Teaching Resources

Religion

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.

A Fire You Can’t Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham’s Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

A revival of religious fervor, 1744

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels:

Abraham Lincoln: Redeemer President

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Abstinence pledge card, 1842

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

Bartolomé de Las Casas debates the subjugation of the Indians, 1550

Curriculum Subjects: Art 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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Black Prophets of Justice: Activist Clergy before the Civil War

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Cahokia: Ancient America's Great City on the Mississippi

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Colonial Traveler: A Critical Edition of Two Voyages to New-England

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Columbus reports on his first voyage, 1493

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

Cotton Mather’s Account of the Witch Trials, 1693

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

De Soto’s discovery of the Mississippi, 1541

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

Disorderly Women: Sexual Politics & Evangelicalism in Revolutionary New England

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

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+

For a “Christian America”: A History of the Religious Right

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

From Puritan to Yankee: Character and the Social Order in Connecticut, 1690-1765

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

George Washington on attending church, 1762

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Religion and Philosophy, Science, Technology, Engineering and Math Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

God’s Almost Chosen Peoples: A Religious History of the American Civil War

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Imperialism and the Spanish American War

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

In the Almost Promised Land: American Jews and Blacks, 1915–1935

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Indian Policy

Curriculum Subjects: Geography, Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Inheriting the Revolution: The First Generation of Americans

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Inventing the "Great Awakening"

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Jerry Falwell and the Moral Majority

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

John Wesley and Slavery

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John Winthrop and the “City upon a Hill”

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

John Winthrop describes life in Boston, 1634

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

John Woolman

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Lower East Side Memories: A Jewish Place in America

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Moralists and Modernizers: America’s Pre-Civil War Reformers

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Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led Her People to Freedom

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Myths and Misconceptions: Slavery and the Slave Trade

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy, World History Grade Levels: 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12

Religion and Literacy in Colonial New England

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

Religion and Social Reform - Roots of Reform

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Religion and the American Revolution

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Religion and the Founding of the American Republic

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Religion in a Revolutionary Age

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Religious Enthusiasm in the New World: Heresy to Revolution

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Slavery

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

Slavery Fact Sheet

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Geography, Religion and Philosophy, World History Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12

Stephen Austin’s contract to bring settlers to Texas, 1825

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

The Columbian Exchange: Biological and Cultural Consequences of 1492

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

The Doctrine of Discovery, 1493

Curriculum Subjects: Geography, Religion and Philosophy, World History Grade Levels: 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+

The Enlightenment in America

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

The Great Awakening

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

The Great Awakening in New England

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The horrors of slavery, 1805

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The Market Revolution: Jacksonian America, 1815–1846

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The New England Soul: Preaching and Culture in Colonial New England

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The New York Conspiracy of 1741

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Government and Civics Grade Levels:

The Rise of the City

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

The Salem Witch Trials: An Unsolved Mystery from History

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

The Spanish Armada

Curriculum Subjects: World History Grade Levels:

The United Nations and the international community, 1967

Curriculum Subjects: Government and Civics, Religion and Philosophy, World History Grade Levels:

Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, 1911

Curriculum Subjects: Economics, Foreign Languages, Literature, Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels:

Under the Cope of Heaven: Religion, Society, and Politics in Colonial America

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

Views of American Slavery: Taken A Century Ago

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

William Jennings Bryan: Missionary Isolationist

Curriculum Subjects: Grade Levels:

William Penn on the “Well-Governing of My Family,” ca. 1700

Curriculum Subjects: Religion and Philosophy Grade Levels: K, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13+