campaigning for nationwide, and it is your job to decide which one is important enough to deserve the support of everyone.

Topics: In groups of 4-5 (randomized groups this time, sorry), you are to pick one of the following reform movements:

·  Temperance Movement

·  Education Reform

·  Prison/Mental Health Reforms

·  Labor Reform

·  Women’s Rights

·  Nativism

·  Religious Revivalism

·  Transcendentalism and Utopia

Research: For the debate you want to try to explain why America “needs” your reform. Your group’s task is to research your topic in two ways (both online and on pages 99-105):

1. The problems that existed in American society in the first half of the 19th century that sparked these reform movements.

2. Why your reform movement is more important to be addressed immediately by the American people than the other reform movements

Round 1: Your group will be given the opportunity to “pitch” your reform movement to the rest of the class for 3-4 minutes (VISUALS required). What problems need reforming? Why do they need reforming (specifics)? How is your group going to reform those problems (laws, new regulations, public awareness)? Who is the leader (or leaders) of your group? Your job is not to discredit the other groups or attack their platform, your job is to talk about why your movement deserves attention FIRST. What is your movement, and why is it the most important?

Requirements for Round 1 Presentation:

·  A minimum of 6 slides, how you divide them is up to you

·  No more than 50 words per slide, all of them in your own words (not copy-pasted)

·  Share your slides with me:

·  Each slide must feature an image

·  Everyone is expected to speak

·  Your group will lose points if it goes under 3 minutes, and will be cut off at 4:30

Important Note: Are we pretending that it’s actually the 1800s? Kind of, but not really. I am expecting that your presentation talks about the reforms that your group was able to accomplish mid-1800s to early 1900s. What laws did you pass? How did your movement show its success? When you introduce the accomplishments of your movement, simply phrase it as “we intend to do [insert detailed account of accomplishment here].”

End of Round 1: Following the first round, our class will vote in order to rank the reform movements in order of importance. The top four movements will be placed in an “upper” bracket and the bottom four movements will be placed in a “lower” bracket. Within both the upper and lower brackets pairings will be teacher determined and your movement will be given an “opponent” movement.

Round 2 (Championship Round): Here you will try to identify any hypocrisy in the other reform’s argument and how your reform could negate the need for the other reform. You will also want to restate the importance of your reform. You will have roughly 20 minutes to prepare this round and will be given 30 seconds to a minute.

Grand Tournament (alt)

You will be completing the “Round One” portion of this assignment as a written assignment as opposed to a presentation. You can choose any of the reforms, and will be addressing the round one prompt in three typed paragraphs. You need to include at least five citations of sources that you have used (formatting does not matter, you can give me a list of web links you used). When you finish your paragraphs you need to organize some time (lunch or after school if no class time is available) to discuss your paragraphs and tell me why your reform is important.