May 2019 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
May Day
Also try: may pole, spring
Physical Fitness and Sports Month begins
National Mother Goose Day
Also try: nursery rhymes
2
Holocaust Remembrance Day
Also try: World War II, Judaism
William Herschel discovers first binary star (1780)
King Charles II gives royal charter to Hudson's Bay Company (1670)
3
World Press Freedom Day
Also try: First Amendment
4
International Firefighters Day
Margaret Thatcher becomes first female Prime Minister of the UK (1979)
Four student protesters killed at Kent State (1970)
5
Ramadan begins, North America
Also try: Islam, Muslim calendar
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)
10
Nelson Mandela becomes president of South Africa (1994)
Also try: apartheid, South Africa
Jefferson Davis captured by Union troops (1865)
Also try: American Civil War
11
Salvador Dali born (1904)
12
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 Law of Harmonics (1618)
16
Mississippi River steamboat service begins (1817)
Also try: Mississippi River
US Bureau of Mines founded (1910)
17
Supreme Court rules on Brown v. Board of Education (1954)
Gary Paulson born (1939)
Also try: Hatchet
18
Mount St. Helens erupts (1980)
Also try: volcanoes
John Winthrop elected first Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony (1631)
19
Anne Boleyn, wife of King Henry VIII, beheaded (1536)
Also try: King Henry VIII
20
Charles Lindbergh begins first solo transatlantic flight (1932)
Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis patent the first blue jeans (1873)
21
American Red Cross founded by Clara Barton (1881)
22
Lassen Peak erupts (1915)
Also try: volcanoes
First major wagon train heading for the Pacific Northwest sets out on the Oregon Trail (1843)
Also try: westward movement
23
World Turtle Day
Also try: reptiles
24
Brooklyn Bridge opens (1883)
Mary Had a Little Lamb published (1830)
Also try: nursery rhyme
25
Jesse Owens breaks six world records in one hour (1935)
Also try: track and field
The Consitutional Convention begins in Philadelphia (1787)
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
John F. Kennedy born (1917)
Also try: US presidents
Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reach Mount Everest summit (1953)
Learn About Composting Day
Also try: soil, gardening
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