We’ve curated a collection of news and resources focused on race, equity, and social justice designed to support educators, parents, and students.
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Social Justice
Useful Links from Critical Media Project
This list from the Critical Media Project includes useful links to various social justice resources like organizations and initiatives, media outlets, bibliographies, studies, and reports.
Social Justice Lessons
Project Look Sharp has lessons, curriculum kits, webinars, video demonstrations, and articles related to media literacy and social justice.
Teaching Math Through a Social Justice Lens
Education Week reports how math teachers are increasingly bringing social justice questions and examples into the classroom like policing patterns, the spread of the pandemic, and campaign finances.
Teacher Guides: Controversial Issues
iCivics released five new teacher guides and a series of brief informational videos on teaching controversial issues. The videos are free and available on-demand to help educators prepare for teaching about current events.
Social and Cultural Literacy Resources for Classrooms
In this collection from Common Sense Education, there are lessons, videos, downloadables, and games organized by a few key topic areas like facilitating tough conversations, understanding bias and prejudice, and getting students civically engaged.
True Justice Film & Resources
Educator resources from the Kunhardt Film Foundation include lesson plans and an engagement guide about Bryan Stevenson and the Equal Justice Initiative’s call to transform our nation’s false narratives of racial difference and move towards a more equitable future. Themes such as truth and reconciliation and law and complicity are explored through Bryan’s personal story, the legacy of slavery, and systemic racism in the courts.
Race & Ethnicity
General
Talking About Race Web Portal
The Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture launched “Talking About Race,” a new online portal designed to help individuals, families, and communities talk about racism, racial identity, and the way these forces shape every aspect of society, from the economy and politics to the broader American culture.
Online Course: Anti-Racism Journey for Educators with Students
This self-directed online course from Microsoft for K-12 educators is based in social and emotional learning and curated by experts in the field of equity and inclusion, restorative practices, and education technology, to empower educators to include equity and anti-racism work with students.
Taking Action in Your Classroom
EquityEdu, an educational nonprofit, offers advice and resources about how educators can incorporate active listening, critical thinking, and media literacy lessons in their classrooms when talking about race.
A Guide to Equity and Antiracism for Educators
Edutopia, an arm of the George Lucas Educational Foundation, offers reading materials, videos, and lesson plans that teachers can use to self-educate about equity issues in the classroom and teach about antiracism to students in a socially conscious way.
Resources for Teaching About Race and Racism with The New York Times
This free, curated collection from The New York Times Learning Network includes over 75 lessons plans, writing prompts, short films, and graphs relating to racism and racial justice. Topics include identity, prejudice, inequality, the history and legacy of racism, connections to current events, and how to take action.
Talking to Young Children About Race and Racism
Here are tips and resources from PBS Kids to help you have a meaningful conversation with young children about race, racism, and being anti-racist.
Visions of Equity
A special project, led by BIPOC staff at TIME, features a collection of stories on the fight for racial justice and building a better world.
Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPI)
Celebrating Asian American Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage
Join the Share My Lesson community in celebrating the generations of Asian and Pacific Islander Americans with this tailored collection of general and age-appropriate resources, activities, and lesson plans that cover subjects like teaching AAPI perspectives and experiences within humanities education and others.
Teaching Resources for Standing Against Anti-Asian Racism
The recent shooting in Atlanta that killed eight people, including six Asian women, sparked protests and rallies of support of Asian communities across the United States. Here are some resources from KQED to help students discuss ways to stand against anti-Asian racism and understand the history of Asian Americans in the United States.
Talking to Kids About Anti-Asian Racism
This list from TIME for Kids includes resources for educators, families, and caregivers, lesson plans and classroom resources, and related readings from TIME magazine about the Atlanta shooting and rise in hate crimes against Asian Americans to help children navigate the news.
Daily News Lesson: Asian Americans face a wave of discrimination during the pandemic
This lesson from PBS NewsHour Extra looks at the rise in violence against Asians in the United States. Using news articles and videos, students can learn about the history of racism and hate crimes facing BIPOC communities and identify steps that can be taken to combat xenophobia.
