Memories of the Depression
Introduction to Personal Memoirs
Personal memoirs are short, non-fictional
narratives written to recall episodes or incidents in an author’s life.
Usually written in the first-person, memoirs are often nostalgic since they
reminisce about times past.
Famous people sometimes write memoirs to describe their participation in famous events. But ordinary people can write memoirs, too. The memoirs you will read are written by someone who grew up during the Great Depression; they describe life on a farm in the 1930’s.
These memoirs will help you:
1) learn more about
how real people lived during the Depression
2) compare growing up in
the Depression to your life today
3) introduce you to
non-fiction memoirs or personal narratives
|
|
Find
out more about the author of these personal memoirs by clicking here. |
Instructions
1) Choose one of the
personal memoirs from the selection listed below. After you’ve chosen a
memoir, either read it on the screen or click the Print command on the
toolbar so you can read it on paper.
2) After reading the
memoir you selected, click to access the activity guide about that memoir. The
activities include some hyperlinks to other Web resources to add to what
you’ve learned from the memoirs. To use an activity guide, choose the Print command on the
toolbar to print out the guide to record your responses and reflections about
the topic.
3) After reading
several of the memoirs and the corresponding activity guides, click on the Challenge
Activities link
below the list of memoirs for a final project before returning to the Main
Student Page
by clicking on the link at the bottom of the page.
The List of Personal Memoirs
Basic Comforts: Learn what it was like to live without
electricity, central heating, or indoor plumbing
Chores:
Learn
about helping with farm chores, like milking cows and baling hay, during the
Depression
Entertainment: Learn what kids did for amusement in small
towns and on farms during the Depression
Food & Shopping: Learn how people shopped and what they had
available to buy during the Depression
Transportation: Learn
what transportation kids had to get around during the 1930’s
The Final Step