Worked examples
Two examples
Example 1
The source
This photograph is good evidence for which question?A. How many children worked in cotton mills in 1908?A photograph Lewis Hine took in 1908 of a young girl standing at a spinning machine in a cotton mill in the South. Hine took it for the National Child Labor Committee, which was working to pass laws against child labor.
B. What did the girl think of her job?
C. What did work in one mill look like for one child in 1908?
D. Did Congress pass a law against child labor?
- Ask: reliable for what? Every source is good evidence for some questions and not for others.
- A photograph is reliable for what was in front of the camera on the day it was taken: this girl, this machine, this mill, in 1908. That is C.
- A asks for a count of all the mills. One photograph of one child cannot count anything: that question is too wide.
- B asks what the girl thought. A camera shows faces and hands, not thoughts. The maker could not see it. Notice, too, whose voice is missing: the girl’s. She does not speak in this source.
- D asks about a law. The photograph was made to help win one, but it cannot show whether a law was passed. That came later, and needs other sources.
- One more question from the card: why, and for whom? Hine worked for a group that wanted laws against child labor. He chose what to show in order to persuade. The photograph is real and close, but it is not neutral.
Answer: C
Example 2
The source
Which question can this guidebook not answer?A. Which places did the guidebook tell visitors to see in 1939?A guidebook to New York City, printed in 1939 for visitors coming to the World’s Fair. It describes the city’s neighborhoods, museums, bridges, and buildings, and suggests walking tours.
B. How did families in crowded tenements live in 1939?
C. Which bridges did the guidebook describe in 1939?
D. What walking tours did the guidebook suggest?
- Ask the card’s questions. Who was it made for? Visitors to the World’s Fair. Why? To help them see the city.
- So it is good evidence for what it shows visitors: neighborhoods, museums, bridges, walks. A, C, and D are all questions it can answer.
- B asks about life inside crowded tenements. A book made to show visitors the sights is not built to answer that. Its makers were pointing visitors toward the things worth a trip. Whose voice is missing? The tenement families’.
- For B, a historian would look for other sources: the census, a housing inspector’s report, letters, or interviews with people who lived there.
- So the answer is B. The habit to keep: before you use a source, ask what it was made to do, and match it to the question you are asking.
Answer: B
Where this is taught: Skills Quiz 2, Primary and secondary sources: First, the idea · Skills Quiz 2: the worked example · Skills Diagnostic, Part 2
In your Kaplan book: Unit 3, Chapter 1, Lesson 4: Evaluate Author's Reasoning and Evidence · Map of the Terrain, topic 2: Primary and secondary sources
The drill
Ten questions
How many:
Read what is in the box first. Then tap your answer; a few questions ask you to choose words from a drop-down instead, the way the GED test does. Press Check my answers at the bottom.Read what is in the box first. Circle your answer; where there are brackets, circle the choice that fits. The answer key, with the reasoning, is on the last page.