Presented by:
Search
NEH Connections
Sound, Film, and Video
American Experience: We Shall Remain
This NEH-funded five-part television series on PBS is a provocative multimedia project which spans four centuries and gives Native American voice to the national experience from the Mayflower to the Wounded Knee occupation of 1973.
Camelot!
On May 8, 2008, PBS stations broadcasted a new concert version of the musical about King Arthur and his kingdom Camelot. The EDSITEment lesson "Exploring Arthurian Legend" surveys the stories surrounding Arthur from their beginnings in the oral tradition in Medieval Europe, through the Renaissance and Victorian England, and concludes with T. H. White's modern retelling The Once and Future King, which was the basis of the Lerner and Lowe musical. EDSITEment has other related lesson plans as well.
Was This Atlantis?
The PBS series Secrets of the Dead aired "Sinking Atlantis," about the Minoan civilization that is the original source of the Atlantis legend. One theory is that the final blow to a declining Minoan civilization was a volcanic eruption, as happened with Roman Pompeii. EDSITEment has a lesson plan on Pompeii, and another one on Greek Mythology, a period contemporaneous with the Minoans. Study other Minoan contemporaries with the lesson plans on Egypt’s Pyramids, and Ancient Mesopotamia, and view Minoan artifacts from the EDSITEment-reviewed Timeline of Art History.
American Experience: Walt Whitman
This program, about the life and work of the poet Walt Whitman, partially funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities, is available to watch online. EDSITEment lesson plans "Walt Whitman's Poetry and Notebooks: The Sweep of the Universe" and "Walt Whitman to Langston Hughes: Poems for a Democracy" will introduce students to one of the most compelling voices of the 19th century.
American Masters: Zora Neale Hurston
American Masters' "Zora Neale Hurston: Jump at the Sun" offers an introduction to the writer many consider the pre-eminent African American woman novelist of her generation. The American Masters website provides a career timeline, photographs, and additional footage from the film. An important letter from Hurston to the poet Countee Cullen on race relations in America is also included as are links to related websites.
When Worlds Collide
This PBS website looks at how the Old and New Worlds mixed after Columbus landed on Hispaniola in 1492. The 90-minute documentary and website trace milestone events during the 16th century and illustrates how both the New World and the Old were radically transformed by contact. The extensive resources for teachers and students include a timeline, scholarly essays and lesson plans.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
- Aztecs Find a Home: The Eagle Has Landed
- Common Visions, Common Voices
- Couriers in the Inca Empire: Getting Your Message Across
- In My Other Life
- Mexican Culture and History through Its National Holidays
- Mission Nuestra Señora de la Concepción and the Spanish Mission in the New World
- Other Worlds: The Voyage of Columbus
- Picturing Freedom: Selma-to-Montgomery March, 1965
- The Aztecs — Mighty Warriors of Mexico
- What Was Columbus Thinking?
- Where I Come From
American Icons: A Radio Series from Studio 360 with Kurt Andersen
A radio series which focuses on the fundamental works in American cultural history featuring one-hour programs that span our history: Thomas Jefferson's Monticello, Herman Melville's Moby Dick, Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, Edith Wharton's novel The House of Mirth, F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, I Love Lucy, and The Autobiography of Malcolm X.
Remembering Jim Crow
In this podcast and website, produced by American Radio Work with major funding from NEH, the system of racial segregation in the south popularly known as "Jim Crow" is remembered. For much of the 20th century, African Americans in the South were barred from the voting booth, sent to the back of the bus, and walled off from many of the rights they deserved as American citizens. Until well into the 1960s, segregation was legal.
Ronald Reagan
February 6, 2011 is the 100th anniversary of Ronald Reagan's birth. On February 7 and 14, PBS broadcasts a two-part biography of the 40th president of the United States. Learn more through this NEH-supported site.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
Jimmy (James Earl) Carter
On February 21, American Experience:
Jimmy Carter's story is one of the greatest dramas in American politics. In 1980, he was overwhelmingly voted out of office in a humiliating defeat. Over the subsequent two decades, he became one of the most admired statesmen and humanitarians in America and the world.
