Subjects

Government, Social Studies, English

Estimated Time

One 90-minute class period

Grade Level

Middle and High School

Warm Up Activity

What is the American Dream?: An Introduction

Have students hear from student Janice Aragon from Brentwood High School in New York as she discusses her life as a first-generation student and her hopes to secure a better future for her family. Watch this video as a class.

How do families achieve the American Dream?

Part of the American Dream is the idea that if you work really hard then your children will have a “better” life than you, their children will have a better life than them and so on down each generation. This idea specifically means that each generation will have more opportunities offered to them than the previous generation, and therefore can enjoy a better quality life. Think about this part of the “Dream," how it becomes a reality, and for whom.

1. Pose these questions to students in small groups:
   • How exactly does this part of the American Dream happen?
   • What must one generation do to help the next be “better off”?
   • What must they accumulate or accomplish to become wealthier than the last generation?

Example answers are:

1. Ask students to write down their answers on large sheets of paper and then tape them to the board.
2. Review their answers aloud. Mark answers that apply to many people with a capital “M” and answers that apply to a very few people with a lower case “f”. For example, inheriting genes that will make you a professional athlete, or inheriting millions of dollars from your parents typically happen to relatively few people so it gets a small “f”. The ability to get a loan to buy a house in a safe neighborhood is something that most people are legally allowed to do- gets a big “M”.

*Explain to students that these are like rungs on a ladder that one uses to climb towards the top of society. If certain rungs are missing it may be very difficult or even possible to climb to the top. Have them keep this in mind during the next activity.

Main Activity

1. The Story of Two Families

1. Put students in pairs and randomly assign them as either “Family A” or “Family B”.
2. Give each individual student their respective sheet and ask them to follow along as you read through the lives of family A and B going all the way back five generations.
3. As you read through important milestones, have students write down their best guess of either “yes” or “no” as it applies to their family.
4. Read these instructions aloud to your students:
   

Think about your family and your family’s roots. For this exercise you are going to imagine that this is the story of your family starting with your great great great grandfather. That is five generations back! Listen as your teacher reads the answers to each statement and circle yes or no to mark whether this event could have happened in your family or not. While you are learning about your family’s history think about how these events shaped the life of your family from five generations ago and the consequences they had on your family all along their journey.

1. After you have read through their family history reveal that for Family A all the answers will be “no”, and Family B all the answers will be “yes.”
2. After revealing the answers ask the students to think about the following questions, discuss them with their partner and write their answers at the bottom of their paper:
   1. How hard or how easy it was for their family to “move up” from one generation to the next?
   2. What were some of the main rights that allowed or stopped your family from able to improve from one generation to the next?

By Katie Gould, Teacher Resource Producer for PBS NewsHour Classroom

This lesson was updated on June 9, 2023. It was originally published on February 6, 2016.

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