May Curriculum Calendar - Lesson Plan Ideas by Date

Enhance your current curriculum with this fun reference calendar. Whether you want to highlight historic events, honor birthdays of significant people, or celebrate holidays, this is a valuable tool for every teacher. Click on any event to find a breadth of related teaching resources that will spark new ideas to spice up your daily lessons. There's something worth celebrating every day!

Curriculum Calendar

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thur Fri Sat
28
Harper Lee born (1926)
29
International Dance Day
Also try: choreography, ballet
30
International Jazz Day
Louisiana Purchase (1803)
Also try: US expansion
1
Mental Health Awareness Month begins
Physical Fitness and Sports Month begins
National Mother Goose Day
Also try: nursery rhymes
2
King Charles II gives royal charter to Hudson's Bay Company (1670)
William Herschel discovers first binary star (1780)
3
World Press Freedom Day
Also try: First Amendment
Washington DC incorporated as a city (1802)
Also try: capital cities
4
International Firefighters Day
Margaret Thatcher becomes first female Prime Minister of the UK (1979)
Four student protesters killed at Kent State (1970)
5
National Cartoonist Day
6
Sigmund Freud born (1856)
Also try: psychology
Hindenburg Disaster (1937)
Also try: hydrogen, airship
7
The RMS Lusitania sinks (1915)
Tchaikovsky born (1840)
8
Harry S. Truman born (1884)
Also try: US presidents
German surrender: Victory in Europe Day (1945)
Also try: World War II
9
John Brown born (1800)
MIT researchers bounce a laser off the Moon for the first time (1962)
Also try: lasers, speed of light
10
Jefferson Davis captured by Union troops (1865)
Also try: American Civil War
Nelson Mandela becomes president of South Africa (1994)
Also try: apartheid, South Africa
11
Salvador Dali born (1904)
Richard Feynman born (1918)
Also try: physicists, nobel prize
12
International Nurses Day
Also try: medical careers
Florence Nightingale born (1820)
Also try: nursing, Crimean War
13
US declares war with Mexico: Mexican-American War begins (1846)
Student hunger strike in Tiananmen Square (1989)
Also try: hunger strike
14
Lewis and Clark begin expedition (1804)
Also try: Corp of Discovery
First US Space Station launched (1973)
15
Johannes Kepler discovers his Harmonic Law (1618)
US Department of Agriculture created (1862)
Also try: farming, forestry
16
Mississippi River steamboat service begins (1817)
Also try: Mississippi River
US Bureau of Mines founded (1910)
17
Gary Paulson born (1939)
Also try: Hatchet
Supreme Court rules on Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
18
John Winthrop elected first Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1631)
Mount St. Helens erupts (1980)
Also try: volcanoes
19
Anne Boleyn, wife of King Henry VIII, beheaded (1536)
Also try: King Henry VIII
The Empire State Building is designated a New York City landmark (1981)
20
Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis patent the first blue jeans (1873)
Charles Lindbergh begins first solo transatlantic flight (1927)
21
American Red Cross founded by Clara Barton (1881)
22
First major wagon train heading for the Pacific Northwest sets out on the Oregon Trail (1843)
Also try: westward movement
Lassen Peak erupts (1915)
Also try: volcanoes
23
World Turtle Day
Also try: reptiles
24
Mary Had a Little Lamb published (1830)
Also try: nursery rhyme
Brooklyn Bridge opens (1883)
25
The Consitutional Convention begins in Philadelphia (1787)
Jesse Owens breaks six world records in one hour (1935)
Also try: track and field
26
National Paper Airplane Day
Sally Ride born (1951)
Also try: NASA, astronauts
William and Frederick Langenheim take first photos of a solar eclipse in US (1854)
Also try: photography, astronomy
27
The Queen Mary takes maiden voyage (1936)
Also try: passenger ships
28
Jim Thorpe born (1888)
Also try: athletes
29
Learn About Composting Day
Also try: soil, gardening
John F. Kennedy born (1917)
Also try: US presidents
Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reach Mount Everest summit (1953)
30
National Creativity Day
Also try: imagination, inventions
Lincoln Memorial dedicated (1922)
Also try: Abraham Lincoln
31
World No Tobacco Day
Walt Whitman born (1819)
Also try: poetry
1
Audiobook Month Begins
National Pen Pal Day

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