Curated OER
Applying Ahimsa to Traditional Stories
Investigate the life of Mahatma Gandhi by researching non-violent lifestyles. Learners define the word ahimsa and discuss the personal characteristics that made Gandhi a peaceful warrior. They also create a poster about the story "The...
Curated OER
The Grimm Truth—Comparing & Contrasting Children’s Stories and Fairy Tales in Cross-Cultural Texts at Different Points in Time
Students explore world literature through completing several varied exercises. In this compare and contrast activity students compare and contrast stories and how time and culture impacts the stories.
Curated OER
Comparing Cultures
Young readers compare two stories/cultures, identifying how they are alike and different. They share their own version of a well-known story and adapt it to another culture. They explain their adaptations.
Curated OER
Tell Me A Story -- Feelings
Practice using feelings as a way to reflect on past experiences. The poem The End and the text Tell Me a Story Mama are used to identify feeling words. As an extension, pupils participate in a service learning project and reflect upon...
Digital Public Library of America
Beloved by Toni Morrison
Any classroom study of Toni Morrison's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Beloved requires careful planning and scaffolding. A primary source set that includes a video, illustrations, photos of artifacts, and a broadside of the Fugitive Slave...
Federal Reserve Bank
The Story of the Federal Reserve System
Prevent the Federal Reserve System from becoming a dry topic for your middle and high schoolers by using an informative, engaging resource! The cartoon takes your class on a journey with aliens from the planet of Novus to observe the...
Digital Public Library of America
Teaching Guide: Exploring Little Women
Louisa May Alcott's Little Women is a literary masterpiece as well as a timestamp of the formative mid-nineteenth century in America. Using a primary source set of photographs, letters, and portraits, readers discuss the ways...
Curated OER
Small Actions with Big Results
Students explore philanthropy in literature. In this literature lesson, students read text from three different genres that all have a moral. Students compare and contrast these pieces of literature, focusing on the character traits that...
Scholastic
The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere
Practice sequencing events using Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's narrative poem about the famous revolutionary hero. Learners read Revere's own account of the event, and compare/contrast the two texts using a t-chart. Finally, they imagine...
Curated OER
Expanding the Story of the Montgomery Bus Boycott
Introduce the class to the Civil Rights Movement by taking a critical look at the Montgomery Bus Boycott in 1955. They will pay close attention to the role women played in organizing the boycott and bringing national attention to the...
Smithsonian Institution
Stamp Stories of Westward Expansion
What a fantastic project idea for discussing not only the history of America's expansion into the West, but for reviewing any major unit of history in your class. Pupils build stamp collections to visually represent themes of the unit,...
Curated OER
My Hero Story Scramble
Use websites to read stories about heroes. The "My Hero" website provides skills and reading materials to help your class analyze sequence and story parts. They put the events in order to show the correct sequence of events.
Curated OER
Every Building Tells a Story
Examine images from past that depict buildings and towns from their own communities, and compare images with photographs taken at present locations, interview local architect and compare role of 19th Century architect to 21st Century...
Curated OER
Historical Agency in History Book Sets (HBS)
Study historical events by combining the study of historical fiction and non-fiction. Learners read about true past events in historical fiction novels and then research non-fiction accounts of the same events. What are some differences...
Curated OER
Comparing the Boston Massacre to the Kent State Shootings
Pupils compare and contrast the Boston Massacre to the Kent State shootings. In this compare and contrast lesson plan, students review what happened in each case and compare them using a Venn Diagram.
Curated OER
Beowulf: Songs of Ancient Heroes
Introduce your class to epic heroes with these activities for Beowulf. After watching a video clip, taking notes on heroes, and tracking characteristics of heroism throughout Beowulf, class members retell an episode of Beowulf using a...
Curated OER
The Anne Frank Story
What is genocide? Create timelines regarding the human genocide. Middle and high schoolers analyze information that requires them to consider links between Armenian genocide and the Holocaust. In groups, theydesign timelines that...
Curated OER
Places We Live
With a wonderful bibliography to support this lesson on Illinois, President Lincoln, and rural vs. urban settings, this activity is a motivating experience. The lesson begins with pupils exploring books, such as The Little House by...
Curated OER
Questions of Courage
Examine discrimination. For this character education lesson, learners read two biographies, Vivien Naki and Hamilton Naki then analyze their personal discrimination experiences. They complete a Venn diagram to compare and contrast the...
Curated OER
Land and Liberty: The Saga of Sam McCulloch
The struggles of Sam McCulloch, a free black man, to be recognized as a citizen entitled to own land in Texas are the focus of research project that ask groups to examine a series of primary source documents and piece together...
MENSA Education & Research Foundation
It’s Greek to Me: Greek Mythology
It's no myth: this packet on Greek mythology is an excellent addition to your social studies curriculum. With writing activities, such as short answer responses and biopoems, and reading activities, which include creation stories and...
Curated OER
Daniel's Story Study Guide
Students explore the concept of prejudice. For this World War II lesson, students read Daniel's Story by Carol Matas. Students complete the provided study guide as they read the novel and discuss the Holocaust.
Curated OER
Thinking About Money
Students evaluate various approaches to spending money.In this spending money literacy lesson, students broaden their financial goals by reading "Alexander Who Used to Be Rich Last Sunday" and "A Chair for My Mother."Students use a Venn...
Curated OER
Molly's Pilgrim
Third graders explore the multi-ethnic nature of America's citizens and examine the symbolism of the Statue of Liberty. In this Molly's Pilgrim lesson, 3rd graders discuss the poem "The New Colossus," examine vocabulary words in the...