Teaching Resources

Literature and Language Arts

Over the past fifteen years, the Gilder Lehrman Institute has worked closely with master educators across the country. Many of them have developed unique lesson plans and activities related to this historical era. These resources are included here along with pedagogical videos and other general teaching tools that can be adapted for a variety of time periods and themes in American history.

Aaron Burr, fugitive and traitor, 1804

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Amazing Grace: An Anthology of Poems about Slavery, 1660–1810

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America the Beautiful, 1893

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American Moderns: Bohemian New York and the Creation of a New Century

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American Women Writers and the Work of History, 1790–1860

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Anti-corporate cartoons, ca. 1900

Curriculum Subjects: Art, Economics, Government and Civics Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Beneath the American Renaissance: The Subversive Imagination in the Age of Emerson and Melville

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Beyond the Gray Flannel Suit: Books from the 1950s that Made American Culture

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Birth of a Nation

Curriculum Subjects: Art, Geography, Government and Civics, Literature Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Black, White, and Huckleberry Finn: Re-imagining the American Dream

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Conflict and Captivity in the Colonies

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 6, 7, 8

Cotton Mather’s Account of the Witch Trials, 1693

Curriculum Subjects: Government and Civics, Literature, Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels:

Differing Views of Pilgrims and Native Americans in Seventeenth-Century New England

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics Grade Levels: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Education in America, 1860-1950

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics, Literature Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Essential Questions in Teaching American History

Curriculum Subjects: Art, Economics, Foreign Languages, Geography, Government and Civics, Literature, Religion and Philosophy, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math, World History Grade Levels: K, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Examining Women’s Roles through Primary Sources and Literature

Curriculum Subjects: Art, Literature Grade Levels: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inauguration, 1933

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics, Literature Grade Levels:

Going to School, Then and Now: Education in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and To Kill a Mockingbird

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Harriet Beecher Stowe sends Uncle Tom’s Cabin to Victoria and Albert, 1852

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels:

Huck’s Raft: A History of American Childhood

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Letter from Christopher Columbus: A Common Core Unit

Curriculum Subjects: Geography, World History Grade Levels: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Lighting Out for the Territory: Reflections on Mark Twain and American Culture

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Lincoln speech on slavery and the American Dream, 1858

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics Grade Levels: 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Mightier than the Sword: Uncle Tom’s Cabin and the Battle for America

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Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave

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New Amsterdam: The Center of the Dutch Settlement

Curriculum Subjects: Geography Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

New Deal Network

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New Essays on The Catcher in the Rye

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Nineteenth-Century Native American Viewpoints

Curriculum Subjects: Geography Grade Levels: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Norwegian Immigration in the Nineteenth Century

Curriculum Subjects: Geography, Literature Grade Levels: 5, 6, 7, 8, 9

Of Mice and Men and Migrant Farm Workers of the Great Depression

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Our America: Nativism, Modernism, and Pluralism

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Perspectives on the Fourth of July

Curriculum Subjects: Art, Government and Civics, Literature, Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 6, 7, 8

Phillis's Big Test

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President Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address, 1865

Curriculum Subjects: Government and Civics Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Religion and Literacy in Colonial New England

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 5, 6, 7, 8

Revolutionary Propaganda: Persuasion and Colonial Support

Curriculum Subjects: Government and Civics Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Singing for Freedom

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5

Statue of Liberty, 1884

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

Teaching Literacy Through History Lesson Plans

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 5, 6, 7, 8

Ten Mile Day and the Building of the Transcontinental Railroad

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Terrible Honesty: Mongrel Manhattan in the 1920s

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The American Epic: Transforming a Genre, 1770–1860

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The Fifties in America

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The Great War

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The Jungle

Curriculum Subjects: Literature Grade Levels: 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

The Novel Art: Elevations of American Fiction after Henry James

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The Real American Dream: A Meditation on Hope

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The Soldier’s Pen: Firsthand Impressions of the Civil War

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Tom Paine and Revolutionary America

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Unchained Voices: An Anthology of Black Authors in the English-Speaking World of the Eighteenth Century

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Uncle Tom's Cabin and American Culture

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Using Primary and Secondary Sources: Slavery in the Founding Era

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels: 3, 4, 5

Washington’s Farewell Address: A Common Core Unit

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12