Resource Library
Find compelling classroom resources, learn new teaching methods, meet standards, and make a difference in the lives of your students.
We are grateful to The Hammer Family Foundation for supporting the development of our on-demand learning and teaching resources.
![A group of high school students sit at desks in conversation.](/sites/default/files/styles/scale_480/public/2023-10/AdobeStock_254378868.jpg?itok=f6YAphey)
Introducing Our US History Curriculum Collection
Draw from this flexible curriculum collection as you plan any middle or high school US history course. Featuring units, C3-style inquiries, and case studies, the collection will help you explore themes of democracy and freedom with your students throughout the year.
Universe of Obligation (UK)
Students learn a new concept, universe of obligation, and use it to analyse the ways that their society designates who is deserving of respect and protection.
![A chalkboard with a hand-drawn Universe of Obligation diagram of concentric circles on it.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/IMG_8783.jpg?h=1f7c1d57&itok=ENXxhHAU)
The Weimar Republic (UK)
Students reflect on the idea of democracy as they analyse the politics, economics, and culture of Germany during the period of the Weimar Republic.
![A crowd of women standing in line at a polling station in the Weimar Republic in 1919, the first year women were allowed to vote.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/Ch04_Image12_Medium_res.jpg?h=7627bb82&itok=YljeUuli)
Youth in Nazi Germany (UK)
Students learn about the experiences of young people in Nazi Germany through a variety of firsthand accounts and identify the range of choices that they faced.
![Hitler Youth groups educated young people according to Nazi principles, and the encouraged comradeship and physical fitness through outdoor activities](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Holocaust_HitlerYouthHiking_FH229449.jpg?h=827069f2&itok=PbrzWAsf)
Jewish Life before the Holocaust
Students learn about pre-war Jewish life and compare it with today’s diaspora in order to reflect on how modernity can impact tradition.
![Students sit in a classroom.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2023-01/San_Francisco_Classroom_2017_FH152836_0.jpeg?h=56d0ca2e&itok=WDArBFmq)
Jewish Resistance During the Holocaust
Students define the term resistance and then learn about the different ways that Jews resisted the Nazis during the Holocaust.
![Students sit in a classroom.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2023-01/San_Francisco_Classroom_2017_FH152836_0.jpeg?h=56d0ca2e&itok=WDArBFmq)
The 1968 East LA School Walkouts
Students learn about education, identity, and activism through an exploration of the East Los Angeles school walkouts, when thousands of students protested unequal educational opportunities for Mexican American students.
![John Ortiz, Mexican-American student leader at James A. Garfield High School, addressing assembled students during a walkout.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/1968_LAStudentWalkoutatGarfieldHigh_FH2169821.jpg?h=61a57aa7&itok=I40HzuJ5)
California Grape Workers’ Strike: 1965–66
Students explore the first year of the Delano grape strike, when grape workers in California's San Joaquin Valley went on strike to demand higher wages and better work conditions.
![Dolores Huerta and others hold up "Huelga" signs as part of the grape strike.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/1965_GrapeStrikeDelanoCalifornia_FH2121754.jpg?h=ae158943&itok=JphiCAwe)
Why Identity Matters
Students reflect on how aspects of their identities are more visible or felt in certain situations and read an informational text to help them consider the interplay between individual identity and social identity.
Teaching with Video Testimony
Students watch video testimony from a Holocaust survivor and engage in purposeful reflection about the survivor’s important story.
![Classroom sitting in a circle discussing](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/facing-history-sf-drew-bird-a-036.jpg?h=f2fcf546&itok=sUVWju0K)
Defining Our Obligations to Others
Students are introduced to the concept of universe of obligation to better understand how societies create "in" groups and "out" groups.
![A chalkboard with a hand-drawn Universe of Obligation diagram of concentric circles on it.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/IMG_8783.jpg?h=1f7c1d57&itok=ENXxhHAU)
Making Rights Universal
Students analyse four rights in the UDHR and decide whether they are universal and enjoyed by all in the world today.