Featured Websites
American Routes
A weekly two-hour public radio program produced in New Orleans, presenting a broad range of American music — blues and jazz, gospel and soul, old-time country and rockabilly, Cajun and zydeco, Tejano and Latin, roots rock and pop, avant-garde and classical.
Featured Lesson Plans
American Experience: Dolley Madison
She defined the role of the President's wife, became America's first First Lady, and in the process changed the face of the American presidency.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
On Being (formerly Speaking of Faith)
With NEH funding, the long running NPR program On Being (formerly called Speaking of Faith) has produced a series of biographical programs of influential 20th-century historic figures: Sister Aimee Semple McPherson, Takanka Iyotaka (Sitting Bull), Albert Einstein, Charles Darwin, Joshua Heschel, and Reinhold Niebuhr. These portraits focus on their lives and thought, their spiritual development, the effect of their work on others, and their impact in contemporary society — bringing special attention to their religious context and milieu.
Thurgood Marshall Before the Court
NEH funded NPR radio program on Thurgood Marshall Before the Court. Best known as the first African American on the U.S. Supreme Court, Marshall's earlier work as a civil rights lawyer changed history and is the focus of this podcast and website.
Young American Heroes: True Stories of Young People in U.S. History
Young American Heroes tells stories of ordinary young people who have done extraordinary things in American history. Television programs featuring these young heroes can also be viewed here. The website enables visitors to add to these stories using video, graphic novel, and other tools. The graphic novel versions of the stories are freely available for downloading, reading on screen, or printing out. The site also features selected videos, graphic novels, and other story materials that other users have created.
For All the World to See
The project explores the historic role of visual culture in shaping, influencing, and transforming the fight for racial equality and justice in the United States from the late-1940s to the mid-1970s. For All the World to See includes a traveling exhibition, website, online film festival, and richly illustrated companion book.
Picturing America on Screen
Picturing America on Screen is an NEH-funded documentary film project produced by Channel 13, WNET, New York. A group of 25 films created by 9 talented directors presents a sampling of Picturing American art ranging from the mystery and beauty of Anasazi pottery to the sculptural poetry of contemporary artist Martin Puryear.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
- Benjamin Franklin's Many "Hats"
- Edward Hopper's House by the Railroad: From Painting to Poem
- Homer's Civil War Veteran: Battlefield to Wheat Field
- Jacob Lawrence's Migration Series: Removing the Mask
- Martin Puryear's Ladder for Booker T. Washington
- Mission Nuestra Señora de la Concepción and the Spanish Mission in the New World
- Picture Lincoln
- Romare Bearden's "The Dove"—A Meeting of Vision and Sound
- The Massachusetts 54th Regiment: Honoring the Heroes
- Thomas Hart Benton — The Sources of Country Music
Ken Burns: "Prohibition"
Ken Burns documentary that tells the story of the rise, rule, and fall of the Eighteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and the entire era it encompassed. Website includes essays, interactive timeline & map, and lessons and activities.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
"The War of 1812"
Website for the PBS film War of 1812. Website includes short scholarly essays on the American, British, Canadian & Native American perspectives on the war, the role of black sailors and soldiers, diplomatic manouoers, James Madison’s leadership, and the military campaigns. Multiple lesson plans for elementary, middle and high school levels
"The War That Made America"
The War That Made America brings to life a vastly important — but often misunderstood — period of American history, a period that set in motion forces that would culminate in the American Revolution. The dramatic documentary tells the story of the French and Indian War (1754–1763), which began in the wilderness of the Pennsylvania frontier and spread throughout the colonies, into Canada, and ultimately around the world. Narrated and hosted by Graham Greene, the Academy-Award nominated actor for Dances With Wolves and an Oneida Indian whose ancestors fought in this war, The War That Made America combines a commitment to accuracy with a compelling filmed portrayal of the dangerous world of the 18th-century frontier.
"Reporting America at War"
The NEH-funded film by Stephen Ives, Reporting America at War, explores the role of American journalists from San Juan Hill to the Persian Gulf in a three-hour documentary that tells the dramatic and often surprising stories of the reporters who wrote the news from the battlefield.
