Name: _________________________
Use complete sentences if needed.
Hour: _____
Chinese Immigration to America Webquest
Type in the following web address:
https://www.loc.gov/classroom-materials/immigration/chinese/
Part 1: Introduction
1. Why did Chinese immigrants first come to America?
2. What problems did Chinese immigrants and Chinese Americans face in the United
States?
Click on Searching for the Gold Mountain
Part 2: Searching for the Gold Mountain
3. Why was the discovery of gold in California seen as a major opportunity for people
around the world?
4. In what Chinese city was the news of the massive gold discovery in California first
reported?
5. By 1851, about how many Chinese people had moved to the United States?
6. What did some Chinese people call California?
7. What other places along the Pacific had the Chinese immigrated to by the 1850s?
8. Why was it so difficult for Chinese immigrants to have success looking for gold?
© History Wizard http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/History-Wizard
9. Why were very few Chinese men able to send their wives and children to America?
Click on Struggling for Work
Part 3: Struggling for Work
10. What was the relative age and gender of most of the first Chinese immigrants?
11. What skills did most of the early Chinese immigrants to America lack?
12. Why did railroads need workers so badly during the 1860s and 1870s?
13. Why did Chinese laborers see railroads as an opportunity during the 1860s and
1870s?
14. How many Chinese laborers worked on the Central Pacific’s side of the
Transcontinental Railroad?
15. What type of railroad work did Chinese laborers do on the Transcontinental
Railroad?
16. In what year was the Transcontinental Railroad completed? About how many years
did it take to complete?
17. What industrial jobs did many Chinese immigrants do once the Transcontinental
Railroad was completed?
18. What did many Chinese immigrants open and operate within mining towns?
19. How did Chinese labor help farming in the United States?
Click on Intolerance
Part 4: Intolerance
© History Wizard http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/History-Wizard
20. List several cities and states that had race riots and attacks against Chinese
immigrants:
21. What types of abuses did Chinese immigrants face within the United States?
22. What are the three main things that created a climate of terror and bloodshed in the
American West?
23. Were the people who committed crimes against Chinese usually punished?
Click on Legislative Harassment
Part 5: Legislative Harassment
24. What did the Foreign Miners License tax law require?
25. What did the Sidewalk Ordnance of 1870 ban?
26. What did the Queue Ordinance of 1873 outlaw?
27. List three other laws that prevented Chinese-Americans and Chinese immigrants
equality within the United States.
28. What were Chinese immigrants often blamed for causing within the United States?
Click on Exclusion
Part 6: Exclusion
29. What was unique about the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882?
30. What did the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 prevent Chinese immigrants from
attaining?
© History Wizard http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/History-Wizard
31. How did the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 impact Chinese living in the United
States?
32. How did the 1924 Immigration Act change immigration policies in the United States?
Click on Building Communities
Part 7: Building Communities
33. What caused Chinatowns to form?
34. List at least four ways Chinatowns served the Chinese and Chinese-American
communities:
Click on Taking Care of Our Own
Part 8: Taking Care of Our Own
35. List three ways Chinese and Chinese-Americans were helped by people within the
Chinatowns:
36. What were tongs?
37. Do most Chinese-Americans live in Chinatowns today?
38. How did the media often portray Chinatowns?
39. How do you think Chinatowns are portrayed in our modern culture?
40. Why do you think so many Americans like to visit well known Chinatowns in New
York City or San Francisco?
Click on Growth and Inclusion
© History Wizard http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/History-Wizard
Part 9: Growth and Inclusion
41. What groups of Chinese were allowed into the United States after the Chinese
Exclusion Act of 1882?
42. What loophole were "paper sons" and "paper daughters" trying to exploit in the
Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882?
43. How many Chinese immigrated into the United States between 1910 and 1940?
44. What was the name of the immigration station that many Chinese immigrants
passed through in San Francisco?
45. How were many Chinese immigrants able to start businesses in the United States?
46. How did Chinese and Chinese Americans help the United States in World War II?
47. How did World War II help change American immigration policy?
Click on A New Community
Part 10: A New Community
48. How did the Immigration and Naturalization Act of 1965 change immigration in the
United States?
49. List two things that you learned or found interesting by doing this webquest:
50. What grade would you give the United States for its polices on Chinese immigration
from the 1850s to 2000s?
A
B
C
D
F
Please explain your grade below:
© History Wizard http://www.teacherspayteachers.com/Store/History-Wizard
0
