Resource Library
Find compelling classroom resources, learn new teaching methods, meet standards, and make a difference in the lives of your students.
We are grateful to The Hammer Family Foundation for supporting the development of our on-demand learning and teaching resources.
Introducing Our US History Curriculum Collection
Draw from this flexible curriculum collection as you plan any middle or high school US history course. Featuring units, C3-style inquiries, and case studies, the collection will help you explore themes of democracy and freedom with your students throughout the year.
Staging the Compelling Question
Students are introduced to the themes of the compelling question by responding to a quote from James Baldwin that sparks their thinking about the complexities and contradictions within US history.
Supporting Question 1: The Nation’s Founding Ideals
Students explore the supporting question "What does the Declaration of Independence state about the nation’s founding ideals?"
Supporting Question 2: Founding Ideals Versus Realities
Students explore the supporting question "What contradictions existed between the ideals and the reality of the founding of the United States?"
The Sharps’ Dilemmas
Students are introduced to upstanders Waitstill and Martha Sharp, an American minister and his wife who undertook a rescue mission to help save Jews and refugees fleeing Nazi occupation.
Standing Up to Hatred on Cable Street
Students study the Battle of Cable Street in London by examining testimonies of individuals who demonstrated against fascist leader Oswald Mosley.
Stereotypes and “Single Stories”
Students create working definitions of stereotype as they examine the human behavior of applying categories to people and things.
Race and Space
Students examine the Nazi ideology of “race and space” and the role it played in Germany’s aggression toward other nations, groups, and individuals.
Children’s Emigration Project
Students discover the complexities of Martha Sharp's rescue project by analyzing historical correspondences.
Backlash and the KKK
Students learn about the violent responses to the transformation of US democracy that occurred as a result of Radical Reconstruction.
Shifting Public Opinion
Students examine the factors that led many northerners to turn against federal policies passed during the Reconstruction era that protected freedpeople.
Political Violence and the Overthrow of Reconstruction
Students learn about the period of violence in the South from 1873-1876 and examine its role in influencing elections and ending Republican control of Southern state governments.