Facing History invites educators to weave poetry into classroom instruction using four of our teaching resources to shed light on historical and contemporary experiences and to help students process their own identities and emotions.
Teaching the Missing History of LGBTQIA+ Civil Rights
by
Rob Tokanel
Teachers are encouraged to discuss the history of LGBTQIA+ civil rights with their students to help them explore the dangers of fearing and demonizing the “other.”
World War II brought a new awareness of human rights around the world. After the horrors of the Holocaust came to full light, few people could deny the dangers of racism. The anti-colonial movement was growing stronger around the world, and with the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 by the newly formed United Nations, many turned their attention to the rights of colonized people globally. In Africa, Asia, and the Americas, liberation movements helped bring the plight of millions under European colonialism to public attention.
Facing the resilience of indigenous traditional education in Canada, Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald, who was also Minister of Indian Affairs, commissioned Nicholas Flood Davin, a journalist, lawyer, and politician, to go to Washington, DC, in 1879 to study how the United States tackled the same issue.