Words Aptly Spoken®: American Documents, 2nd ed
Read the formative documents of U.S. history.
| Audience | Grades 9–12; used in Classical Conversations communities in Challenge I. Anyone studying American history will find in this guide a rich sense of the culture and voices that shaped the United States. Use this guide with your 9th graders (Challenge I) as they study American literature, or further on in high school when they study American history. |
| Accessibility | The guide uses primary source material, making otherwise complex historical events accessible to both teachers and students. It even provides various writing assignments that teachers need only evaluate. |
| Preparation | Flexible. Read and learn along with your student, or research historical context as you desire. |
| Ease of use | All primary source materials are printed in their entirety in the guide. Large margins allow for plenty of note-taking. |
| Page Count | 248 |
| Format | Paperback |
| Publication Date | Second edition, 2011 |
General Description
Wholly unlike the other study guides in this collection, Words Aptly Spoken®: American Documents studies the history of American government through the lens of the documents that shaped it. These primary sources allow readers to enter into history first-hand.
The book opens with portraits of all the U.S. presidents and vice presidents, followed by 17 speeches by famous statesmen, including Patrick Henry, George Washington, and Abraham Lincoln. Poets like William Thackeray and Joaquin Miller further enliven historical events with poems about Pocahontas, The Battle of the Alamo, and Panama. In addition, formative essays, such as two of the Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton and James Madison, provide valuable insight into the United States Constitution and the government it was meant to establish. Following this, the collection includes important legal documents that further influenced the nation’s government, its boundaries, and the rights of its citizens.
These four types of documents—orations, poetry, essays, and legal documents—combine to equal 43 informative pieces of American history, each accompanied by questions for review and further thought. In order to further students’ experience of American history, the text also includes illustrations and photographs selected from the U.S. Library of Congress.
