American Press Institute
Newspapers in Your Life: What’s News Where?
Big news isn't necessarily newsworthy everywhere! How do journalists decide what to cover with so much happening around them? A instructional activity on media literacy examines the factors that affect the media's choice of stories to...
Newspaper Association of America
Using the Newspaper to Teach the Five Freedoms of the First Amendment
Of all the amendments found in The Bill of Rights, the First Amendment contains some of the most important freedoms for American citizens. A unit plan on the First Amendment features interactive lesson plans designed to teach about those...
National History Day
Reporting on World War I
Throughout history, newspapers have reported the events of the day as they unfolded. Using primary and secondary sources from World War I, scholars uncover how the American people learned of the events of the War to End All Wars. History...
Energy for Keeps
The Energy Times
Extra! Extra! Read all about past and present energy use in a classroom-made historical newspaper. Useful as a cross-curricular assignment between science, history, and language arts, the project is sure to get young journalists...
Teaching Tolerance
Journalism for Justice
Roll the presses! Or at least have your class members participate in the time-honored tradition of the student press by creating their own newspapers or journalist pieces on a social problem. After conducting research and collaborating...
News Literacy Project
Democracy’s Watchdog
As part of a study of the importance of the First Amendment, expert groups research different historic case studies of investigative reporting, and then the experts share their findings with jigsaw groups. The case studies include Nellie...
Stanford University
Carlisle Indian Industrial School
How do policies aimed to help actually hurt? Native American boarding schools—an attempt at assimilating children of indigenous tribes into white culture—had a shattering effect on those who attended. With primary sources, including...
Curated OER
Writing a News Article
Join the newspaper business with a series of lessons and exercises focused on elements of journalism. The packet focuses on distinguishing fact from opinion, writing effective headlines, sequencing events, and editing and proofreading a...
Newspaper Association of America
Game On: Constitution Activities for Elementary through High School
Who would've guessed that a document written over 200 years ago would still have a lot to teach us today? A set of folder games incorporates parts of a newspaper to teach about the Constitution and how it still applies to life today. The...
Ford's Theatre
How Perspective Shapes Understanding of History
The Boston Massacre may be an iconic event in American history, but perhaps the British soldiers had another point of view. Using primary sources, including reports from Boston newspapers and secondary sources from the British...
Roy Rosenzweig Center for History and New Media
Fred Seibel, the Times-Dispatch, and Massive Resistance
A lesson challenges scholars to analyze editorial cartoons created by Fred Seibel, illustrator for the Times-Dispatch, during the Massive Resistance. A class discussion looking at today's editorial pages and Jim Crow Laws leads the way...
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
Harriet Beecher Stowe Sends Uncle Tom’s Cabin to Victoria and Albert, 1852
Harriet Beecher Stowe's plea for abolition is not only laid plain in her acclaimed novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, but in her written correspondence as well. High schoolers read a letter written by Stowe to Prince Albert and Queen Victoria to...
University of Southern California
Deconstructing Genocide: The Ultimate Crime Against Humanity
There are eight stages of an atrocity known as genocide, and it's important to understand how they are represented so we can fight against it in the future. As young historians watch video clips of ten Jewish Holocaust survivors'...
National Endowment for the Humanities
Chronicling America: Uncovering a World at War
As part of a study of World War I, class members read newspaper articles from the time that urge American involvement, non-involvement, or neutrality. Using the provided worksheet, groups analyze the articles noting the central argument...
National History Day
Uncovering a World at War
Has media always had an influence on public policy? After researching and reading news articles written during World War I, learners understand the influence of communication and media. They discuss articles in small groups and as a...
University of Arkansas
Our Responsibilities
The fourth in a five-lesson plan unit examining human rights and personal responsibility asks class groups to investigate a current rights issue, and using the provided graphic organizer, summarize the issue, consider which rights are...
Historical Thinking Matters
Spanish-American War: 1 Day Lesson
After analyzing newspaper articles portraying different perspectives of the explosion of the Battleship USS Maine, your young historians will take a stand on which position is the most believable in both discussion and writing.
Smithsonian Institution
Mobilizing Children
Scholars find out how the government used propaganda to mobilize children to help in the war effort. Lesson exercises include analyzing a quote from Franklin Roosevelt, viewing propaganda images and posters, and participating in a lively...
Stanford University
Beyond Vietnam
On April 4, 1967 Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his speech "Beyond Vietnam." The controversy that followed is the focus of a three-lesson plan unit that asks class members to consider the political and social implications of King's...
Museum of Tolerance
Influence of Media
We are bombarded with media images expressly designed to influence viewers. Learning how to analyze the intended effects of these images is essential and the focus of an activity that asks viewers to use the provided questions to guide...
Southern Poverty Law Center
Evaluating Online Sources
All sources are pretty much the same, right? If this is how your class views the sources they use for writing or research projects, present them with a media literacy lesson on smart source evaluation. Groups examine several articles,...
Jamestown-Yorktown Foundation
Tea Overboard
While less well known than the event in Boston, the Yorktown Tea Party was equally decisive in turning community sentiment against Great Britain. To gain an understanding of why the colonists objected to the Tea Act, young historians...