![Eleanor Roosevelt sitting with two other men at a United Nations meeting in New York City](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/67-314.jpg?h=3eea986c&itok=BLv1D5o4)
Maycomb's Ways: Setting as Moral Universe
Students explore how race, class, and gender create the moral universe that the characters inhabit in To Kill a Mockingbird.
![The exterior of a theatre called "Rex Theatre for Colored People."](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/1937_theatreinlealandmississippi_FH248624.png?h=2d333439&itok=SYGt0BUt)
Scout as Narrator: The Impact of Point of View
Students consider how Harper Lee’s decision to tell To Kill a Mockingbird through the eyes of young Scout impacts readers' understanding of the novel.
![Mockingbird Graphic.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/WebRedesign_Wrapper-card_Mockingbird.jpeg?h=24afd704&itok=qskeXCqD)
After Charlottesville: Public Memory and the Contested Meaning of Monuments
Students investigate the role memorials and monuments play in expressing a society’s values and shaping its memory by studying existing memorials and then designing their own.
![Students participate in class.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/2017_5-1-17FacH08686_FH256875.png?h=a141e9ea&itok=k5PV8qJh)
Protesting Discrimination in Bristol
Students use the historical case study of the Bristol Bus Boycott to examine strategies for bringing about change in our communities.
![A commemorative plaque of the Bristol Bus Boycott showing a red building, a bus, and several people.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/1963_BristolBusBoycottPlaque_FH2170722.jpg?h=329fef07&itok=qkRvRn6d)
Responding to the Rohingya Crisis
Students place this ongoing crisis in historical context, view footage from a refugee camp, and reflect on survivor testimony.
![Rohingya Muslims, who crossed over from Myanmar into Bangladesh, walk towards a refugee camp in Shah Porir Dwip, Bangladesh.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/2017_RohingyaRefugees_FH289817.jpg?h=780e8245&itok=G-_U-eVn)
Enacting Freedom
Students consider what it means to be free by learning about the choices and aspirations of freedpeople immediately after Emancipation.
![Black students standing outside in front of a clapboard school house](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Civil_Rights_1900_The_School_at_Pinehurst_Summerville_SC_FH2174932.jpg?h=539e276e&itok=BkLqdaXv)
Think Aloud
Model for students how proficient readers make meaning of a text by verbalizing your thinking as you read.
![A teacher hands out papers to students at a table.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Chicago_Classroom_2018_FH151335.jpg?h=c3635fa2&itok=sjJpQmho)
Sketch to Stretch
Ask students to visualize a passage of text and interpret it through drawing with this reading comprehension strategy.
![Two female students write at their desks.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Chicago_Classroom_2019_FH2101676_0.jpg?h=c11c9c1d&itok=9JMqwQ5G)
Western Imperialism and Nation Building in Japan and China
Students are introduced to the history of Western imperialism in East Asia and its influence on the identities and ambitions of Japan and China.
![An Ukiyo-e of the Utagawa school depicting foreigners in Japan, including Russians, Dutch, British, Americans, French and Chinese. A closeup of the Dutch, Americans and Chinese in the center of the picture](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/Foreign_nations_in_Japan.jpg?h=bb3745a7&itok=kNJq-Ev3)
Telling Our Histories
Students connect themes from the film to Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's concept of “single stories," and then consider what it would take to tell more equitable and accurate narratives.
![View of people on a city street.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2016_TellingOurHistories_card_FH2173875.jpg?h=ac1fc4d9&itok=2zsh7JUC)
Watching Who Will Write Our History
Students view the film, analyze a primary source from the Oyneg Shabes archive, and consider why it matters who tells the stories of the Jews in the Warsaw Ghetto.
![A man rolling up a scroll.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2022_ScreenShot2022-06-10at10.11.31AM_FH2174132.jpg?h=ae1281eb&itok=llfRTLHU)
#IfTheyGunnedMeDown
Students explore the potential negative impact of images through the social media protest #IfTheyGunnedMeDown and develop a decision-making process for choosing imagery to represent controversial events.
