Reflecting on Amanda Gorman's "The Hill We Climb"
Use these activities to help students reflect on the themes in Amanda Gorman’s Inauguration Day poem and consider how their unique experiences and voices can help America “forge a union with purpose.”
![Photo of Amanda Gorman at Biden's Inauguration.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/AP_21020703530611_fullres_Medium_res.jpg?h=3a61c815&itok=h5ZfP4Bq)
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)
How Do Rules & Traditions Shape Communities?
Students create classroom rules through a group activity, and learn the relationship between customs and laws as it relates to a safe learning environment.
![A high school student writes on a piece of paper.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-08/StudentinClassroom_teaser.jpeg?h=56d0ca2e&itok=2k0HoYAK)
How Do Others Define Your Identity?
Students draw on a contemporary parable to explore how identity is formed by our own perception as well as other people's perception of us.
![Students at desks with laptops having a discussion.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/facing-history-sf-drew-bird-a-111_for_Web_or_Office_Use.jpg?h=c9f93661&itok=locch3qM)
What is Community?
Students answer the question, "What is a community?" by writing their own definition of the word and identifying what characteristics make their classroom a community.
![Students move around the classroom in conversation with each other. One student looks directly into the camera with a smile on their face.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/LA_ClassroomImage_2018_FH287148.jpg?h=a141e9ea&itok=lbbZPe6H)
Exploring Contemporary Experiences of Policing and Racial Injustice
In this mini-lesson, students use their head, heart, and conscience to engage with six sources that reflect a range of experiences with policing.
![Police Car.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/TI3_iStock-172192574_full-res.jpg?h=dbfb23f9&itok=rFZal30E)
Suffrage Matters: 7 Reads on Black Voting Rights and Activism
One way to deepen our understanding of voting rights is to consider the experiences of people who have been disenfranchised over the course of our nation’s history and into the present.
![Voting booth with a person voting](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-04/Voting_booth_person_voting.png?h=a6c55029&itok=tYryYOR2)
What I've Learned Along the Way
After 25 years of distinguished service to our organization, Dr. Karen Murphy, Facing History’s Director of International Strategy, will join our partner organization High Resolves as CEO of an initiative called The Human Responsibility Accelerator. In this article, we invited Karen to share a bit of what she has learned in more than two decades at Facing History.
![Photo of Dr. Karen Murphy teaching](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-04/karen_murphy_teaching_hands_raised.jpeg?h=06ac0d8c&itok=0XtPSmhB)
Getting to Know the 10 Questions
Students begin thinking about civic engagement in terms of their own passions and identities as they are introduced to the 10 Questions Framework.
![High school students participate in class.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-06/2017_DrewBirdVisualStoryteller_FH152738.jpg?h=f2fcf546&itok=WOzD1gqb)
The Union As It Was
Students examine documents that shed light on life in the South under the policies of Presidential Reconstruction in 1865 and 1866.
![Photo shows a group of six African American men and women posed picking cotton in a field.](/sites/default/files/styles/dynamic_stack_296_1x/public/2022-07/Civil_Rights_Picking_Cotton_Savannah_1867_FH2177912.jpg?h=2b78d577&itok=DpnqiD0k)