REBEL
Educator Guide
90-120 minutes + Assignments
“What a woman may do if only she dares, and dares to do
greatly.” - Loreta Velazquez
OVERVIEW
Grade Level: 9-12
Subject Areas:
Social Studies, Women’s Studies, Latina/o Studies, US History
Class Time: 90 to 120 minutes + Assignments
Objectives:
It is estimated that between 500 and 1,000 women went into military service
during the American Civil War, yet their contributions to major events of that era
are often overlooked, misunderstood, misrepresented, or undocumented. Using
excerpts from the documentary film Rebel and the remarkable story of Loreta
Velazquez as a guide, students will:
 Consider how factors such as gender and race shape our understanding of
history
 Learn about the stories of women, such as Loreta Velazquez, and examine
the motivations that led them to become soldiers, spies and strategists
during the American Civil War
 Explore how women’s opportunities and roles changed during that period,
and why women’s participation was an important aspect of our history
 Understand the factors and forces that determine how history is shaped for
future generations and why some stories are overlooked or suppressed
while others are celebrated or mythologized
 Compare and contrast the challenges that women in combat experienced
during the Civil War era with the circumstances women soldiers face today
Skills
 Thinking critically about commonly-presented historical narratives
 Analytical reading and viewing
 Stating and supporting opinions in class discussions and in writing
 Working collaboratively
 Interpreting information and drawing informed conclusions
Resources/Materials
 Film Modules (available on the PBS Learning Media website:
www.pbslearningmedia.org)
 Computers with Internet access
 LCD projector
 Rebel Student Handouts
 Student Handout A: Draw a Soldier
 Student Handout B: Women at War
 Student Handout C: Soldiers, Spies and Strategists
 Student Handout D: Hidden Histories
 Whiteboard or blackboard
 Pen and writing paper
ACTIVITIES AND PROCEDURES
ACTIVITY 1: DRAWING CONCLUSIONS ABOUT SOLDIERS
Time: 25 minutes
Film Module: Rebel Film Module 1: Total time 03:06 minutes
You will need: LCD projector and Internet access, pens/pencils,
white/blackboard, markers/chalk, and Student Handout A: Draw a Soldier
(optional)
Goal: Students will be asked to draw a soldier and use their work as a jumpingoff point for a discussion of preconceptions about women in combat. Teachers
will record the responses and revisit/reflect on them following a screening of
Rebel Film Module 1 which introduces the story of Loreta Velazquez.
●
●
Write the word SOLDIER on the board.
Ask your students to create a mental image of a soldier. What kind of person
do they see? What clothes is the soldier wearing? What is the soldier doing?
Where is the soldier?
● Using this mental image as a guide, tell the students that they have 1 minute
to draw a picture of their soldier. The students should draw quickly and not
worry about drawing the soldier precisely. They are welcome to draw stick
figures, but should add clothes and any details that will help to illustrate who
the soldier is. Students may also use Student Handout A: Draw a Soldier to
help with their drawing.
● When time is up, ask the class to share what they have drawn and quickly
record a list of common traits included in their drawings, using the following
prompts:
○ What does your soldier look like?
○ What is s/he wearing and carrying?
○ What is s/he soldiers doing?
○ What traits did you choose not to include? Why?
○ What gender is your soldier? How did you illustrate that?
○ What race is your soldier?
○ What traits are most common among all of the drawings? Why do you
think we think of these traits when we imagine a soldier?
● Follow the discussion with a screening of Rebel Film Module 1 and discuss
the excerpt using the following prompts:
○ During our brainstorming session, how many people drew female
soldiers?
○ How many people drew soldiers that were black, Latino/a, Asian?
○ How does our image of soldiers compare to the historical reality?
○ Where do we learn what soldiers look like?
○ How do you think our understanding of history is shaped by our
assumptions about the roles that men and women play?
○ What does it mean to be a soldier?
○ What other roles do soldiers play other than participating in combat?
○ What ways do people fight for their country or a cause other than
becoming a soldier?
ACTIVITY 2: SOLDIERS, SPIES, AND STRATEGISTS
Time: 60 minutes + Homework
Film Module: Rebel Film Module 2: Total time 06:20 minutes
You will need: pens/pencils, white/blackboard, markers/chalk, LCD projector
and Internet access, Student Handout B: Women at War, and Student Handout
C: Soldiers, Spies and Strategists
Goal: Following from the story of Loreta Velazquez, students will explore the
lives of a selection of women who participated in the Civil War and consider the
motivations for and barriers to their active participation in the conflict.
