Frances Ellen Watkins Harper: Classroom Lesson

Lesson at a Glance

Grades: Grades 7–12
Time: One class period (20–40 minutes)
Standards: NCSS Themes 2 (Time, Continuity, and Change) and 10 (Civic Ideals and Practices); C3 D2.His.4.9-12, D2.His.6.9-12
Reading: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper (profile)

Big Idea

Frances Ellen Watkins Harper used poetry, fiction, and public speech to argue that freedom for Black Americans and rights for women could not be separated.

Before Class

Students read the profile of Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, including the Key Dates and Sources.

Discussion Questions

Harper told white suffragists in 1866 that Black women faced wrongs their movement ignored. What did she mean, and why was it hard for that movement to hear?
When the suffrage movement split over the Fifteenth Amendment, Harper supported it. What reasons might she have had?
Why might Harper have chosen poems and novels, not only speeches, to reach her audiences?
Critics once dismissed Harper as sentimental; scholars now place her at the center of Black literary history. What changed, and what does that tell us about how literary reputations are made?

Activity

Students read the profile’s account of Harper’s 1866 speech and an assigned excerpt from Anna Julia Cooper’s A Voice from the South (1892) in our library. In pairs (25–35 minutes), they chart how each woman connects race and sex in her argument, noting differences of audience, date, and method. Each pair then reads the opening chapter of Iola Leroy and identifies one passage where Harper makes a similar argument through fiction rather than speech. The class discusses which form, speech or novel, was more likely to change a nineteenth-century reader’s mind.

Primary Sources

Cite this page

MLA: “Classroom lesson: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.” Black-History.com, 30 Sept. 2026, https://black-history.com/classroom/frances-ellen-watkins-harper/.
APA: Black-History.com Editors. (2026, September 30). Classroom lesson: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper. Black-History.com. https://black-history.com/classroom/frances-ellen-watkins-harper/
Chicago: Black-History.com Editors. “Classroom lesson: Frances Ellen Watkins Harper.” Black-History.com. September 30, 2026. https://black-history.com/classroom/frances-ellen-watkins-harper/.

Editorial Note

By the Black-History.com editors. Last reviewed 30 September 2026. To suggest a primary source or a correction, write to editors@black-history.com or use our corrections form.