PBS
Analyzing Stop and Frisk Through Personal Stories and Infographics
How much can you learn about an important topic from a single image? High schoolers analyze an infographic that represents the number of stops performed during the Stop and Frisk police procedure. After building background information...
Curated Video
Policy - The Community Guidelines
Following a site's community guidelines is just one step toward being an excellent digital citizen. After a brief introductory video, small groups come up with their own community guidelines and present their ideas to come up with a...
Curated Video
Detecting Lies & Harmful Links
Who and what can you trust online? How do you know? After viewing a pair of introductory videos on positive and safe online conduct, learners discuss the content and put it into practice during an online search activity about alien...
Curated OER
State Issues: The Native People of Hawaii
Students research issues about their state and community. They work in groups to create a multi-media presentation highlighting the issues.
Curated OER
Adbusting: A Media Literacy Unit
Students examine the ethical issues regarding the role of advertising in our society. They watch a series of ads, analyze the messages of the commercials, and in small groups create a counter-ad.
Curated OER
Media Literacy
Students watch a video a pre-taped TV commercials. They define propaganda and re-watch the video. Students choose a poster from Posters American Style and journal about their observations. Students use the computer lab to develop tape...
Curated OER
Massaging the Message: The Media Speaks
Pupils watch video of TV news clips centered on the House of Commons and then complete an information sheet.
Curated OER
The Junk Mail Explosion
Students read direct mail advertising critically, identify persuasion techniques, employ intellectual defenses against persuasive techniques and neatly organize junk mail by persuasive technique.
Minnesota Literacy Council
Introduction to Historical Thinking
Christopher Columbus: hero or villain? Prepare class members for the debate with activities that asks them to think critically about how history is reported.
Personal Genetics Education Project
Claims of CRISPR Being Used to Edit Genomes of Twin Girls Born in 2018
Here is an activity that blends genetic technology, literacy skills, and critical thinking. Pupils review background information about cell lines and CRISPR by video and teacher-led discussion. Scholars collaborate to analyze two...
Museum of the Moving Image
Developing Critical Analysis
To gain an understanding of how images and sounds are used to influence viewers, class members analyze these features in Presidential campaign commercials from 1952-2012.
Curated OER
General Lesson Plan for Documentary Lens
Use this general lesson guide to inform your instruction surrounding a documentary. The lesson is made up of five activities. The activities are intentionally general because they are designed to adapted for specific films. While the...
Curated OER
Press Freedom Versus Military Censorship
Eleventh graders explore the term terrorism. In this US History instructional activity, 11th graders participate in a press release on terrorism.
PBS
Climate Change as a Scientific Theory
Get your class thinking about climate change as a scientific theory. Guided by a handout, emerging earth scientists read articles and take notes about glaciers and sea ice. To conclude, they write an evaluation of the evidence for...
Curated OER
The Whole World is Watching: Iran, 2009
Learners study the impact of social media. For this Iranian election lesson, students examine the outcome of the 2009 election and the public protests that followed it. Learners determine how citizen journalism informed people around the...
Curated OER
Messages in Art Work
Observe images and discuss what messages they convey. In this critical thinking lesson plan, young scholars determine whether works of art are trying to persuade their audience. They also consider the media and how they communicate...
Curated OER
Dealing With Death
Young scholars watch and analyze a video dealing with the topic of death. They answer discussion questions, identify examples of how death is represented in popular media, write a poem, create a memory book, and write a letter to someone...
Curated OER
Technology as a Design Tool for self-portraits
Students create self-portraits using the technology of digital cameras mixed with other media. Adobe Photoshop is a requirement for this specific three week project. State standards for the arts are addressed.
Curated OER
Technology as a Design Tool for Abstract Artwork
Students manipulate pictures using Adobe Photoshop and digital cameras to produce unique abstract works. This lesson can be modified to include a painting/mixed media element. State standards are addressed in this lesson.
Curated OER
Lessons in Drama: Learning About American Political Thought
Students develop critical thinking skills so that they may produce their own written plays or music from their thoughts and feelings. They express their thoughts based on what has been presented to them over the duration of the course.
Curated OER
Community Helpers
Kindergartners learn who community helpers are and what contributions they make for the community. They will hear a story outlining various community helpers, their jobs, and tools, create a graphic organizer connecting community...
Curated OER
Thinking About Hate
This lesson starts out with a guided discussion about the statement "Birds fly in the sky; airplanes fly in the sky; therefore, airplanes are birds" and goes on to cover logical fallacies and reliable sources, relating these to the topic...
Institute for Teaching through Technology and Innovative Practices
The Right Number of Elephants
How can you tell if a number of items is reasonable? Combine math and language arts with a fun lesson based on Jeff Shepard's The Right Number of Elephants. After reading the book, kids discuss amounts of other items and create...
Curated OER
Massive Migrations
Here is an exciting exploration of a fascinating topic for your emerging ecologists: bird migration! They begin by visiting the US Fish & Wildlife Service website to discover which Arctic birds come to their areas. They are assigned...