●
Screen Rebel Film Module 2 and instruct students to take notes using
Student Handout B: Women at War as a guide. They should identify the roles
women played during the war, their motivations for joining in battle, and
strategies they used to avoid detection. Following the screening, discuss the
students’ notes and record their responses.
●
THINK-PAIR-SHARE: Print out or provide the link to one or both of the
following articles. Instruct the students to read the article and discuss with a
partner. Guide their discussion by asking students to identify how the articles
address women’s roles, motivations, and strategies for participating in and
contributing to the war. Ask pairs to share their observations with the class.
Blanton, DeAnne. “Women Soldiers of the Civil War”, National Archives
Prologue Magazine Spring 1993, Vol. 25, No. 1:
http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1993/spring/women-in-thecivil-war-1.html
○ Righthand, Jess. “The Women Who Fought in the Civil War“,
Smithsonian.com, April 08, 2011: http://www.smithsonianmag.com/historyarchaeology/The-Women-Who-Fought-in-the-Civil-War.html
○
●
Divide the class into groups of three to five students and ask them to choose
(or assign them) a research subject from a selection of women who made
critical but often-unrecognized contributions to the Civil War on both sides of
the North South divide. Using Student Handout C: Soldiers, Spies and
Strategists as a guide, instruct each group to examine the motivations women
had for joining the War, the ways these women contributed during this period,
the strategies they used, and the sacrifices they made. (FACILITATOR TIP:
To save class time, students can be asked to complete part or all of this
research assignment as homework.)
○
Possible research subjects:
■ Sarah Emma Edmonds: Canadian woman who joined the Union
Army where she served as soldier and scout in the 2nd Michigan
Infantry under the alias, Franklin Thompson
■ Harriet Tubman: African-American abolitionist, humanitarian, and
Union spy who was born into slavery and later helped rescue more
than 300 slaves through the network of antislavery activists and safe
houses known as the Underground Railroad
■ Jennie (Irene) Hodgers: Irish-born immigrant who served as a male
soldier in the Union Army during the American Civil War and
continued to live her life as a man named Albert D. J. Cashier
■ Elizabeth Van Lew: Well-born Richmond, Virginia resident who built
and operated an extensive Union spy ring during the American Civil
War
■ Rose O'Neal Greenhow: "Wild Rose", as she was called from a
young age, was a leader in Washington society, a passionate
secessionist, and one of the most renowned Confederate spies in the
Civil War
■ Susie King Taylor: Former slave and army nurse who worked with
black Union troops during the Civil War. She wrote Reminiscences of
My Life in Camp with the 33d United States Colored Troops, Late 1st
S.C. Volunteers, the only wartime memoir published by an African
American woman
■ Kate Warne: Union spy and first female detective in the United States
who helped to uncover a plot to assassinate President Elect Abraham
Lincoln
Class Reflection: Ask each group to complete the activity by presenting
their research subject to the class followed by a class discussion using the
following discussion prompts:
○ What common factors motivated these women to participate in the
Civil War?
○ How did the Civil War period change the opportunities these
women had to participate in society?
○ What if anything did they have to sacrifice by joining the Civil War?
○ What similar challenges, if any, do women today face?
ACTIVITY 3: HIDDEN HISTORIES DISCUSSION
Time: 30 minutes
Film Module: Rebel Film Module 3: Total time 09:10 minutes
You will need: pens/pencils, white/blackboard, markers/chalk, LCD projector
and Internet access, Student Handout D: Hidden Histories
Goal: Why do we know so little about the thousands of women who have
participated in every major American conflict? Who writes our history? What are
primary sources and how do they inform our understanding of the past? Students
will examine the conflict between Loreta Velazquez and Jubal Early and consider
the forces that drive the construction of a community or society's historical
narrative, as well of as the consequences for those whose stories conflict with or
undermine that narrative.
●
Revisit the results from Activity 1 and tell students that women have
contributed in multiple roles during every US military conflict, including
combat. Ask students to consider why we know so little about women’s
contribution to military history and brainstorm factors that could contribute to
the lack of information about women’s role in US military history. Record the
students’ responses on the board to revisit later in the activity.
