This article describes strategies used by the author in intermediate level reading, writing and social studies-history GED classes in Harlem and the Bronx. Since four out of five of the New York State TASC exams are based on reading, I assign extensive reading and discussion, as well as strategies for answering multiple-choice questions. In…

Focusing on students' responses to an 1876 writing assignment at Illinois Industrial University (which would ultimately become the University of Illinois), the author analyzes ideological tensions that occurred as the United States found itself revising the pastoral image of the farmer in an increasingly industrial age. (Contains 9 notes.)