Curriculum Resources: lesson plans and assistance with ideas and methods in teaching women's history from elementary school through middle school and high school or for rounding out a homeschooling curriculum.
Video presentations on women's history -- biographies of famous feminists and historical women, plus events and trends. There's a variety here in time and place, useful in classes, for personal enlightenment, or for discussion groups.
In this lesson plan (grades 6-12) from the New York Times, students learn about the United Nations Population fund and the U.S. government's attitudes towards funding family planning and abortion services overseas.
Using the
American Girl historical novels to teach women's history and American history in the middle school. Excellent bibliographies, too.
Study of girls in American history, for middle school study, especially in the inner city. Good reading lists for children and general info too.
A discussion thread from a women's studies email list, on what to cover in a 10-week overview course.
In this lesson plan for grades 6-12, students focus on the position of women in lower castes in the context of the Indian caste system.
A lesson to think about how the women's rights movement rewrote and rethought its goals between the 1848 Delcaration of Sentiments, at Seneca Falls, New York, and later woman suffrage arguments.
Archives of an online class with Gelda Lerner on teaching women's history: theoretical and practical discussions among active history teachers.
Part of an online feature at PBS accompanying a film, this unit focuses on the women of the WASPS in World War II.
Women's role was often in the home, and making quilts was a homemaker's art form. This unit examines how quilts reflected cultural history, and thus examines the complex role of women in history.
Downloadable hypercard stack, designed for a graduate level course and used in a high school course.
In this New York Times lesson plan (grades 6-12), students look at changing views on and the interest in women's sports, focusing attention on women's soccer in particular.
In this lesson plan for grades 6-12, students look at what makes someone a leader, and whether women can meet those criteria. Hillary Clinton and Elizabeth Dole are examples of women political leaders, and students interview a woman leader as part of the assignment.
In this lesson plan for grades 6-12, students look at women who've accomplished much in the scientific realm.
This New York Times lesson plan for grades 6-12 focuses on the lives of U.S. First Ladies.
This lesson plan (grades 6-12) focuses on Sirimavo Bandaraike, the world's first woman prime minister, and then has students research other women leaders.
A series of lesson plans from the New York Times Learning Network Lesson Plan Unit. Many are for current women's issues, but some touch on women's history or are about significant events in women's history.
In this lesson plan for grades 6-12, students look at changing attitudes about women and men, including some historical perspective.
In this New York Times lesson plan for grades 6-12, students look at the Million Mom March of 2000 and also at other women's movements in history -- essentially asking "What is a
women's issue?"
A bridge to women's history research, through the recent news: classroom exercise to explore humanitarianism and charity work done by these two women.
Influential on the political history of their day, but indirectly, first ladies provide an interesting case study to look at the way women wielded power even within roles that supposedly restricted them to the private sphere.
Grade school level online learning project about quilts and quilt history.
Using print biographies and autobiographies of some key women -- ordinary and famous -- in history, this unit helps students visualize their lives and the social and cultural history of their times to a film treatment, considering some key issues in history as they work.
In this lesson plan from the New York Times for grades 6-12, students look at philosophies in different nations about the education of girls. The lesson has a special focus on girls in Afghanistan.
While this New York Times lesson plan does not directly relate to women's history, it could easily be adapted to a look at the
Emma Goldman papers controversy or other similar topics.
This lesson plan uses story quilts to examine how traditions and history are passed along through the handicrafts of women.
A discussion thread from a women's studies email list, on how to use the web in teaching women's history.
A guide to using the DiscoverySchool "Women of the Century" project as a grade 5-8 curriculum unit. Includes tips on using the project in the classroom and correlations with national U.S. history standards.
Teaching women's history through dramatizing six lives: Phillis Wheatley, Sojourner Truth, Harriet Tubman, Sacagawea (Sacajawea), Catherine Haun, and Ethel Waxham.
In this web scavenger hunt for grades 6-12, students look at the July 1999 space shuttle mission where a woman commanded an American space flight for the first time. The underlying lesson is learning how to cite Web sites correctly in MLA format.
An internet course for undergraduate, graduate students, or continuing education. The graphics are beautiful, and the articles informative, even if you don't take the course.
Photos and reading to help students understand women's lives in rural India, about 1970.
A unit to explore the web for information, researching women scientists, in order to understand the contributions that women
have made to the field.
This lesson plan looks at recent First Ladies and examines their impact on American political issues: what issues she was concerned with and what influence she wielded. Students interview family members for their opinions on the impact of the former First Ladies, and also consider gender issues by thinking about what a male "First Lady" equivalent might be like.
In this New York Times lesson plan for grades 6-8, the focus is on violence and abuse against women and the role of cultural attitudes about the role of women.