![National President of Black Lawyers for Justice, carries a picture of Michael Brown as he leads demonstrators on a march.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2014_CurfewSetAfterViolentProtestsFlareAmidOverMichaelBrownShooting_FH2173438.jpg?h=24afd704&itok=E8IzzWCR)
The Impact of Identity
Students explore how identity impacts our responses to other people and events by examining a cartoon and analyzing an opinion poll from a week after Ferguson.
![Students learning in class.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2019_SL_190522_0613_FH2101388.jpg?h=0f4230fa&itok=_mOwH2tA)
The Power of Images
Students examine how identity and biases can impact how individuals interpret images and experience the challenge of selecting images to represent news events, particularly connected to sensitive issues.
![People hold hands in prayer in the parking lot of convenience store that was looted and burned after Michael Brown was shot by police in Ferguson, Mo.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2014_LivinginFerguson_FH230964.jpg?h=8b6300e7&itok=E_y1giir)
The Challenge of Confirmation Bias
Students define confirmation bias and examine why people sometimes maintain their beliefs in the face of information that contradicts their understanding.
![Attentive uniformed students sit at their desks.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/High_school_students_FH137506.jpg?h=1116cd87&itok=4mkiOSJA)
A Contested History
Students consider how US history books, films, and other works of popular culture have misrepresented the history of the Reconstruction era.
![A portrait of W.E.B. Du Bois, head-and-shoulders, facing slightly right.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/3a53178u.jpg?h=87584735&itok=bgkKYE0Q)
Defining Freedom
Students examine how freed people in the United States sought to define freedom after Emancipation.
![A black and white image of African American schoolchildren in Liberty County, circa 1890.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Copy_of_m-11013.png?h=d1cb525d&itok=BZqbljCV)
The Political Struggle, 1865–1866
Students learn about President Andrew Johnson and the Congressional Republican's conflicting visions of how to rebuild the nation after the Civil War.
![A photograph of Andrew Johnson.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/03751u.jpg?h=8c44f663&itok=SOBBoTvF)
Interracial Democracy
Through a video-based activity, students explore how Radical Reconstruction changed the nature of voting rights and democracy in the South.
![People voting.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/FreedmenVotingInNewOrleans1867.jpeg?h=4bc92e92&itok=w2ULaH3x)
Violence and Backlash
By examining periods of violence during the Reconstruction era, students learn about the potential backlash to political and social change.
![Portraits superimposed on an image of the American flag](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Reconstruction_2022_FH2174814.png?h=8e4088dc&itok=zv81hdEs)
Legacies of Reconstruction
Through a video-based activity, students examine America’s struggle for a stronger democracy during Reconstruction and today.
![Dr. Martin Luther King leads thousands of civil rights demonstrators out on the last leg of their Selma to Montgomery 50-mile hike.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/1965_SelmaMontgomeryMarchLeadersandCrowd_FH227.jpg?h=b82ee7a4&itok=0U1Hgtmh)
The World the War Made
Students explore the ways that Emancipation and Radical Reconstruction altered the lives of many Americans.
![Survivors of slavery observe Juneteenth in hats, canes, and bonnets inAustin, TX](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Civic_Engagement_1900_Emancipation_Day_Celebration_FH21310.jpg?h=cb77d5da&itok=zICD1mG2)
Preparing Students for Difficult Conversations
Students establish a safe space for holding sensitive conversations, before introducing the events surrounding Ferguson, by acknowledging people's complicated feelings about race and creating a classroom contract.
![Students learning in class.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2019_SL_190522_0595_FH2101381.jpg?h=0f4230fa&itok=pAqFB2Uf)
Social Media and Ferguson
Students explore the role of social media in Ferguson, apply information verification strategies to social media posts, and develop strategies for becoming critical consumers and sharers of social media.
