Core Knowledge Foundation
Colonial America Tell It Again!™ Read-Aloud Anthology
A read-aloud anthology explores Colonial America. Third graders listen to informational texts, discuss what they heard, and participate in extension activities and writing. Take-home materials, assessments, and remediation opportunities...
Crown Prosecution Service
Racist and Religious Hate Crime
Address the current political climate with a series of thought-provoking activities. A resource packet provides pupils with strategies for challenging racist behavior and religious prejudice, and moves them from being passive bystanders...
Bill of Rights Institute
Preserving the Bill of Rights
Consider how America's founding fathers and their experiences contributed to the rights we all enjoy today. A collection of reading, writing, and collaborative exercises prompt high schoolers to think about the ways their current lives...
Teaching Tolerance
Free to Believe!
The United States: One nation with countless religions. An interesting lesson focuses on the freedom of religion protected under the First Amendment. Academics learn why it is important to protect all religions, why there is a separation...
Teaching Tolerance
Understanding Other Religious Beliefs
Learn what it means to respect others in an engaging lesson on religious beliefs. An inclusive resource focuses on understanding other religious beliefs, the right to freedom of religion, and the U.S. history of religious diversity....
Judicial Branch of California
Protecting our Freedoms: The Bill of Rights
Take to the stage! Integrate both drama and civic skills by asking pupils to create and perform skills that demonstrate the importance of the amendments in the Bill of Rights. After reviewing the Preamble to the Constitution, learners...
Judicial Learning Center
Your 1st Amendment Rights
Why should classes care about the First Amendment? An engaging lesson serves as a powerful tool for answering just that. As all four cases in the lesson relate directly to freedom of expression in schools, young scholars explore the...
Curated OER
ACLU
Is the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) good for America? The informative website is a one-stop shop for ACLU debate resources. Scholars read about the topics surrounding the issue, including free speech, national security, and...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
Puritan Massachusetts: Theocracy or Democracy?
Was Puritan society governed as more of a theocracy or democracy? After comparing and contrasting a series of primary source documents, middle and high schoolers form small groups and debate the question.
US Citizenship and Immigration Services
Thanksgiving 1—Pilgrims and American Indians
The Pilgrims first arrived in America in order to gain religious freedom. Here is a lesson plan that takes the class on this journey with the Pilgrims, stopping to look at how they got here, who they met when they arrived, and a peek...
Speak Truth to Power
Dalai Lama: Free Expression and Religion
How is religious freedom connected to the conflict between China and Tibet? After reading an online passage of background information, your learners will divide into groups and both read and view an interview with the Dalai Lama. They...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Lesson 2: Religion and the Argument for American Independence
Young scholars examine how religion affected arguments justifying American independence. They read and analyze primary source documents, and write an essay analyzing how Americans used religious arguments to justify revolution against a...
Curated OER
Supreme court Decisions on Freedom of Religion
Eleventh graders analyze the limits and bounds of religious freedom issues in the United States through several Supreme Court case decisions.
Curated OER
American Colonial Life in the Late 1700s: Distant Cousins
Students explore daily life and its influences in the late 1700s for two families in different colonies- Delaware and Massachusetts by becoming historical detectives. After gathering information from artifacts to make inferences about...
Curated OER
Religious Freedom
Sixth graders examine the religious issues of the early settlers in the New World and the current issue of separation of church and state. They discuss a list of colonial laws from the 1600s, participate in a class discussion, and in...
Curated OER
social Studies: First Amendment Role-Play
Students evaluate First Amendment case decisions by the Supreme Court. they divide into three groups - Supreme Court justices, prosecution attorneys, and defense lawyers. Both sides present their arguments and the justices deliver...
Curated OER
Settling the Plymouth Colony
Young scholars use the Internet and graphic organizers to research the Plymouth Colony the experience of the Pilgrims. Students compare and contrast different colonies and develop a timeline showcasing their research.
Curated OER
An Approach To Teaching Religious Tolerance
Learners identify First Amendment rights of Freedom of Religion. They identify the colonies which were settled by people escaping religious persecution. They study the beliefs of the five major religions in the US.
Curated OER
The English Settle America
Sixth graders compare immigration today with that of the colonial period. They locate colonies on a map and describe reasons their families immigrated to the United States.
Curated OER
Freedom to Worship
Students investigate reasons why people sought freedom to worship in the United States and some of the difficulties and issues facing them in their immigration. As immigrants, they write letters to family members in the old country.
Curated OER
Sacred Blade at Heart of School Dispute
Fifth graders read the Sacred Blade at Heart of School Dispute, a religious freedom story. In groups students create a mediation session to demonstrate the conflict in the story.
Curated OER
A Civic Duty to Protest
Students examine the concept of religious freedom by evaluating Hong Kong's security laws. In pairs students investigate the levels of religous freedom allowed in various countries around the world and present this information to the class.