"Civil War and Reconstruction", Regents US History Short Essays

Civil War and Reconstruction Regents Short Essays The Civil War and Reconstruction Regents short essays provide students with primary source documents to develop historical analysis skills. Pairs of documents allow students to place texts in context, recognize bias, and assess reliability. Ideal for high school history classes, these materials mirror the updated New York State Regents exam format. Students describe context, identify cause and effect, turning points, or similarity and difference between document pairs. They also explain how elements like audience, purpose, and point of view affect a document’s usefulness as historical evidence. Built using primary sources, these essays deliver an authentic student experience examining the past as historians do. The assessments follow the prototype Regents examination provided by NYSED, with two paired document sets, prompts, and scoring rubrics. Assign these throughout the school year for exam preparation and skill building.