Teachers and Learners · Week 1 · Grades 9–12
Guided Notes: St. Elizabeth Ann Seton
- Name
- Date
- Class
Follow along as your teacher presents. Fill in each section when its slide is on the screen.
A daughter of old New York
Elizabeth Ann Bayley was born in New York City on August 28, blank 1. Her father, Dr. Richard Bayley, became the health officer of the port of New York. Her mother, the daughter of an Episcopal priest, died when Elizabeth was about three.
She grew up a devout Episcopalian who read Scripture closely. In blank 2 she married William Magee Seton, heir to a shipping firm. They had five children, and in 1797 she helped found the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children.
Within a few years the firm was bankrupt and William was dying of blank 3.
A life in six moves
Write what happened in each year.
| Year | What happened |
|---|---|
| 1774 | Write your answer |
| 1794 | Write your answer |
| 1803 | Write your answer |
| 1805 | Write your answer |
| 1808 | Write your answer |
| 1809 | Write your answer |
| 1821 | Write your answer |
| 1975 | Write your answer |
Livorno and the question of the Eucharist
The Setons reached Livorno in late 1803. Because yellow fever had struck New York, officials confined them for weeks in a damp blank 4 station. William died days after their release.
His business partners, the brothers Filippo and Antonio Filicchi, sheltered Elizabeth and her daughter. In their home and in Italian churches she met a faith centered on the blank 5: the teaching that Christ is truly present, body and blood, in the Eucharist.
She returned to New York torn. After months of prayer, study and conflicting advice, she entered the Catholic Church in blank 6 1805.
Apply it
A friend says, “Seton converted because Catholics rescued her when she was broke.” Which fact most weakens that claim? Circle one.
- A She had been raised with no religious beliefs at all
- B Her husband had asked her to convert before he died
- C Converting cost her friends and support in New York
- D The Filicchi family were poor and could offer no help
Why is that the right answer?
Building something new
In 1808 Elizabeth moved to Baltimore, the center of Catholic life in the young country, and opened a small school for girls. A year later she made vows before Archbishop blank 7, the first Catholic bishop in the United States.
With a few companions she settled in blank 8, Maryland. There she founded the Sisters of Charity of St. Joseph’s, the first congregation of religious sisters founded in the United States. Their rule was adapted from the one St. Vincent de Paul gave the Daughters of Charity in France.
In 1810 they opened a free school for poor girls beside a paying academy. She went on raising her own blank 9, and two of her daughters died there of tuberculosis.
Apply it
Which modern project best matches what Mother Seton did at Emmitsburg in 1810? Circle one.
- A A tuition-funded academy that also runs a free program for families who cannot pay
- B A scholarship contest that rewards the single highest-scoring student each year
- C An online course library that anyone can browse without a teacher or classmates
- D A campaign asking the government to take over every religious school in a state
Why is that the right answer?
Take a side
Mother Seton answered a lack of schooling with a community of teachers who lived alongside their students. Today a phone can deliver free courses and an AI tutor. Resolved: free digital tools can now do for excluded students what her schools did.
My side: ☐ Agree ☐ Disagree
- What exactly did her students receive: information, skills, relationships, faith, or all of these?
- Who is still left out when learning depends on devices, connection and self-discipline?
- Can a tool form character, or only a person? Does that matter for what counts as education?
- Could digital tools extend a teaching community’s reach instead of replacing it?
My strongest reason, with evidence from the slides:
The best argument for the other side, and my response:
Think, pair, share
Elizabeth was a society wife, a bankrupt widow, a single mother, a convert and a founder. None of these roles was wasted. Which hard or ordinary part of your own life might be preparing you to serve someone later?
Think: my idea before we talk
Sentence starters: “A part of my life that feels wasted or hard is ...”“It might prepare me to help people who ...”“The role in her life I find most surprising is ...”
Pair: something my partner said
Let us pray
God of every season, you led Elizabeth through loss into a new work.
Form our consciences, and make us generous with what we know.
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, pray for us.
Amen.
My own prayer or intention:
Well done
At her canonization in 1975, Elizabeth Ann Seton became the first native-born citizen of the United States declared a saint. Her feast is January 4.
One thing I learned today:
One question I still have:
How could the example of St. Elizabeth Ann Seton shape the way I live, online and offline?
Challenge: Find one person who is shut out of something you can already do: a subject, a skill, an app, a language. Give that person an hour of real teaching this week.