News Literacy Project
Fact-Check It!
Here's a lesson designed to help learners develop their digital verification skills. First, expert groups study specific digital verification skills, and in a jigsaw activity, share what they have learned with classmates. The jigsaw...
Simon & Schuster
Classroom Activities for The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas
Alexandre Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo is the featured text in three classroom activities. The first activity asks readers to analyze the description of Edmond Dantes in Chapter XVII, paying particular attention to Dumas' word...
American Institute of Physics
Historical Detective: Edward Alexander Bouchet and the Washington-Du Bois Debate over African-American Education
Young scientists meet Edward Alexander Bouchet who, in 1876, was the first African American to receive a PhD in Physics. This two-part lesson first looks at the debate between Booker T. Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois about the type of...
National Woman's History Museum
How Do We Remember and Honor the Contributions of Women in Public Space?
Public art, especially monuments and memorials, are designed to celebrate and honor those who have made significant contributions to a community or even an entire nation. Here's a instructional activity that asks scholars to consider who...
Smithsonian Institution
The Suffragist: Educator's Guide for Classroom Video
Class members take on the role of historical investigators to determine why it took 40 years for women in the United States to get the right to vote. Sleuths view videos and analyze primary sources and images to gather evidence to answer...
K20 LEARN
You Think You Have Problems: Perspective in Multi-Genre Literature
Young scholars are asked to reflect on how personal experiences might influence points of view and perspectives. They read poems and biographies of the poets and then match the poem to the poet. To justify their matches, learners...
PBS
Amid Rising Economic Inequality, Does America Need a Third Reconstruction?
Young political scientists investigate the Poor People's Campaign protest held in Washington, D.C., on June 18, 2022. They research how the event was reported in various news outlets and consider their stance on whether...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Introducing Metaphors Through Poetry
Metaphors are word pictures, creating images in our brains that draw readers to consider how two seemingly unrelated items are alike. Poems by Langston Hughes, Margaret Atwood, and Naomi Shihad Nye provide learners with an opportunity to...
Media Smarts
Unit Two: Celebrities and World Issues
Develop media smarts by considering the power of celebrity involvement in world issues. A look at the work of such celebrities as Angelina Jolie, Oprah, and Bono prepare learners to develop their own media campaign for a global...
US Department of State
The Marshall Plan: The Vision of a Family of Nations
The European Recovery Act (aka the Marshall Plan) was designed to bring together and develop a spirit of cooperation among European nations after World War II. Class members examine the materials from the Marshall Plan exhibit and assess...
National Endowment for the Humanities
A Defense of the Electoral College
Each presidential election year, the debate about the electoral college rages. Michael C. Maibach's "A Defense of the Electoral College" offers young political scientists an opportunity to examine a reasoned argument for why the...
Facing History and Ourselves
Free Press Makes Democracy Work
A unit study of the importance of a free press in a democracy begins with class members listening to a podcast featuring two journalists, one from a United States public radio station and one from Capetown, South Africa. The lesson,...
National Park Service
The Battle of Stones River: A Contrast in Leadership Styles
US Commanding General William S. Rosecrans led the Union soldiers and Confederate Commanding General Braxton Bragg led the rebel army at the Battle of Stones River. Young historians compare how the leadership styles of these two...
Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media
George Washington: General, President, Slave Owner
Times change; behaviors that were once considered acceptable can be seen in a very different light. Middle schoolers revisit the legacy of George Washington in a three-day lesson plan that uses primary sources to reveal Washington as a...
Digital Public Library of America
Ida B. Wells and Anti-Lynching Activism
A packet of 13 primary sources provides young historians with insight into the anti-lynching activism of civil rights Ida B. Wells. Included are images of Wells, her letters, a political cartoon, newspaper lynching announcements, and a...
Digital Public Library of America
Fannie Lou Hamer and the Civil Rights Movement in Rural Mississippi
Good primary resources, offering different perspectives on important issues and events, are hard to find. A packet of 12 primary source images, videos, audio recordings, records, and newspaper articles related to the 1960s civil rights...
Digital Public Library of America
The Underground Railroad and the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850
Escaping Enslaved people attempting to escape didn't need a ticket to ride on the Underground Railroad. Here is a packet of primary sources that reveal the kind of courage and determination they did need to face the challenges to gain...
Digital Public Library of America
Voting Rights Act of 1965
Despite the passing of the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments, as well as the passing of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, the struggle to ensure fair voter registration and election procedures continues. Young historians...
Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation
Conditions in China: Why Might One Leave Home Forever?
Primary source texts provide scholars with the background information they need to understand why Chinese peasant farmers were driven to emigrate. After underlining keywords, phrases, and/or lines in the texts, individuals craft a...
Academy of American Poets
Teaching the Vietnam War with Poetry and Archives
The language of and the perspective of photographs, poems, and official reports differ. After a close reading of two photographs, two poems, and a military report about the Vietnam War, individuals adopt someone's voice or something from...
Angel Island Immigration Station Foundation
Making Your Mark: Free Verse Poetry
Using the insight they have gained into the experiences of detainees at the Angel Island Immigration Station, young poets create their own free verse poems that they feel captures what it may have felt like to be an immigrant interned on...
Academy of American Poets
Teach This Poem: "The Shapes of Leaves" by Arthur Sze
Arthur Sze's poem, "The Shapes of Leaves," encourages young scholars to notice and speak for others who "do not speak." The instructional activity begins with pupils writing about a tree that they really like. The class then examines an...
Academy of American Poets
Teach This Poem: "Putting in the Seed" by Robert Frost
Young botanists dig into a lesson that has them planting lima bean seeds and observing their growth. They compare their experience to that of the speaker in Robert Frost's poem, "Putting in the Seed."
Health Smart Virginia
TED Talk Reflection
Here's a worksheet that encourages listeners to pay close attention to a presentation and encourages them to reflect on what they have heard. Participants identify ideas that touched their emotions, new ideas, and ideas they found...