In this lesson, students look to Muddy Waters and Howlin’ Wolf as case studies that illustrate why African Americans left the South in record numbers and how communities came together in new urban environments, often around the sound of the Blues. Students will examine factors that prompted African Americans to migrate from the South to northern cities during the Great Migration, including the burdens of the sharecropping economy and racial discrimination, as well asanalyze various accounts of the Great Migration era in different mediums, including photographs, paintings, letters, and census data, determining which details are emphasized in each account.

In this lesson, students investigate a collection of musical performances, television interviews, and movie trailers, discussing how black artists of the 1970s, including James Brown, George Clinton, and Curtis Mayfield, addressed black audiences through the music and aesthetics of Funk, casting a light on all that the Civil Rights movement could not do for a racially divided America.

In this six lesson unit from the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, students will focus on the impact of the civil rights movement in Mississippi. The lessons are as follows: Lesson One: Black and White Worlds; Lesson Two: Mississippi Civil Rights Timeline; Lesson Three: Protesting Violence Without Violence; Lesson Four: Integrating Higher Education in Mississippi; Lesson Five: Mississippi in 1964; A Turning Point; and Lesson Six: Civil Rights After the Civil Rights Movement. This unit includes close readings of autobiographies, fiction, and informational texts; the use of primary sources such as newspaper articles, images, and interviews; multi-media components such as documentaries, feature films, and music; and research and writing projects of various lengths completed both as individuals and within groups. Throughout the unit students are encouraged to both analyze and question the persons and events of the civil rights era and make connections between the civil rights struggles of the 1950s and 1960s with those of minority groups today.

In this first lesson from the Six Lesson Mississippi Department of Archives and History Civil Rights in Mississippi Unit, students will use group brainstorming, historical fiction, and eyewitness interviews in order to gain an understanding of de jure and de facto segregation in Mississippi. They will also perform a close reading of an excerpt from Anne Moody’s autobiography Coming of Age in Mississippi and (if time allows) compare it to Kathryn Stockett’s fictional The Help. Five additional lessons are availabel in the NCLOR.

In this lesson, students will explore how the Charleston reflected the culture of the 1920s. Students will delve into the origins of the dance, its controversial past, and how and why it is symbolic of the Jazz age. Assessment includes an essay prompt and a rubric.

In this extensive, PDF unit, students consider forces that “pushed” immigrants out of their home regions and those that “pulled” them towards the United States. They also examine the hardships experienced by many immigrants on their journeys to America. Specifically, the students compare Jewish immigrant Pauline Newman’s account of her life in a Lithuanian village with descriptions and images of life on the Lower East Side of New York City. These exercises highlight the ways that America truly was a “New World” for pre-industrial villagers who were transplanted into urban metropolises like New York. Later in the lesson, students read about the debate over whether or not immigrants like Pauline should have been able to come to the United States. This section of the lesson also asks the students to think about the differences between primary and secondary sources. At the end of the lesson, the students do a creative assignment in which they design a story-board for a film about Pauline’s life.

In this lesson from Teaching Tolerance, students will explore the concept of what it means to be an American and analyze how the changing demographics of the United States impact the American identity. Additionally, students will reflect on important concepts from the central text and encourage thinking among peers about how the “face of America” is changing and what that means in their lives and for our nation.

With this digital collection, students will explore the subject of immigration in U.S. history with particular attention to the two and a half decades from 1890 to the start of World War I.

American author Pearl S. Buck spent most of her life in China. She returned to America in 1934, "an immigrant among immigrants"¦in my native land." In this lesson, students will explore American attitudes toward immigration in the 1930s through Pearl S. Buck's essay, "On Discovering America." They will explore the meaning of the term "American" in this context and look at how the media portrayed immigrants.

Trace the elements of history, literature, polemic, and autobiography in the 1847Â Narrative of William W. Brown, An American Slave.

In this lesson plan from Divining America from the National Humanities Center, students will explore the increasingly diverse and pluralistic nature of religious life in late-twentieth-century America. Discussion questions guide students to consider how immigration, ethnicity, and identity all play a role in American religious beliefs.

To better understand how to find locations on a globe and the different types of terrain and physical features of these places, students will explore 3 stations : Places around the world in VR, Vocab activities with Maps and Globes, and a teacher led station about different physical features in different locations. 🌍🗺️Lesson Link

In this lesson, students explore the historical context of Walt Whitman's concept of "democratic poetry" by reading his poetry and prose and by examining daguerreotypes taken circa 1850. Next, students will compare the poetic concepts and techniques behind Whitman's "I Hear America Singing" and Langston Hughes' "Let America Be America Again," and have an opportunity to apply similar concepts and techniques in creating a poem from their own experience.