Note to Teachers: This page was last updated August 18, 2020. News about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is evolving rapidly. Stay up to date using the New York Times Coronavirus Briefing, which is updated daily, or another trusted news source.
Resources to Support Teaching and Learning
Use these readings and resources to start important conversations with your students about the coronavirus outbreak, and to explore questions about community, responsibility, decision-making and upstanding that are relevant in this moment.
Featured Collection
Back to School 2020: Building Community for Connection and Learning
This collection of teaching resources will help you lay a foundation of community and care as schools return this fall, whether in a remote, in-person, or hybrid format.
Featured Collection
A Guide for Supporting Remote Student Book Clubs
Launch a remote book club that builds connectedness, fosters empathy, and provides opportunities for student-driven learning with the help of these resources.
Featured Collection
Parenting and Caregiving for Adolescents During the COVID-19 Pandemic
As many families navigate remote learning with school closures due to the COVID-19 pandemic, get suggestions for videos, readings, and activities to nurture children's learning and engagement at home.
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Taking School Online With a Student-Centered Approach
The resources on this page are designed to help teachers approach online learning with a focus on sustaining community, supporting students, and creating engaging, meaningful learning experiences.
Teaching Strategy
Journals in a Remote Learning Environment
Consider how you can bring a practice of student journaling into your remote or hybrid classrooms.
Teaching Strategy
Contracting for Remote Learning
Contracting is an effective strategy for building a reflective and respectful community, especially in remote or hybrid learning environments.
Teaching Strategy
Big Paper (Remote Learning)
Use this strategy in remote settings to help students explore a topic in-depth, slow down their thinking, and focus on the views of others.
Teaching Strategy
Learn to Listen, Listen to Learn (Remote Learning)
Designed for remote settings, this discussion strategy is especially useful when having conversations about controversial topics.
Teaching Strategy
Wraparound (Remote Learning)
Use this strategy in remote settings to invite all students to share brief responses during a synchronous session or asynchronously.
Teaching Strategy
Graffiti Boards (Remote Learning)
Use this strategy in remote settings to help students “hear” each other’s ideas and gives them space to process emotional materials.
Teaching Strategy
Save the Last Word for Me (Remote Learning)
Use this strategy in remote settings to facilitate online small-group discussions where students practice speaking and listening.
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Taking Barometer Online
Learn how to implement the Barometer teaching strategy in an online learning environment. This strategy asks students to take a stand on an issue in an online class discussion.
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Taking Found Poems Online
Learn how to implement the Found Poems teaching strategy in an online learning environment. This strategy helps students review material and synthesize their learning by creating a found poem.
COVID-19 and Current Events
We've created resources to help you and your students understand the complexity of the ongoing pandemic and its connection to history and current events. Several of these teaching ideas have student-facing Google Slides to use in remote learning.
Teaching Idea
How Do You Close the School Year During Distance Learning?
These six activities help students reflect on the past school year, celebrate their school community, and look ahead to what comes next. Especially with coronavirus upheaval, it’s important for students to feel a sense of closure before summer break begins.
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Democracy & Civic Engagement
Student Journaling During the Coronavirus Pandemic
Journals can provide students with a space to process their thoughts, feelings, and uncertainties during this difficult time. Use the tips and writing prompts in this resource to help your students establish a practice of journaling.
Teaching Idea
Democracy & Civic Engagement
Create a Toolbox for Care
This Teaching Idea invites students to think about the “tools” they have access to during the coronavirus outbreak that can help them take care of themselves, others, and their wider community.
Teaching Idea
Race in US History
Why Is the Coronavirus Disproportionately Impacting Black Americans?
Help students explore the underlying causes of racial inequity in coronavirus outcomes with the activities in this Teaching Idea.
Teaching Idea
Democracy & Civic Engagement
COVID-19: How Can We Make Choices That Promote The Common Good?
This Teaching Idea features Google Slides with activities that prompt students to reflect on the difficult ethical questions we’re all facing during the coronavirus crisis.
Teaching Idea
Democracy & Civic Engagement
Coronavirus: Protect Yourself and Stand Against Racism
This Teaching Idea provides facts about the new coronavirus and allows students to explore instances of discrimination related to COVID-19.
Student Access to Streaming Videos
Due to the massive increase in students needing access to digital content from home, Facing History has lifted the login restrictions for students on our large and diverse streaming video collection. If you search, and a login block appears, simply click on the video title, which will bring you to a second page, which includes the new password-free link for students. You can send that link to your students if you want to suggest that they watch a particular video:
View Our On-Demand Webinar Series
Explore remote teaching strategies and approaches to creating community and sustaining student-centered learning in a digital environment.
Learn about interdisciplinary connections, media literacy, strategies for supporting students' social-emotional well-being, and resources to probe deeper questions about community, responsibility, and the common good.
Learn about the preparations schools should be doing and explore teaching strategies for online learning.
Our Resources Work With Remote Learning
Facing History’s entire collection of resources is available for free on our website. Hundreds of readings and dozens of streaming videos are directly accessible to both teachers and students and can be integrated into online learning plans. Additionally, explore our upcoming online courses and webinars, as well as our on-demand learning center.
Search Our Global Collection
Everything you need to get started teaching your students about racism, antisemitism and prejudice.