Site icon The digital classroom, transforming the way we learn

Lesson plan; A New Child Labor Crisis in America

Ann S. Michaelsen

In this lesson, students will learn about how migrant children work brutal jobs across the United States. Then they consider what they would do if they were president. This lesson plan is from “The New York Times”. By Michael Gonchar and Jeremy Engle March 12, 2023

Featured Article: “Alone and Exploited, Migrant Children Work Brutal Jobs Across the U.S.” by cand “The Daily” episode “A New Child Labor Crisis in America”

Migrant children, who have been coming into the United States without their parents in record numbers, are ending up in some of the most punishing jobs in the country, a New York Times investigation found. This shadow workforce extends across industries in every state, flouting child labor laws that have been in place for nearly a century. Twelve-year-old roofers in Florida and Tennessee. Underage slaughterhouse workers in Delaware, Mississippi and North Carolina. Children sawing planks of wood on overnight shifts in South Dakota.

Largely from Central America, the children are driven by economic desperation that has been worsened by the pandemic. This labor force has been slowly growing for almost a decade, but it has exploded since 2021, while the systems meant to protect children have broken down.

In this lesson, students will learn about the current child labor crisis in the United States and, now that it has been exposed, what is being done to tackle the problem.

Step 1: Listen to the first minutes of “The Daily.” PS commercial first. 

To get an introduction to what this investigation is about, listen to the “Daily” episode “A New Child Labor Crisis in America” from 0:30 to 3:45 and then answer these two questions:

  • How did the investigative reporter, Hannah Dreier, come to this story?

  • What did she find in her investigation?

Continue listening from 3:45 to 5:11 and then answer the following question:

  • How did she find the children she interviewed for her article?

Step 2: Respond to a short excerpt from the featured article.

Choose one of these three excerpts from Ms. Dreier’s investigative article and respond. What does the excerpt make you think of? What questions does it raise for you?

Excerpt No. 1: “Underage workers in Grand Rapids said that spicy dust from immense batches of Flamin’ Hot Cheetos made their lungs sting, and that moving heavy pallets of cereal all night made their backs ache.”

Excerpt No. 2: “Charlene Irizarry, the human resources manager at Farm Fresh Foods, an Alabama meat plant that struggles to retain staff, recently realized she was interviewing a 12-year-old for a job slicing chicken breasts into nuggets in a section of the factory kept at 40 degrees.”

Excerpt No. 3: After a week of 17-hour days, she [Carolina, age 15] sat at home one night with her aunt and considered her life in the United States. The long nights. The stress about money. “I didn’t have expectations about what life would be like here,” she said, “but it’s not what I imagined.”

Read the featured article — or continue listening to the “Daily” episode to 26:05 — 

Here are some easy questions to start off with;

  • Where are most of the migrant children from?
  • What was one of the factors that worsened their economic situation?
  • When did the number of migrant child workers explode in the U.S.?
  • What are some of the sources that The Times used for its examination?
  • What are some of the jobs that migrant children do in different states?
  • How old was the youngest girl who washed hotel sheets in Virginia?
  • What is the name of Oscar Lopez’s school in South Dakota?
  • What subject does Valeria Lindsay teach at Homestead Middle School near Miami?
  • How many students are in her English learner program?
  • How does migrant child labor benefit both employers and consumers?
  • Where are most of the migrant children from?
  • What was one of the factors that worsened their economic situation?
  • When did the number of migrant child workers explode in the U.S.?
  • What are some of the sources that The Times used for its examination?
  • What are some of the jobs that migrant children do in different states?
  • How old was the youngest girl who washed hotel sheets in Virginia?
  • What is the name of Oscar Lopez’s school in South Dakota?
  • What subject does Valeria Lindsay teach at Homestead Middle School near Miami?
  • How many students are in her English learner program?
  • How does migrant child labor benefit both employers and consumers?

and then answer the following questions.

1. Why are so many unaccompanied minors coming to the United States? What factors are pushing them to leave their home countries? What factors are pulling them to America?

2. Who are sponsors? What role are sponsors supposed to play in the immigration system?

3. Ms. Dreier writes, “These are not children who have stolen into the country undetected. The federal government knows they are in the United States, and the Department of Health and Human Services is responsible for ensuring sponsors will support them and protect them from trafficking or exploitation.” What are the many reasons the government’s system of support and protection for migrant children has broken down?

4. What kinds of work are many of these children, some as young as 12, doing in the United States?

5. Federal law bars minors from a long list of dangerous jobs, including roofing, meat processing and commercial baking. Except on farms, children younger than 16 are not supposed to work for more than three hours or after 7 p.m. on school days. If child labor is illegal in the United States, why are thousands of children still working full-time jobs in dangerous conditions? What responsibility should employers have for these violations?

6. Teachers at Union High School in Grand Rapids, Mich., estimated that 200 of their immigrant students were working full time while trying to keep up with their classes. What do you think might be the challenges of having a full-time job in the evening or overnight in addition to attending school?

7. Choose one or more of these prompts to share your reaction to this investigation:

  • What is your response to the story and the revelations about children working exhausting hours and dangerous jobs in slaughterhouses and factories in the United States?

  • What details from the investigation stand out to you? Which story of the children profiled made the strongest impression on you?

  • What questions do you still have for Ms. Dreier?

More to be found here. 

Exit mobile version