● Screen of Rebel Film Module 3. Ask students to take notes during the
screening using Student Handout D: Hidden Histories as a guide, and record
quotes, events, and evidence that provide insight into how and why the
stories of figures like Loreta Vasquez and their own research subjects have
been lost, suppressed, or erased from history.
● Following the screening, discuss the circumstances that lead to Loreta
Velazquez’s story being suppressed. Revisit the results of the pre-screening
brainstorm, and ask students if the film module revealed any additional
factors that could be added to the list.
● Complete the activity with a class discussion using the following prompts:
○ Do you think the histories of women in combat today are subject to the
same resistance and censorship as women in the Civil War era? Why or
why not?
○ How are circumstances for women the same? How are they different?
○ Who do you think is writing the history of contemporary events?
○ Are there any contemporary communities whose histories are being
misrepresented, suppressed, or erased from history? If so, who? What
factors are contributing to their histories being distorted or lost?
ESSAY ASSIGNMENT
Using the film modules and previous activities as a guide, instruct students
research and complete an essay on the following subject:
●
Women in Combat Then and Now: Should women be on the front lines? As
the role of women in the US military continues to change, the debate about
how and if women should participate in armed conflict continues. Students
should research and examine the arguments for and against women in
combat and compare today's debate with the prevailing attitudes of Loreta
Velazquez's time.
EXTENSION ACTIVITIES
●
This Just In: Dispatches from the Civil War. Ask students to imagine they
are reporters during the Civil War and have them select a woman to
“interview”. Students can use this opportunity to further examine the life of
their research subject from Activity 2.
○ Instruct students to ask questions about their subject’s life before the war,
her motivations for taking action, how her life has changed, and how she
views the war and its goals now that she has been in combat.
○ Remind students to write the subject’s answers in her “voice” and to
include specific details and vivid imagery to make the subject come alive.
○ Students can take it further by creating Civil War period portraits for their
subjects, and using the cinematic style of Rebel as inspiration, film
recreations of scenes described in the “interview”. An alternative would be
to collect public domain images (available from the National Archives or
the Library of Congress) to illustrate their subject’s stories.
○ Going Further: Create a Dispatches from the Civil War website that
features the students videos as well as a Profiles from History page that
provides academically rigorous and historically accurate background
information on the subject. Make sure that students cite their sources for
their subjects and encourage them to include primary source material that
is available for reproduction in the public domain. The following websites
and online tools can help to make the presentation more engaging and
dynamic:
■ Weebly for Education: http://education.weebly.com/
■ Tumblr: www.tumblr.com
■ Animoto: animoto.com
■ Capzles: www.capzles.com
■ Prezi: prezi.com
●
Passing: How women soldiers appropriated and subverted the
conventions of Race, Gender, and Class. When Loreta Velazquez became
Harry T. Buford, she transformed not only her gender but also racial identity
and consequently her place in the social hierarchy.
Ask students to consider the questions and issues raised by Loreta’s
story and posed by scholars in the film including the following:
■ “How does someone who is Hispanic and different, try to assimilate,
cross, or pass into sameness, and what does that do? How does
that pit her against racial others?” – Jesse Alemán
■ Loreta buys a slave named Bob and attempts to “expand her own
boundaries of the possible while enslaving another human being.” –
Vicki Ruiz
■ “When Loreta makes him [Bob] a comrade in arms…she is
essentially humanizing the slaves.” –Renée Sentilles
■ “For someone like Loreta Velazquez, you have an immigrant trying
to find a sense of identity within this country, and the way she does it
is by fighting for it.” – Jesse Alemán
○ Using the discussion as a jumping-off point, have students consider
under what circumstances individuals may attempt to “pass” in the
present day. What circumstances might motivate a person to attempt to
pass themselves off as a different race, gender, religion, nationality,
etc.?
○ Ask students to research the role that passing plays in contemporary
society including the social, political and cultural factors that motivate
individuals or communities; strategies used for avoiding detection; and
the positive and negative consequences. Students should also consider
how modern media, such as the internet, contribute to an individual or
group’s ability to mask or enhance their identities.
○
●
In Plain Sight: The History of Women in Espionage.
In the film, Loreta Velazquez states that, “A woman labors under some
disadvantage in an attempt to find her own way in the world, and at the same
time she can do things that a man cannot.”
○
○
○
○
○
Students will view the complete film (available at
www.rebeldocumetary.com) and research the history of women in
espionage using the following questions as prompts:
■ What does Velazquez mean when she says that a woman do
things that a man cannot?
