Curated OER
Cartoons for the Classroom:
Editorial cartoonists can make a big impact: this political cartoon analysis handout displays 2 cartoons by 2011 Pulitzer-award-winning cartoonist Mike Keefe. Background information gives learners context on the award, and 3 talking...
Center for Civic Education
The Power of Nonviolence: What Is Nonviolence? What Does It Cost?
Your young learners will delve into the language of primary source documents in order to identify the characteristics, benefits, and costs of nonviolence. The lesson includes a mix of activities, including an anticipatory activity,...
Curated OER
Lesson 1: The Importance of Rules in Our Country and in Our Classroom
Explore the importance of rules in a community with the engaging first lesson of this series on the US government. To begin, children play a paper clip game that requires them to make up their own rules as they go, after which the...
College Board
2012 AP® Microeconomics Free-Response Questions
A train company is experiencing losses. What happens if it raises prices: will it make up for its lost revenue, or wind up more deeply in the hole? Learners consider the dilemma, along with other questions regarding supply and demand...
National Endowment for the Humanities
The Mexican Revolution
The legacies of the Mexican Revolution are visible today—even if some history classes don't cover them. Using primary sources from leaders in Mexico at the time of the popular uprising and other evidence, such as railroad maps, young...
BBC
Local Democracy
Middle and high schoolers explore how democracy works. After a teacher-led discussion, pupils go to websites embedded in the plan which lead them through activities that are all about the democratic process. The first website has them...
Curated OER
"The Missiles of October": The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962
Students investigate the presence of Soviet missiles in Cuba in 1962 and how that presence triggered an international crisis. The options available to the president as well as the advantages and disadvantages of each are articulated in...
University of Arkansas
Promises Denied
"Promises Denied," the second instructional activity in a unit that asks learners to consider the responsibilities individuals have to uphold human rights, looks at documents that illustrate the difficulty the US has had trying to live...
Foreign Policy Research Institute
Ancient and Medieval China
This is a thorough instructional activity on Chinese history that includes readings from primary and secondary sources, guided reading questions, videos, and a take-home final assessment. While it indicates an audience from 9th through...
Scholastic
Cooking Dinner (Thanksgiving)
American traditions of Thanksgiving come to life through culinary activities. Young chefs practice cooking a turkey and setting a table for a Thanksgiving family feast. They use math and reading skills to follow directions and measure...
Deliberating in a Democracy
Educating Non-Citizens
Students distinguish between the privileges of being a U.S. Citizen and privileges that are forfeited if not a U.S. Citizen. For this history lesson, students analyze the rights of people in a democratic society through research,...
Deliberating in a Democracy
Euthanasia
Students analyze euthanasia as a possible way to die. In this controversial instructional activity, students reflect and discuss euthanasia as a possible way to enter death. Classroom discussion allows students to voice their...
Deliberating in a Democracy
Minorities in a Democracy
Students consider diversity in democracies. In this democratic values lesson, students read an article titled, "Minorities in a Democracy." Students respond to discussion questions about the article.
Canadian Museum of Civilization Corporation
Propaganda Posters
Don't be put off by the fact that the World War I propaganda posters in this packet are Canadian and some of them are even in French. All the better, in fact, to see the techniques. The richly detailed plan has instructors model...
North Carolina Civic Education Consortium
The Nineteenth Amendment
Beginning with an exercise of favoritism to engage learners, progressing through image and primary source analysis of the Nineteenth Amendment and the Seneca Falls Declaration, and culminating in a look at a political cartoon called...
Speak Truth to Power
Marina Pisklakova: Domestic Violence
After reading Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and discussing background material about domestic violence, class members create a map showing where in their community survivors of domestic violence can get help and...
Josephson Institute
Trustworthiness
Build trust—literally—with a instructional activity that sparks reflection, grand conversation, and creativity. Scholars construct a trust tower out of blocks showcasing a picture that represents a good deed they have done to gain trust...
NEST Family Learning
Christopher Columbus
Reinforce historic knowledge of Christopher Columbus with an activity book compiled of a variety of coloring pages, puzzles, questions that spark discussion, and learning games.
Global Oneness Project
Recording a Dying Langauge
Is there value in preserving indigenous languages that are almost extinct? That's the question posed to viewers of a short film about the attempt of one Native American woman who is creating a dictionary for Wakchumni, the language of...
Curated OER
Woodrow The White House Mouse
Inauguration Day is January 20. Implement an entire week's worth of mini activities to help young historians become knowledgeable of the President's job, the executive branch, and the White House. The worksheets focus on...
Deliberating in a Democracy
Crime and Punishment
Should the United States ban the death penalty? Scholars use real-life examples of criminal activity to come to their own conclusions on the death penalty. Primary source documents, as well as video clips, open the issue of capital...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
The War of 1812: America’s First Declared War
Free Trade and Sailor's Rights! Pupils dive into America's first declared war, the War of 1812. They analyze the presidencies of Jefferson and Madison through diary entries and historical reasoning. To conclude the lesson, they use their...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
Conservation, Preservation, and the National Parks
Going green? Scholars investigate the creation of the US National Park program. Through diary entries as well as expert testimony, they synthesize information and analyze the need for conservation and preservation. Finally, they display...
Constitutional Rights Foundation
Rachel Carson and the Modern Environmental Movement
Scholars analyze the environmental movement started in the 1960s. Through excerpts from Rachel Carson's books as well as diary entries, they take a look at the reason for the modern movement to save the planet and then create final...