were dealing with tougher times. The Africans were enslaved by the white people without getting paid a wage for working. All women, men, and even children were taken by the white people and had to work as their slaves. Meanwhile, the Indians were losing their lands from the white settlers. Many of the Indians were killed and they were viewed with betrayal and distrust of the white settlers. As shown above, the life in 1840s was indifferent with both positive and negative sides. The kids in 1840s were educated in different ways than we are taught today.
There was only one teacher teaching all ages of students in one-room schoolhouse in rural areas. There was no transportation to take the children to school, so they had to walk 4 -5 miles and in fact it was short length for the students to walk. The students had to attend to school for only 132 days, but not many of the students attended school. Most kids who lived in rural areas stayed home and helped their parents on plantations, milking goats, and cleaning. They had very strict discipline; the teachers had rights to lash students’ knuckles and hands with a ruler or a pointer if they thought the students needed a strong discipline. There was no food provided from school. Students all had to bring their own lunch from their house. The wealthy kids were able to bring food to school, but the farmers’ kids often couldn’t bring their lunches. The education mostly ended in eighth grade. The eighth graders had to pass an exam in order to graduate. Furthermore, there were interesting facts about the one-room school teachers. The one-room school teachers had multiple rules to follow- the female teachers were not allowed to marry during the educating years. If they were married, then it meant that they were quitting to teach. Teachers were expected to attend at church and they were not allowed to be far away from their homes in the
evening.