Key learning points

1. The Industrial Revolution created great wealth and great poverty.
2. Young children were used to sweep the chimneys of houses in the growing cities.
3. Poet William Blake used his writing to took a stand against the exploitation of child workers.
4. His poem ‘The Chimney Sweeper’ uses the language of religion and the language of social issues to take a stand.

Keywords

• Influence - to affect or change how someone or something develops, behaves, or think

• Awareness - knowing that something exists

• Harsh - cruel, unkind, or unpleasant in a way that seems unfair

• Widespread - existing or happening in many places and/or among many people

• Exploitation - the use of something in order to get an advantage from it

Common misconception