Eames: The Architect and the Painter
This NEH-funded project, coming to WNET’s American Masters on December 19, is the first film since the death of the husband-and-wife team widely regarded as America’s most important designers.
American Experience: "Annie Oakley"
As part of the Wild West collection on the American Experience, Annie Oakley returns on Jan. 31. She was the toast of Victorian London, New York, and Paris. She excelled in a man's world by doing what she loved, and won fame and fortune as the little lady from Ohio who never missed a shot.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
Constitution USA
This four-hour PBS series introduces viewers to some of today’s major constitutional debates—free speech in the digital age, same-sex marriage, voting rights, separation of church and state, presidential power in the post-9/11 world, to name just a few—and the fascinating stories of the people they affect every day.
"Slavery by Another Name"
Slavery by Another Name is a 90-minute, NEH-funded documentary challenging one of America's most cherished assumptions: the belief that slavery ended with the Emancipation Proclamation. The film is viewable online and the website enriched with an interactive map and timeline with text, videos, photos, a searchable selection of themes, enriched with clips, commentary, and more.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
- Birth of a Nation, the NAACP, and the Balancing of Rights
- Jacob Lawrence's Migration Series: Removing the Mask
- Lesson 1: The Battle Over Reconstruction: The Aftermath of War
- Lesson 2: The Battle Over Reconstruction: The Politics of Reconstruction
- Lesson 3: The Battle Over Reconstruction: The Aftermath of Reconstruction
- The Emancipation Proclamation: Freedom's First Steps
American Experience: "Triangle Fire"
PBS's American Experience series highlights the deadliest workplace accident in New York City’s history. A dropped match on the 8th floor of the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory sparked a fire that killed over a hundred innocent people trapped inside and spurred calls for workplace reform.
American Experience: "Into the Deep"
On March 20th, PBS will look at the history of the American whaling industry from its 17th-century origins in drift and shore whaling off the coast of New England and Cape Cod, through the golden age of deep ocean whaling, and on to its demise in the decades following the American Civil War.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
"Panama Canal" on American Experience
On April 3, watch how — at a cost of 5000 lives and $350 million — the canal connected the Earth’s two biggest oceans and reinforced America’s international stature.
"Surviving the Dust Bowl"
From PBS's American Experience, "Surviving the Dust Bowl" is the story of the farmers who came to the Southern Plains of Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas dreaming of prosperity, and lived through ten years of drought, dust, disease and death.
Freedom Riders on PBS
In 1961 a courageous band of civil rights activists challenged segregation in the South. Check local listings for your area for PBS American Experience. EDSITEment lessons here.
Featured Websites
- American Memory Project (Library of Congress)
- Documenting the American South
- History of Jim Crow
- National Archives Teachers' Resources
- We Shall Overcome: Historic Places of the Civil Rights Movement
Featured Lesson Plans
- A Raisin in the Sun: The Quest for the American Dream
- Dr. King's Dream
- JFK, Freedom Riders and the Civil Rights Movement
- Let Freedom Ring: The Life & Legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr.
- Martin Luther King, Jr., and the Power of Nonviolence
- Ordinary People, Ordinary Places: The Civil Rights Movement
- Picturing Freedom: Selma-to-Montgomery March, 1965
- The Freedom Riders and the Popular Music of the Civil Rights Movement
The Presidents
"The Presidents," part of the American Experience series on PBS, explores the lives and times of the individuals who have held the highest office in the land. One can look at the presidency in the 20th century and through its office see the drama of contemporary America—war, economic hardship, women's rights, race relations, our triumphs and our tragedies—it is all there. EDSITEment also has a companion feature/index that highlights video segments as they pertain to relevant EDSITEment content.
