By Rich Cairn, History, Civics & Social Studies Inclusion Specialist, CES

Teaching about Disability in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era

Slides from presentation by Rich Cairn at the virtual conference: A More Perfect Union: Exploring America's Story in the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, June 17, 2024

In celebration of our new course on teaching disability history in the K-12 classroom, we invited Wendy Harris, a teacher at a school for the Deaf with expertise in teaching DeafBlind students, to share her thoughts about disability with us. The topic of Deafness as a disability gives the opportunity to begin with an exploration of the conception of DISABILITY itself, and the question of what abilities and attributes should be regarded as a disadvantage or an equally valid and valuable difference in experience of the world. This is where Wendy Harris's reflections begin.