![Peaceful demonstrators gather in Ferguson, Missouri, in the aftermath of Michael Brown’s death.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/2016_PeacefulProtestinFerguson_FH224149.jpg?h=c4842d71&itok=6lE2ICT0)
Reflecting on Statues and the UK’s Colonial Past
This lesson provides students with an opportunity to reflect on the relationship between statues and the UK’s colonial past.
![BLM protest image in Norwich](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Black_Lives_Matter_Norwich_%2850081199172%29_for_Web_or_Office_Use.jpg?h=c9f93661&itok=24wTr26v)
The Power of Names
Students begin their study of Reconstruction by examining the relationship between the individual and society through an exploration of names.
![Survivors of slavery observe Juneteenth in hats, canes, and bonnets inAustin, TX](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/Civic_Engagement_1900_Emancipation_Day_Celebration_FH21310.jpg?h=cb77d5da&itok=zICD1mG2)
Seeking Justice: George Floyd’s Death and Structural Racism in the UK
This lesson provides students with an opportunity to reflect on the murder of George Floyd, the anti-racist protests in the UK, and the origins of systemic racism.
![Crowd protesting after George Floyd.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/GeorgeFloyd_2BWD3NW_Medium_res.jpg?h=c9f93661&itok=xdJ4wjJ4)
Connect, Extend, Challenge
Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.
![Students write at their desks.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2023-07/Chicago_Classroom_2019_FH2101681.jpeg?h=56d0ca2e&itok=pItuRsH2)
Connect, Extend, Challenge (UK)
Deepen students' understanding of a topic by having them connect to their prior knowledge.
![Students write at their desks.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2023-07/Chicago_Classroom_2019_FH2101681.jpeg?h=56d0ca2e&itok=pItuRsH2)
Bearing Witness to the Nanjing Atrocities
Students confront the enormity of the crimes committed during the Nanjing atrocities by listening to survivor testimony.
![Survivors of the 1937 Nanjing Massacre pose for a photo during a ceremony in Nanjing on July 6, 2013.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2013_SurvivorsoftheNanjingMassacre_FH131053.jpg?h=eb24755d&itok=rk1PRXzc)
Japanese Imperialism and the Road to War
Students examine sources that shed light on the underlying causes of the outbreak of World War II in Asia.
![Japanese marines during the Battle of Shanghai, 1937](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/1937_JapaneseMarinesDuringtheBattleofShanghai_FH282501.jpg?h=3777c4b7&itok=SGFks5bs)
Justice and Judgment after the Nanjing Atrocities
Students explore the complexities of achieving justice in the aftermath of mass violence and atrocities as they learn about the Tokyo Trials.
![Matsui Iwane stands on trial at the War Crimes court, receiving his death sentence from the court.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/1948_MatsuiIwaneatHisWarCrimesTrial_FH131021.jpg?h=bbc1e75b&itok=0OTyPqL2)
The Nanjing Atrocities: The Range of Responses
Students analyze the spectrum of choices available to individuals, groups, and nations during the Nanjing atrocities.
![Chinese citizens, and American and British visitors, evacuate Nanjing in preparation for an attack by the Japanese.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-05/IMAGE_33_5_EVACUATION_Medium_res.jpg?h=d9e3d5ec&itok=xyqP52So)
Verifying Breaking News
Students evaluate the differences among news accounts about Ferguson, develop strategies for verifying news and information, and understand the challenges facing journalists as they cover complex, fast-moving events.
![Reporters conducting an interview.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/iStock-1350663690.jpg?h=62bc044e&itok=TN8_VBij)
What Aspects of Our Identities Do We Show to Others?
Through a mask-making activity, students learn that they can conceal or reveal aspects of their identity.
![Two high school students in a classroom](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/sedgehillY10-021115-nk-HR-4.jpg?h=1116cd87&itok=gUvyU5kN)
How Do Communities Define We & They?
Students draw on a classic Dr. Seuss story to explore how communities make choices regarding membership.
![Students and teacher engage in discussion in a classroom.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/SanFrancisco_Classroom_FH152780.jpg?h=f2fcf546&itok=m7vlE77a)