Social Studies Lesson Plans
| Current Events | Tolerance & Social Responsibility | |
| Economics | Wisconsin | |
| Government | Other Great Social Study Lesson Plan Resouces | |
| History | Geography |
Current Events
- New York Times-Learning Network
- Lesson plans based on articles appearing in the New York Times, helping teachers integrate current events into their curriculum.
- TeachableMoment Classroom Lessons
- Timely teaching ideas to encourage critical thinking on issues of the day and foster a positive classroom environment.
Economics
- EconEdLink
- Online economic and personal finance lessons and resources for educators and students.
- EconKids
- Produced by Rutgers University, this resource provides ideas for using children's literature to teach economics.
- Economics Wisconsin
- Links to resources that will be of value to the K-12 teacher economics teacher. The "Online Guide" organizes resources by Wisconsin Model Academic Standards.
- National Council on Economic Education Online Lessons
- Standards-based classroom resources for K-12 teachers, students and parents.
- Federal Reserve Education
- Links to instructional materials and tools that can increase your understanding of the Federal Reserve, economics and financial education.
Government
- Ben's Guide to U.S. Government for Kids
- This site focuses on resources that teach about the United States government. It is tailored for educators, parents, and K-12 students.
- The Democracy Project
- Activities and lesson plans intended to further one's understanding of local, state and the federal government.
- iCivics
- Founded by Justice Sandra Day O’Connor in 2009, iCivics makes available curriculum units for grades 5-12 on various aspects of governance, such as budgeting, civil rights, the constitution, the three branches of government, etc.
History
- Best of History Web Sites
- This is "an award-winning portal that contains annotated links to over 1200 history web sites as well as links to hundreds of quality K-12 history lesson plans, history teacher guides, history activities, history games, history quizzes, and more." (Description taken from the website.)
- History in Song
- Lyrics of songs arranged by U.S. historical period. [Even though there are a lot of broken links, I thought it a unique enough resource that I should keep it on this list.]
- Library of Congress: Lesson Plans Using Primary Sources
- The Library of Congress offers lesson plans and classroom materials which utilize primary sources from the Library's vast digital collections.
- Making of America
- This is a digital library of primary sources in American social history from the antebellum period through reconstruction.
- National Archives & Records Administration (NARA) Digital Classroom
- Reproducible primary documents, educational units correlated to national academic standards, and cross-curricular connections.
- Teaching History with Technology
- This resource was "created to help K-12 history and social studies teachers incorporate technology effectively into their courses. Find resources for history and social studies lesson plans, activities, projects, games, and quizzes that use technology. Explore inquiry-based lessons, activities, and projects. Learn about web technologies such as blogs, podcasts, wikis, social networks, Google Docs, ebooks, online maps, virtual field trips, screencasts, online posters, and more. Explore innnovative ways of integrating these tools into the curriculum, watch instructional video tutorials, and learn how others are using technology in the classroom!" (This excerpt was taken from the "Teaching History with Technology" website.)
- Teaching With Historic Places
- This resource uses properties listed in the National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places to enliven history, social studies, geography, civics, and other subjects. Includes activities that help teachers bring historic places into the classroom.
- teachinghistory.org
- This website is funded by the U. S. Department of Education. Its purpose is to provide K-12 history teachers access to a multitude of resources (including lesson plans) to improve the teaching of U.S. history.
- The Underground Railroad
- Produced by National Geographic, this is an interactive site about the Underground Railroad. Includes maps, classroom ideas and other resources.
- This Day in History
- A very good resource for those assignments requiring students to access information about the day they were born.
- Wisconsin Historical Society – For Teachers
- Resources intended to enliven the study of Wisconsin state and local history.
Tolerance & Social Responsibility
- ADL Curriculum Connections: Anti-Bias Lesson Plans and Resources for K-12 Educators
- "Curriculum Connections is a collection of original lesson plans and resources that help K-12 educators integrate multicultural, anti-bias, and social justice themes into their curricula. Each edition is organized around a particular topic or theme, and a new edition is published approximately two times per school year." (Description taken from the website.)
- Educators for Social Responsibility - Online Teacher Center
- Provides teaching resources on a range of issues related to international security, conflict resolution, peacemaking, violence prevention, and social responsibility.
- Teaching Tolerance
- "Founded in 1991 by the Southern Poverty Law Center, Teaching Tolerance is dedicated to reducing prejudice, improving intergroup relations and supporting equitable school experiences for our nation's children." (from the website)
Wisconsin
- Links to Other Wisconsin Resources for the K-12 Classroom
- Lesson plans pertaining to Wisconsin. Other resources which can be used to support educating youth about Wisconsin.
- Wisconsin Historical Society – For Teachers
- Resources intended to enliven the study of Wisconsin state and local history.
Other Great Social Studies Lesson Plan Resources
- C-Span Classroom
- Free primary source materials for social studies teachers
- Core Knowledge Lesson Plans
- Unit plans developed by teachers in Core Knowledge schools and presented at Core Knowledge National Conferences.
- Discovery Education
- Lesson plans written by teachers for teachers. Browse by subject and grade.
- EDSITEment
- Lesson plans and websites from the National Endowment for the Humanities in partnership with the National Trust for the Humanities and the MarcoPolo Education Foundation. Many of the lesson or unit plans have accompanying worksheets.
- The Gateway to 21st Century Skills
- "The Gateway has been serving teachers continuously since 1996 which makes it one of the oldest publically accessible U.S. repositories of education resources on the Web. The Gateway contains a variety of educational resource types from activities and lesson plans to online projects to assessment items.” (from the website)
- IDEAS
- Lesson plans and other resources for the K-12 teacher. Option provided to search for resources by Wisconsin Model Academic Standards and Common Core Standards. As a staff member or student at UWO, or as a teacher you can register for this resource without charge.
- NY Times Daily Lesson Plan
- Hundreds of lesson plans for grades 6-12 based on articles that have appeared in the New York Times. This is a joint endeavor with the Bank Street School of Education. Many interesting features.
- PBS Learning Media
- “PBS LearningMedia™ provides educators with strategies, tools, and professional development resources needed to fully utilize digital learning." (from the website)
- Primary Source: Resource Guides and Bibliographies
- Books "films, lesson plans, websites, and news sources for teaching and learning about global education and world regions, cultures, and histories." Many primary source materials included. (quote from the Primary Source website)
- Resources for Teaching Social Studies in the Elementary School
- University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh Professor Ava McCall's website.
- SCORE: Schools of California Online Resources for Education
- Lesson plans and other teacher resources arranged by grade level and content area. This was last updated in 2006, but it appears to be still useful.
- Social Studies Central
- This resource was created by a long-term middle school social studies teacher. Links to many lesson plan resources, a selection of the "best" lesson plan sites, lots of primary sources, etc.
- Thinkfinity
- Thousands of free lesson plans and educational resources, including lesson plans organized by state standards.
- Yale-New Haven Teachers Institute
- Very detailed and lengthy unit plans about a variety of topics.
Revised August 2013
Questions, comments, suggestions? Contact Stephen Katz at katz@uwosh.edu
