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Lesson Plans

Inquiry-based lesson plans exploring a small number of sources over one or two class periods

16th Century, High School, Lesson Plans

Accounts of Tenochtitlan

Hand-colored woodblock print of Tenochtitlan, showing it as a well-planned city in the middle of a lake. The core of the city is a rectangular plaza, surrounded by islands with houses. Causeways connect the city to the shore, and other settlements ring the lake.

Dr. Delia Cosentino
November 4, 2025

13th Century, 14th Century, 15th Century, 16th Century, 17th Century, 18th Century, 19th Century, 20th Century, College Prep, High School, Lesson Plans

Indigenous Chicago Curriculum

Indigenous Chicago Project
December 20, 2024

19th Century, Classroom Materials, High School, Lesson Plans, Middle School

Indenture and Enslavement in Illinois

Indenture contract between John Posey and Phillis

Hilary Mac Austin
December 19, 2024

19th Century, Activities, High School, Lesson Plans, Middle School

Nineteenth-Century Currency

$1 bank note with illustrations (clockwise from top) of industrious white farmers, stateman Daniel Webster, and three Indigenous people.

Hilary Mac Austin
November 18, 2024

19th Century, 20th Century, Classroom Materials, College Prep, Lesson Plans

Causes and Impacts of the United States’ War with the Philippines

Postcard with image of Emilio Aguinaldo and short handwritten message

Janice Lobo Sapigao, Skyline College
September 13, 2024

19th Century, 20th Century, Classroom Materials, High School, Lesson Plans

US Imperialism in the Philippines

Sketch of the stern of ship with a large hole from an interior explosion in the side just above the waterline. Captioned "McCutcheon/Manila Bay/June 29-98"

Janice Lobo Sapigao, Skyline College
September 13, 2024

20th Century, Classroom Materials, Lesson Plans, Middle School

Black Childhood and the Great Migration

Hand-colored portrait of seven young Black men in basketball uniforms. Another Black man stands in the back row wearing a suit. The young man sitting in the front holds a basketball with the text "YMCA Champs 1921."

Dr. Michael Hines & Alexandrea Henry, Stanford University
September 12, 2024

20th Century, Classroom Materials, Lesson Plans, Middle School

Black Labor and the Great Migration

Chart in a printed book showing the percentages of white and Black workers employed in different industries in 1930. Substantially larger percentages of Black men and women work in semi-skilled and unskilled jobs than white men and women. The difference is more pronounced for women, because 55.7% of Black women work as servants.

Dr. Michael Hines & Alexandrea Henry, Stanford University
September 12, 2024

20th Century, Classroom Materials, Lesson Plans, Middle School

The Black Church and the Great Migration

Large, multi-story stone church on a residential streetcorner.

Dr. Michael Hines & Alexandrea Henry, Stanford University
September 12, 2024

16th Century, 17th Century, Classroom Materials, College Prep, Lesson Plans

Food, Health, and the Humors in Early Modern Europe

Two-page spread of an early printed book.

Sarah Peters Kernan, PhD
June 17, 2024

16th Century, High School, Lesson Plans

Albrecht Dürer and Representations of Race in the Renaissance

Dr. Lia Markey, Newberry Library
June 13, 2024

17th Century, Classroom Materials, College Prep, Lesson Plans

Resistance in the Colonial Caribbean (Advanced)

Title page for the Book A True and Exact History of the Island of Barbados: Illustrated with a Map of the Island, as also the Principal Trees and Plants there, set forth in their due Proportions and Shapes, drawn out by their several and respective Scales.

Dr. Christopher Fletcher, Newberry Library
June 11, 2024