Teacher Lesson Plans

Allow students an opportunity to go back to America's WWII Home Front to examine various morale boosters in general ( radio, movies, etc. ), but particularly Major League Baseball.

The student will complete a project creating a PhotoStory describing an event of the Berlin Airlift. They may concentrate on the personalities of the airlift, the German people, the Soviet response to the post-war world, etc.

Students will be able to understand the purposes and outcomes of the Berlin Airlift, the Berlin blockade as a response to the growing Cold War and as the first battle of the Cold War.

After a short PowerPoint introducing the Berlin Blockade, the students will participate in a cooperative learning activity emphasizing the study of primary sources to increase understanding of Truman's decision to continue the Berlin Airlift.

The Berlin Airlift was a significant factor in the future of the Cold War. This activity will be used in class as a bridge to the Cold War era, helping students to understand East and West Berlin.

Students will use primary sources to study the Berlin Blockade and discuss options Truman may have contemplated.

Students will read a brief passage from the text concerning the Berlin Airlift. Students will watch excerpts from documentaries on the airlift and on Gail Halvorsen. After viewing the dvd/videos, the class will discuss and complete a study guide.

Create a meal (or meals) to complete a day's worth of calories for Berliners at the time of the Airlift and present to class in order to visualize what they were actually eating.

This activity asks students to review online materials related to the Berlin Airlift and to investigate the site to complete their activities. 

Students will describe and explain cartoons from the Berlin Airlift, putting them in historical context.

Individual Assignment - write an essay over the Treaty of Versailles and the causes of World War II.

Essential Question: How did Black GIs respond to Jim Crow in U.S. Armed Forces during World War II?

Students will study and write about famous black Americans in the 1920s and 1930s.

Students will have to research the Bleeding Kansas era as to events, people, and outcomes, giving them a better understanding as to the important of the era in American history.

To introduce analysis of primary documents to sixth through eighth grade students in preparation for History Fair’s theme, “Breaking Barriers in History”

Students will use a variety of sources to focus in on Britain's decision to withdraw from the Mediterranean.

Brown v. Board of Education, Topeka

To show the difference in two controversial figures of the border war period of history in both Missouri and Kansas. To show that different sides can view people/ideas differently depending on your "Historical Memory"

Students look at how a cabinet they created would advise them to fight against War on Terrorism today. For time sake, the students will be focusing on the cabinet positions of Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense, Secretary of Treasury, and Attorney General.

To help students understand the different points of views from the Missouri Bushwhackers and the Kansas Jayhawkers using the Massacre at Osceola, the jail collapse in Kansas City, and the Raid on Lawrence.

This lesson will give students the opportunity to examine the role of the President from various angles to consider its important role within the United States’ government.

Students will use a graphic organizer to analyze primary sources of Campaign media in three elections.

The daring activities of Gail Halvorsen will be presented in class. Students will then be asked to formulate a plan to create and hopefully implement their own service activity.

Students will receive three or four letters written by Truman to Bess Wallace and analyze them

This is lecture activity using power discussing the importance of and impact of WWI specifically from the point of view of Harry S. Truman. The lecture follows the decision of the 33 year old veteran from the farm to France leaving his mom and sister.

Students will read letters written by Capt. Harry S. Truman from France to his fiancée Bess Wallace and his cousins Mary Ethel and Nellie Noland and compare them to accounts of the experiences of his division (35th) during WWI.

Students as a group will present a persuasive argument for which of the 4 MAIN (militarism, alliances, imperialism, nationalism) causes was primarily responsible for leading to World War I.

Students, in groups, will research various new technologies in World War I.

Teach students about Harry S. Truman through use of primary and secondary sources, physical artifacts, research, and role playing

Students will study the treaty process as it relates to presidential power. There will be a review of the treaty process, the Treaty of Versailles, and the Fourteen Points.

Choice of various writing assignments.

This will be a technology-based, analysis, assignment that will focus on primary source documents of President Truman's viewpoints on race and letters that Brooklyn Dodgers Hall-of-Famer Jackie Robinson wrote to former Presidents.

For this lesson, the student will create a mock Facebook page for a historical figure from Missouri during the Civil War time period.

Students will understand the major turning points of the Civil War, why these turning points were important, and how many of these turning points are interconnected.

Cooperative learning through document analysis, students summarize the worldwide efforts of the Cold War, including the competition for power between the United States and the Soviet Union.

The purpose of this lesson is to link the Communist Revolution in China (1949) to subsequent Cold War events, including Korea and McCarthyism.

Through small group work and an individual assignment, students will use a background description, various maps and the Truman Doctrine speech to analyze European postwar events and reactions by the Soviet Union and the United States which led to heightened Cold War tension.

A series of lectures, document analysis, cooperative learning and individual assignments.

Students will examine how the end of WWII, and especially the threats of atomic weapons and Communism, changed the political dynamics of the world.

This assignment allows the students the opportunity to explore the vast amount of visual examples that address various aspects of the Cold War and offers new insight into the era.

Students will be responsible for collecting a portfolio (18 or more titles) of children's literature addressing the subject, giving examples, or dealing with the issue of civil liberties outlined within the Bill of Rights

Applying a historical figure to modern social media.

Assignment is both individual and cooperative integrating media and visual literacy
into social studies core content using primary sources - Presidential photographs. Abraham
Lincoln, our 16th president, and an early adopter of his era’s newest technology (photography),
has a lot in common with today’s Instagram and TikTok stars. Recognizing the camera's power,
Abraham Lincoln made extensive use of photographs during his presidency. He often sat for the
leading photographers of the day, allowing them to distribute his image widely. Lincoln was the
first president to take full advantage of photography, both as a campaign tool and to craft a
desirable public persona.

Students will attempt to answer the prompt: Compare and Contrast the Civil Rights accomplishments of the Truman administration and the Eisenhower administration by examining the documents and incorporating their knowledge of the time period.

Students will read campaign speeches given by Truman and Dewey in September, 1948, in Salt Lake City, and then compare the two by filling out a checklist of typical campaign speech characteristics.

In this classroom activity students will learn about President Truman's home (which originally belonged to his mother-in-law). Students will study pictures of the interior and exterior of Present Truman's house in 1945 and compare and contrast them.

Discussion, group research, individual paper.

A lesson focusing on foreign policy.

Students will compare and contrast the United States Bill of Rights and the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Students compare and contrast two composers