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Directions: This Launchpad, adapted from www.WhatSoProudlyWeHail.org, provides background materials and…
The Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery exhibition titled “…
On the same day when the New York Times, the Washington Post, and other national media outlets announced the reopening of the Emmett Till case, 36 K-12 educators from across the…
On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass gave his famous speech, “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?” to the Rochester Ladies' Anti-Slavery Society in Rochester, New York.
When we think of using primary source oral histories in our classrooms, there is one resource that is often overlooked but ideally suited to the world history, civics, or global studies curriculum…
This Launchpad, adapted from http://www.WhatSoProudlyWeHail.org, provides background materials and discussion questions to enhance…
William Faulkner’s self-proclaimed masterpiece, As I Lay Dying, originally published in 1930, is a fascinating exploration of the many voices found in a Southern family and community. The…
How did the English picture the native peoples of America during the early phases of colonization of North America? This lesson plan will enable students to interact with written and visual…
By juxtaposing the different promotional tracts of William Penn and David Pastorius, students will understand the ethnic diversity of Pennsylvania along with the “pull” factors of migration in the…
Students examine Martin Puryear’s "Ladder for Booker T. Washington" and consider how the title of Puryear’s sculpture is reflected in the meanings we can draw from it. They learn about Booker T.…
Set in the Dominican Republic during the rule of Rafael Trujillo, In the Time of the Butterflies fictionalizes historical figures in order to dramatize the Dominican people’s heroic…
Students practice strategies of "close reading" in order to understand Edith Wharton's gripping tragedy about an unhappy marriage set against the stark backdrop of rural New England.
Although it was the Japanese who attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, U.S. military planners decided that Germany, not Japan, was to be the primary target of operations. This lesson plan will focus on…
When the delegates to the Philadelphia Convention convened in May of 1787 to recommend amendments to the Articles of Confederation, one of the first issues they addressed was the plan for…
In December 1941, Japanese armed forces launched a massive offensive, attacking targets as far East as Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, and as far West as Burma. This lesson plan will focus on the overall…
In 2003 the National Geographic Society published a memoir called Facing the Lion by Joseph Lemasolai Lekuton in which the author describes growing up on the savannah in northern Kenya…
The 2017 winner of the Pulitzer Prize in poetry, Olio by Tyehimba Jess, “melds performance art with the deeper art of poetry,” explains a statement from the judges, “to explore collective…
Critics have hailed The Things They Carried as one of the finest examples in American literature of writing about war. O’Brien served in Vietnam from 1969 to 1970, and, in The Things They Carried…
Literature about war—whether the lived experience of the author or not—has over the centuries taken the form of many genres: epic, tragedy, comedy, narrative poetry, history play, novel, short…
On April 14 we commemorate the death of Abraham Lincoln (1809–1865). The years in which Lincoln served as president, 1861–1865, were among the most momentous in America’s history. A month after…
Is there anything more distinctive in American poetry than hearing a recording of Robert Frost reading one of his own poems? Video clips and recordings from the sixties capture the distinctive…
In France and Germany in the latter half of the nineteenth century, newspapers—printed matter in general, in fact—underwent dramatic and dynamic changes. For newspapers, readership had increased…
This interactive gives students the opportunity to explore reactions to President Thomas Jefferson's 1807 embargo across the young nation.
NOTE: works best in Internet Explorer, and Chrome…
Planning to visit the U.S. Capital in person this spring? If so, the official National Park Service app for the National Mall and memorial parks can be used to explore many of the most cherished…
As we prepare to celebrate all things Irish this week on St. Patrick’s Day, enter the poetic dream-vision or “aisling” of Irish poet W. B. Yeats with EDSITEment’s new feature, “…
Last week’s blog post introduced Chronicling America, a deep repository of historic American newspapers covering the years 1836–1922. Students can use newspapers available through …
In social studies classrooms and movie theaters alike, the civil rights movement appears to fit neatly into a short timeframe, from “Montgomery to Memphis.” It begins with Brown v. Board of…
Although he was born into slavery, Frederick Douglass became an extraordinary American orator and statesman. His work as a leader in the abolitionist movement included taking on the role of writer…
Lissette Lopez Szwydky-Davis* and Sean Connors** received an NEH grant for their Summer Institute for K-12 educators, “Remaking Monsters and Heroines: Adapting Classic Literature for Contemporary…
Teaching composition or expository writing in high school is an enduring challenge, perhaps even more so today, when the rapid-fire exchange of Tweets among students can lie at the hub of daily…