■ How have social restrictions, stereotypes, and preconceptions
related to gender contributed to women’s success as spies and
secret agents?
■ Do you think women spies today have the same advantages?
Have each student identify one female spy from World War II through
present day to focus on as a research subject, and compare her
experiences with those of a woman spy from the Civil War.
Ask students to write a dialogue between the woman from each era.
They should discuss their motivations for joining their movements, their
methods of participation, and what they each hope
to accomplish.
Students should also consider what questions they might have, what
lessons they could learn, and what choices each woman might make if
she were in the other’s shoes.
Students can work with a partner and present the dialogues to the class
or they can record the interviews on video and edit them into a Women
in Espionage collection.
○
STANDARDS
Common Core Standards
● Speaking and Listening Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in
History/Social Studies, Grades 9-12, Nos. 1, 2, 3, 4, 6
● Common Core Writing Standards for English Language Arts and Literacy in
History/Social Studies, Grades 9-12, Nos. 1, 4, 7, 8, 9
National Center for History in the Schools
● United States History Content Standards for Grades 5 -12
○
Era 5: Civil War and Reconstruction (1850-1877), Standard 2: The
Course and character of the Civil War and its effects on the
American people
● Historical Thinking
○
Standard 2: Historical Comprehension
○
Standard 3: Historical Analysis and Interpretation
○
Standard 4: Historical Research Capabilities
National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies
● Time, Continuity and Change
● People, Place and Environments
● Individual Development and Identity
● Individuals, Groups and Institutions
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
FILMS
The Civil War
Directed by Ken Burns
Hailed as a landmark in historical storytelling since it was first aired on PBS in
1990, Ken Burns's epic documentary brings to life America's most destructive-and defining--conflict. http://www.pbs.org/civilwar/
Glory
Directed by Edward Zwick
This 1989 feature film stars Denzel Washington and tells the inspiring story of the
54th Massachusetts Volunteer Infantry, the first formal unit of the US Army to be
made up entirely of African American men
Lincoln
Directed by Stephen Spielberg
A 2012 American historical drama film directed and produced by Steven
Spielberg, starring Daniel Day-Lewis as United States President Abraham
Lincoln. The film is based in part on Doris Kearns Goodwin's biography Team of
Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, and covers the final four months
of Lincoln's life, focusing on the President's efforts in January 1865 to pass the
Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution
BOOKS
Blanton, DeAnna. They Fought Like Demons: Women Soldiers in the
American Civil War. Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 2002.
Blight, David W. Race and Reunion : The Civil War in American Memory.
Cambridge, Mass.: Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2001.
Clinton, Catherine, 1952-, and Nina Silber. Divided Houses : Gender and
the Civil War. New York: Oxford University Press, 1992.
Clinton, Catherine. Tara Revisited: Women, War, & the Plantation Legend.
New York: Abbeville Press, 1995.
Faust, Drew Gilpin. Mothers of Invention : Women of the Slaveholding
South in the American Civil War. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina
Press, 1996.
Gallagher, Gary W. Jubal A. Early, The Lost Cause, and Civil War History: A
Persistent Legacy. Milwaukee: Marquette University Press, 1995.
Hall, Richard. Women on the Civil War Battlefront. Lawrence: University
Press of Kansas, 2008.
Leonard, Elizabeth. All the Daring of the Soldier: Women of the Civil War
Armies. New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1999.
Ruiz, Vicki L., and Virginia Sánchez, eds. Latina Legacies: Identity,
Biography, and Community. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
Velazquez, Loreta Janeta, 1842-, and C. J. Worthington. The Woman in
Battle, a Narrative of the Exploits, Adventures, and Travels of Madame
Loreta Janeta Velazquez, Otherwise Known as Lieutenant Harry T. Buford,
Confederate States Army. Hartford,: T. Belknap, 1876.
WEBSITES
Documenting the American South, University of North Carolina at Chapel
Hill:
http://docsouth.unc.edu/support/about/
Smithsonian.com: The Civil War at 150
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history-archaeology/Civil-War-History.html
Facing History and Ourselves
http://www.facing.org/
Blanton, DeAnne. “Women Soldiers of the Civil War”, National Archives
Prologue Magazine Spring 1993, Vol. 25, No. 1:
http://www.archives.gov/publications/prologue/1993/spring/women-in-the-civilwar-1.html