Speaking Up Against Racism Around the Coronavirus
This resource from Learning for Justice includes guides on responding to the rise of prejudices against Asians, how to deal with hate and bias at school, how to tackle discussions about bias and stereotypes, and how to facilitate critical conversations.
Soul of America Film & Lesson
The film examines periods of American history when our better angels stood as a counterbalance to our worst instincts. Lesson Three uses first person testimony, historical photographs, and a film excerpt to understand how underlying xenophobia and racism contributed to one of the most shameful episodes in contemporary American History — the incarceration of Japanese Americans during WWII.
Black Lives Matter
Understand, Learn and Act: Teaching In the Midst of Mass Protests for Black Lives
KQED gathered a list of resources to help educators address the systemic nature of racism and police violence in their classrooms. Resources include teacher learning and reflection, student learning and discussion, and social-emotional learning and well-being.
Reflecting on George Floyd’s Death and Police Violence Toward Black Americans
This resource from Facing History and Ourselves gives teachers a step-by-step guide to begin conversations with their students about George Floyd’s death and the events that surround it.
Teaching Black History: Resources For All Ages
This blog post from PBS station Georgia Public Broadcasting highlights lessons for K-12 educators to help teach students about the significant events and people in African-American history in the United States.
Short Film: John Lewis
In March 2020, Kunhardt Film Foundation (KFF) filmed Congressman John Lewis as he made his final walk across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma. This short film can be used as a teaching tool for introducing students to the legacy of an American icon.
Teaching Black History
Black history isn’t just for February. Here, some perspectives on teaching Black history and suggested activities for any time of the year.
Libraries Respond: Black Lives Matter
This resource from the American Library Association includes terminology, plans for action, staff development opportunities, and library programming that libraries can implement.
Racial Justice Resources: Justice for Black Lives
This comprehensive resource guide from the National Education Association includes tools & resources for talking about race, conducting racial equity assessments, strategic planning, ideas for capacity building and action, FAQs, and a directory of web pages, documents and allied organizations focused on racial justice in education.
Indigenous & Native Peoples
Teaching About Indigenous Peoples’ Day
This resource from Educators 4 Social Change includes lesson plans, articles, and information sites for educators to teach students about Indigenous Peoples’ Day and Native American history.
Indigenous Peoples’ Day Resources
Here are lessons, books, and films from Zinn Education Project for teaching the truth about Christopher Columbus and Indigenous Peoples’ history.
Indigenous Peoples Month Resources
November is Indigenous Peoples Month (also known as Native American Heritage Month), which is an opportunity to learn about Indigenous peoples’ history, culture, and perspectives. Use these lessons from Morningside Center for Teaching Social Responsibility to discuss Indigenous peoples and the issues they care about.
Hispanic/Latinx
Latino Americans
This collection of lesson plans, videos and classroom resources from PBS LearningMedia invites teachers and students to explore the history, people and issues chronicled in the PBS series, Latino Americans.
Bring Hispanic Heritage Month to Life: A Collection of Resources
For grades PreK-8, this collection from Scholastic can help educators teach students about Hispanic history, art, and music using these lesson plans, book lists, crafts, and biographies.
Celebrate Latinx Heritage
This collection from WeTeachNYC includes lessons, videos, artwork, music and many living testaments from diverse Latinx across the United States.
Identity & Representation
Digital Short Video & Facilitator Guide
Titled “This Is For The Birds,” this free digital short from Conscious Media Consulting, LLC, addresses biases, narratives, and representations through the life of a bird. A free viewer’s guide also provides insight into each scene and dialogue, and a facilitator’s guide is available for purchase that can help educators and parents engage in discussions of how marginalization happens.
Free Film Education Lessons
The New York International Children’s Film Festival launched the film education program FilmEd. This is a free, online program for K-8 classrooms across the U.S. which provides theme-based lesson plans, such as identity, with grade-appropriate short films designed to encourage engagement in the arts, support media literacy and critical thinking skills, and amplify BIPOC filmmakers and their stories.
