|If you're interested in||
Midwife Martha Ballard kept a diary from 1785 to 1812. Historian Laurel Ulrich analyzed the Ballard diary in her 1990 book, A Midwifes Tale. Through the eyes of these two authors, we have a direct look into a post-Revolutionary household on the Maine frontier. The detailed evidence has allowed historians to revise their thoughts about American women in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in New England.
Teachers can use this DoHistory Web site, the book, and the film A Midwifes Tale to supplement texts and give students a chance to work with selected primary sources, adding variety, excitement, and depth to classroom learning. From here, students may launch into their own investigations of local history. So, welcome. We hope that you find what you need.
What Youll Find
At this Web site, you can bring Martha Ballards words directly to your students. Try the magic lens that changes Martha Ballard's diary from a handwritten to a transcribed version. There are also many other unique historical documents that we have scanned in and transcribed. There are examples of how historians use such documents in their investigations. Looking further, you will find tools and guidance for your students when faced with doing history with primary sources.
In planning for your classroom, you might find it helpful to print out our site map. You can then highlight and make notes on your print-out as you navigate through the site. It is not necessary to have read the book A Midwifes Tale by Laurel Ulrich or to have seen the film based on that book in order to use and learn from DoHistory. We do, however, include film and book excerpts and references at appropriate points for those who wish or need to dig deeper and learn more.
As you design activities for your class, you can use the site in many ways. Some, but not all, of the possible activities may need active Internet access during student instruction:
Pick and Choose Appropriate Levels Middle School through Adult
This Web site encourages exploration by users. The length of time exploring, conceptual levels of thinking required, and learning outcomes will vary throughout the site. For example, you could design a lesson for some students using historical maps (Maps and Pictures of Martha Ballards World) while other students could follow a complex paper trail in the historical investigation of a rape reported by Martha Ballard (One Rape. Two Stories). Some sections offer varying levels of choice and guidance, while others are simple presentations of information that could be used at your discretion in a myriad of ways.
Thus you may decide to use only a portion of the site. Or you may decide to individualize instruction by assigning different parts of the site to different students. We recommend that you explore the site first. Knowing the site well, you can more readily identify learning outcomes, plan activities, direct your students to the appropriate sections, and assess the results.
Martha Ballards diary offers insight into the stuff of everyday life, through a womans eyes. In this instance the woman was an active midwife, so we have the added bonus of seeing the realm of birth and death as women lived it in Martha Ballards time. The themes and topics emerging from the diary cross into many realms. Here are some of them:
This site also touches on two other themes around the historians craft:
You will find information about these themes scattered throughout the site and in Martha Ballards diary itself. The book and film, both titled A Midwifes Tale, also touch on these themes in various ways. See the Browseable Diary, Search the Diary, themes and stories, the document lists by topic and type, and site map to stimulate more thoughts about possible themes that you might want to pursue.
These are only a few suggestions of the many possible activities that you could plan. As you browse through the site, more will occur to you. See also the bibliographies and links to other Web sites for resources beyond this site.
See also the teacher's guide
for the film developed by the producer, director, and historian who worked
on this web project: