This six-minute video takes students “behind the stage” at political party conventions by interviewing the convention manager and speechwriting team who launched Barack Obama’s national political career by choosing him to make the keynote speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention. Deconstructing how conventions function as a complex messaging operations involving the coordination of hundreds of speakers, the video provides students with insight into one of the most important moments in modern American politics, and would be useful in any sequence of lessons focused on the election of presidents or modern campaigning methods.

This 12-minute video and lesson plan explore the September 11 terrorist attacks, which occurred 20 years ago, before any of today’s K-12 students were born. How can we examine the events of that day and the aftermath as historians would? This activity asks students to examine primary sources, pose questions for investigation and gather additional narratives from this time period.

After the 2000 election night ended with no clear winner and exposed flaws in our voting system, there was a push for reforms to make elections run more smoothly. This 12-minute video introduces students to the turmoil and confusion of the Bush v. Gore election recount and illustrates the surprising and unintended aftermath of that event: Instead of reforms, there was a change toward an even more politicized electoral process. Useful as an introduction to the Bush v. Gore election controversy, the video can also be used to set up a conversation about the past and future of voting rights and voter suppression.

This four-minute video explores the causes and consequences of the Democratic Party’s division into two parties following the Democratic national convention of 1860. After rejecting Stephen A. Douglas’s failed attempt to reconcile the Northern and Southern factions of the party with his doctrine of “popular sovereignty,” the Southern delegates walked out of the convention. That decision led to the election of Abraham Lincoln, the Civil War, and 50 years of Republican dominance in national politics. A concise summary of the unusual events that allowed Abraham Lincoln to win the election of 1860, the video fits into any sequence of lessons on the factors leading to secession and the Civil War.

This seven-minute video and accompanying lesson plan looks at how throughout the 1960’s and 70’s the second wave feminism movement worked to address gender inequality across the United States. While the movement had several important victories, the Equal Rights Amendment was not passed. Was the second wave feminist movement a success nonetheless?

This ten-minute video examines what obligation countries have to refugees. It’s a question as important today as it was in 1975, when the United States evacuated 130,000 South Vietnamese allies during the fall of Saigon and brought them to this country to start new lives. Today, as Afghan and Ukrainian migrants settle in the United States, students will explore whether refugee resettlement is better now than it was for the Vietnamese 50 years ago, and what is owed to people fleeing war, destruction and despair across the globe.

This 9-minute video illustrates how demographic trends and a changing California economy in the 1990s created a backlash against immigration, only to be followed by another swing in the ideological pendulum. This lesson examines how economic and demographic forces affect the strategies of the political parties, and demonstrates how policies like Proposition 187 can produce unintended and surprising consequences.

This eight-minute video explores how with the economic pain of the pandemic, new groups of American workers are pushing to form labor unions at restaurants, stores and warehouses. It’s the biggest surge of activism since the 1930s. At the height of the Great Depression, with as many as 13 million Americans out of work, President Franklin Roosevelt pushed New Deal reforms through Congress, including the 1935 National Labor Relations Act. It guaranteed private sector workers the right to form unions. This lesson asks students to examine the push for workers’ rights beginning with the Industrial Revolution in the United Kingdom, continuing to the Great Depression in the United States and on to contemporary efforts.

This 11-minute video tells the story of Tommie Smith and John Carlos, their raised-fist Black Power salute on the medal podium during the 1968 Olympic Games in Mexico City, and the consequences they went on to face. This video shows the development of the civil rights protests of the 1960s, and how the cultural context of that decade led to a wave of protests by athletes. It illustrates how the cultural context of the 1980s caused a decline in political consciousness among athletes. Finally it addresses how recent shootings and misconduct by police officers have fueled a resurgence of athlete activism. The video includes footage and discussion of Jackie Robinson, Muhammad Ali, Michael Jordan and O.J. Simpson. It will help students understand the complexities and challenges that black athletes face on the public stage. Students will learn how the modern take-a-knee protest movement, started by Colin Kaepernick, is directly linked to the Olympics protest in 1968.

Content Advisory:
This video contains graphic depictions of police shootings.

This 14-minute video shows students how the federal government’s botched raid on the compound of the Branch Davidian religious sect in 1993 gave rise to a nationwide militia movement of people advocating an expansive and individualistic interpretation of the Second Amendment. Students will learn how this movement included terrorists like Timothy McVeigh as well as lawful activists, many of whom continue to influence the national conversation on gun rights. Including interviews with militia activists as well as their opponents, the video provides students with context and insight on a defining cultural and political moment in the tug-of-war between individual rights and government powers. Useful for any lesson introducing Second Amendment controversies, the video illustrates why the right of individuals to own firearms remains one of the most contentious issues in American government.

Content Advisory:
This video includes footage of gun violence during a law enforcement raid that left 80 people dead.

This 10-minute video delves into how the nature of Supreme Court nominations have changed since the defeat of Robert Bork. As President Biden makes his first Supreme Court nomination, he is hoping for bipartisan support for nominee Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson. Recent history of Supreme Court nominations have yielded bitter battles and guarded answers from nominees on their views of important legal issues.

Collection of Lesson plans related to George Washington’s life, his service to his country, and his legacy. Lesson plans can be searched by grade level and topic.

Oral history and article of Herb Hanneman, a Wisconsin survivor, of the Batman Death March

Enhance your classroom experience on Dr. Martin Luther King Jr Day with these teacher-tested lessons from the nationally recognized We the People: The Citizen & the Constitution curriculum. These materials will help inform your students about the national struggle for civil rights and equal protection under the law.

This resource offers a selection of primary sources related to Mildred Fish Harnack. These sources include: photos, admission papers, letters of recommendation, a poem written by Harnack, and an article related to outstanding UW Alumni. Mildred Fish Harnack's life before leaving for Germany comes to life through these sources.

This webpage is maintained by Mildred Fish Harnack's great-niece (granddaughter of Mildred's sister Marion). She offers personal family artifacts and letters, as well as newspaper clippings and other primary sources.

Standards alignment suggested here is only if the primary sources are used in analysis that aligns to the standards - for example, they are used to consider cause & effect, the context of the situation, or the primary reason the author wrote the text.

This teaching guide from the OER Project outlines their courses, PD, and other resources.

The OER Project is a coalition of educators and historians committed to boosting student engagement and achievement through transformational social studies programs. By empowering classroom teachers with better curricula, content, and a vibrant community, we deliver more compelling, impactful, and usable histories. “OER” stands for open educational resources. When you grab a free worksheet off Pinterest for your tenth graders, that’s an OER resource. We recognize the value of OER resources, but want to go beyond the typical content repository approach—we aim to improve OER by providing coherency, support, and community.

Currently, the OER Project offers two courses—Big History Project (BHP) and World History Project (WHP)—both of which are completely free, online, and adaptable to different standards and classroom needs. Unlike textbooks, lesson websites, and other commercial products, everything has been purposely built to truly empower teachers and leave traditional history courses in—sorry for the pun—the past. We also offer short, standalone courses for those who want to try the OER Project approach, but aren’t yet ready to take on a full history course. Our current standalone options include Project X, a course that uses data to explore historical trends to help make predictions about the future; Project Score, a course that uses writing tools and the use of Score, a free, online essay-scoring service to help support student writing; and Climate Project, an evidence-based overview of the global carbon problem that culminates in students developing a plan of action they can implement locally

Use the following NewsHour Classroom resources to examine King’s impact on civil rights and his ongoing legacy. Lessons include a deep dive anayisis of the “I have a dream” speech and the impact of Dr, King’s work on current evens

Cartoons in Sunday comic strips make us laugh. Political cartoons in the front section of the newspaper challenge us to think.

Because political cartoons present a particular point of view or story through symbolism and caricature, they are a particularly effective method for teaching history.

By interpreting political cartoons, students are encouraged to discover different points of view on the same historical event.

The three political cartoons in this section focus on Robert M. La Follette; they offer an additional opportunity to explore the progressive era in Wisconsin. Suggested activities, brief histories of each cartoon, a one-page biography of La Follette, and an introduction to cartoon analysis are also included.