“All Skinfolk Ain’t Kinfolk” Documentary
After a contentious race, the runoff for mayor of New Orleans came down to two candidates: Desirée Charbonnet and LaToya Cantrell, two very different black women. The winner of this election would take office as the first female mayor of New Orleans and the city’s fourth black mayor. Through news footage, campaign advertisements and archival audio and video, All Skinfolk Ain’t Kinfolk is the unprecedented story of this mayoral runoff told through the eyes of black women living in this city.
“All Skinfolk Ain’t Kinfolk” Resources
After viewing All Skinfolk Ain’t Kinfolk, download the free resources available, including a lesson plan, conversation starter, discussion guide and election guide. The Skinfolk Salon series also features conversations from a series of private virtual gatherings that sought to create a safe space for women of color and allies to convene, ask questions and interrogate the unique role Black women hold in seeking to secure leadership roles and build political power.
Gender & Sexual Identity
DISCLOSURE Toolkit for Colleges, Universities and Community Groups
This 33-page toolkit is designed to be used in higher education and with community groups. It contains approximately 36 minutes of DISCLOSURE clips and includes general discussion prompts, facilitation tips, thematic questions to go along with the clips, resources, and ways to take action.
DISCLOSURE Discussion Guide
Designed to be used with the full film, the 32-page DISCLOSURE Discussion Guide is free for all audiences and contains prompts for engaging in conversation after viewing. It also offers a range of resources, information about the filmmakers, a glossary of terms, and ways to take action.
Women’s History Month Resources
This list of K-12 curriculum and other educational resources from the Anti-Defamation League includes lessons about gender stereotypes and bias, important women in history, women’s fight for equity, and an analysis of sexism, its causes, and solutions.
Understanding LGBTQ+ Identity: A Toolkit for Educators
Here are some PBS LearningMedia resources designed for students in grades 8 and higher that can help educators and parents talk with their children about the history of Pride, how to be an ally, and what it means to be part of the LGBTQ community.
9 Resources for Women’s History Month
Here are nine classroom resources from Facing History and Ourselves that offer a historical look at women making history in various contexts and connections between women’s history and women’s experiences today.
Lesson Plans to Help Students Understand Gender and to Support Transgender and Non-Binary Children
These easy-to-use lesson plans from HRC Foundation’s Welcoming Schools can help students understand ways gender stereotyping impacts all children.
Police & Protests
Guide for Combating Protest Disinformation
Amid mass demonstrations against police violence, PEN America created a tip sheet for minimizing the spread of misinformation and disinformation about the protests. Tips include verifying images and videos, accounts, and sources.
You are probably spreading misinformation. Here’s how to stop.
As misinformation about the death of George Floyd and Black Lives Matter protests grows, the Washington Post published this article about the inadvertent spreading of misinformation and tips for analyzing content on social media before sharing it.
The Headlines That Are Covering Up Police Violence
This article discusses how the choices made by media outlets and journalists when covering activism and protests can influence public support or rejection of policies that might solve social ills such as racism and police brutality.
Resources on the History of Policing and Today’s Calls for Reform
This list of resources from KQED are aimed to help educators learn more about policing in the United States, its historical roots in slavery and the Industrial Revolution, and the connections between today’s protests and longstanding efforts to reform and re-imagine law enforcement.
Teach the History of Policing
In this resource from the Zinn Education Project, teachers can use books, articles, and films to teach middle- and high-school students about the origins and practices of policing in the United States and how we arrived at the current political moment.
Three Ways to Teach the Insurrection at the U.S. Capitol
This free lesson plan from PBS NewsHour Extra includes videos and discussion questions, allowing students to compare and contrast media representations of protests and riots, and comments from public officials.
Survey: How the Media Has Covered the Issue of Systemic Racism and the Police
From Jacob Blake, to George Floyd, to Breonna Taylor, 2020 has seen immense pressure to re-examine how the police interact with society. The Factual set out to survey how both left- and right-leaning media have covered the issue of systemic racism in the police.
It’s time to change the way the media reports on protests. Here are some ideas.
This article from the Nieman Journalism Lab at Harvard looks at how national media outlets make editorial choices when they cover protests that often fail to frame those events accurately and steps reporters and newsrooms can take to stop those habits.
How to Talk to Young Children About the Police
Britannica for Parents gathered expert advice for how to talk with children about the role of police in your community.