Featured Websites
- American Presidency Project
- American President
- Internet Public Library: Presidents of the United States
- Presidential Speeches
- Presidential Timeline of the Twentieth Century
Featured Lesson Plans
- FDR's "Four Freedoms" Speech: Freedom by the Fireside
- Lesson 1: FDR's Fireside Chats: The Power of Words
- Lesson 2: The Social Security Act
- Lesson 3: African-Americans and the New Deal's Civilian Conservation Corps
- Lesson 4: FDR and the Lend-Lease Act
- Lesson 5: Eleanor Roosevelt and the Rise of Social Reform in the 1930s
- The Cuban Missile Crisis, 1962: The Missiles of October
- The Korean War: "Police Action," 1950–1953
The Civil War: A Film by Ken Burns
Ken Burn's classic series, partially funded by NEH, . Check out EDSITEment's resources for teaching about the causes, the course, and the consquences of the war.
PBS's The War
The War, Ken Burns' seven-part documentary, partially funded by NEH tells the story of the Second World War through the personal accounts of a handful of men and women from four quintessentially American towns. The series explores the most intimate human dimensions of the greatest cataclysm in history and demonstrates that in extraordinary times, there are no ordinary lives.
Featured Websites
- American Memory Project (Library of Congress)
- Anne Frank House
- Avalon Project at the Yale Law School
- Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, Education
- Internet Public Library
- Jazz: A Ken Burns Film
- National Archives Teachers' Resources
- Naval Historical Center
- U.S. Centennial of Flight Commission
- United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Featured Lesson Plans
"Rediscovering Alexander Hamilton"
Rediscovering Alexander Hamilton tells the story of one of America's most important founding fathers. It takes viewers to the Caribbean islands where Hamilton was born, to Yorktown and Wall Street where he fought and worked, and to Harlem and Weehawken, New Jersey, where he lived and died.
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
- A Landmark Lesson: The United States Capitol Building
- Lesson 1: The First American Party System: U.S. Political Parties: The Principle of Legitimate Opposition
- Lesson 2: The Federalist Defense of Diversity and "Extending the Sphere"
- Lesson 2: The First American Party System: A Documentary Timeline of Important Events (1787–1800)
- Lesson 3: The First American Party System: Federalists and Democratic-Republicans: The Platforms They Never Had
- Ratifying the Constitution
- The Constitutional Convention: Four Founding Fathers You May Never Have Met
- The Constitutional Convention: What the Founding Fathers Said
PBS: "Death and the Civil War"
On the 150th anniversary of Antietam, the single bloodiest battle on American soil, this PBS film examines how the unprecedented carnage changed American attitudes towards death
Featured Websites
Featured Lesson Plans
PBS: "Henry Ford"
An American Experience film, Henry Ford documents the most influential American innovator of the 20th century, and offers an incisive look at the birth of the American auto industry with its long history of struggles between labor and management.
"Shakespeare Uncovered"
WNET’s Shakeapeare Uncovered series tells the story behind the stories of Shakespeare’s greatest plays. Six episodes combine history, biography, performance and analysis and personal passion of each host as they conduct interviews with actors, scholars and directors from key locations and include video of performances.
Featured Websites
- Folger Shakespeare Library: Online Resources for Teachers
- Mr. William Shakespeare and the Internet
- Shakespeare for Kids
Featured Lesson Plans
- Hamlet and the Elizabethan Revenge Ethic in Text and Film
- Hamlet Meets Chushingura: Traditions of the Revenge Tragedy
- Shakespeare's Macbeth: Fear and the "Dagger of the Mind"
- Shakespeare's Macbeth: Fear and the Motives of Evil
- Shakespeare's Othello and the Power of Language
- Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet: 'You Kiss by the Book'
- William Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream: Conflict Resolution and Happy Endings
PBS: "The Jewish Americans"
David Grubin’s landmark documentary series explores 350 years of Jewish American history. This story chronicles the struggle of a tiny minority who make their way into the American mainstream while, at the same time, maintaining a sense of their own identity as Jews. It includes essays on Jewish Life in America, video clips, and resources for educators.
EDSITEment has partnered with Thinkfinity to help you find, save, and share even more free lesson plans and educational resources. Try it Now
-
-
EDSITEment! is a project of the National Endowment for the Humanities
-
Special support for Edsitement is provided by Thinkfinity.org and Verizon
