The final lesson plan in the "What Makes Democracy Work?" series examines the connections between imagination, literature, and democracy. Class members listen to a podcast, read an excerpt from Azar Nafisi's, The Republic of Imagination,...

A lesson about Kamilah Aisha Moon's poem "Imagine" asks young scholars to imagine, "What would happen if...?" If Dr. Martin Luther King's dream became a reality. If Renisha McBride was a white girl and crashed her car in a black...

The wood sculpture Nkisi Nkondi is said to have been used to aid in conflict resolution. Learners pretend they are journalists reporting on a conflict in which the figure was used to resolve an issue. A creative and interesting use of...

Students analyze the song Imagine. In this Vietnam era lesson, students listen to and analyze the intention and meaning of Lennon's song "Imagine." They discuss what they think Lennon meant and how the song interplays with their own...

Learners use their imagination and research skills to create a virtual tour of the "Land of the Midnight Sun." They are told that Alaska is the largest state in the United States. Students gather information about Alaska to help them...

Students access the Oregon Trial website to find information on what it was like to experience traveling the Oregon Trial. Then, in groups, they create dioramas depicting events that could have happened along the Oregon Trail.

Students design a discussion tool to facilitate class brainstorming of solutions to dilemmas and difficult situations. They write situations that they imagine or may have faced that could be resolved in a variety of ways. Students orally...

When Europeans first came back with tales of China, they provided vivid written accounts and minimal visual imput. This resulted in art rendered mostly from descriptive language. Learners explore this phenomena by listening to...

Students imagine what they think the First Thanksgiving was like and then draw a picture of themselves at the First Thanksgiving for a class book.

Students examine our society's fascination with Mars.  In this journalism lesson students read an article that outlines the various ways Mars has captured our imagination and are given topics for discussion and a chart to...

Uncle Sam wants you to support the troops. Learners use an engaging lesson plan to analyze primary and secondary sources to discover what life was really like for American citizens at home during WWII. Pupils complete...

Students research the American Revolution. In this Revolutionary War instructional activity, students research facts about the American Revolution, write an expository essay, and peer edit for good content. The paper is suggested to be...

Think outside the box - and think about education beyond the classroom walls - with a resource that has your critical thinkers watching a video about a nursery in Scotland that lets youngsters roam wild in a forest....

Build a historical perspective from four different points of view. Young historians take on the role of a slave-owning white person, non-slave owning white person, slave, or free African-American person and imagine what life would be...

NASA has crafted an imaginative and memorable series of lessons, "NASA and Jamestown Education Module." This lesson is one of the five components. In it, middle schoolers connect history and science by comparing the settlement of...

The four-faced Hamat'sa mask is the inspiration for a lesson on ceremonial art and the process of initiation. The class examines images of the piece, then discusses how the mask represents ceremonial initiation. They get imaginative...

We are very dependent upon other life forms around us to survive. Here, scholars explore relationships in the ecosystem with the help of Auntie Litter and the pollution patrol. They imagine a world without grass, making connections to...

Imagine what it was like to be a slave in the United States in 1845. Eighth graders are given an opportunity to experience life from the point of view of Frederick Douglass as they read and discuss an annotated passage from Narrative of...

Imagine a lesson that models for learners how to separate facts from opinions. How to detect bias. How to evaluate a source of information. How to identify propaganda. Although designed for middle schoolers, the activities in this packet...

Everyone learns and experiences life differently. A set of lessons about character intensities encourages middle and high schoolers to analyze themselves, their peers, and characters from a book based on the five listed intensities:...

Imagine having to give up cell phones, computers, and TV? What would be lost? What gained? An examination of the Drokpa, a nomadic people who live in the grasslands of Tibet, provides class members an opportunity to consider how access...

Imagine advertising for a product but not being paid to do so. Welcome to the world of Viral Messaging. Class members first view a T-Mobile flash mob video that went viral and has been seen by over 14 million viewers. After analyzing the...

Citizens in the modern world can't imagine making the same social choices made by many Germans in the 1920s and 1930s, but they don't realize that they actually do it every day by ostracizing others. A case study of middle schoolers...

Imagine dumping out a milk can and finding letters from one of the darkest moments in history! Scholars use Holocaust Reading Passages and research to discover how people recorded and hid history during the events of World War II. They...