Unit 5 - Life in a Multiracial Democracy
A vital culminating unit on Life in Multicultural Democracy includes an exploration of concepts like colorblindness and intersectionality. These are complicated and challenging concepts investigated here through geographic practices, sociological perspectives, politics, and children’s literature. These lessons offer a variety of enrichment opportunities that support students’ literacy, reading about and understanding the world we live in.
Children’s Literature and the Fight for Justice
This lesson will provide multiple examples of the use of the First Amendment to help citizens protest unfair treatment by the government. It is also an opportunity to pair ELA and reading comprehension with government and history.
Grade level: 🎓
Grades 6-8
Subject: 🕮
History/Government/ELA
Literacy Skills: ✎
Children's Literature
Time Required: 🕗
60 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Secondary: Unit 4: 14th Amendment Legal History
Colorblind Practices After Brown
This lesson is supposed to help students recognize one of the unintended results of the Brown decision: equating colorblind policies with equity.
Grade level: 🎓
Grades 10-12
Subject: 🕮
Social Studies/Sociology
Literacy Skills: ✎
Video and Academic Secondary Sources; Reflection Writing
Time Required: 🕗
45 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Desegregation Stories in Children’s Literature
Reading comprehension is an important skill in school learning. Here we introduce children’s literature that might help students of upper elementary and middle grades think about kids’ experiences with desegregation in the 1950s and 1960s in the United States.
Grade level: 🎓
Grades 6-8
Subject: 🕮
U.S. History; English Language Arts; Sociology
Literacy Skills: ✎
Video and Academic Secondary Sources; Reflection Writing
Time Required: 🕗
45 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Secondary: Unit 1: Introduction
Intersectionality - Brown v. Board Lesson Plan
This lesson introduces the concept of intersectionality and invites students to consider how this concept influences human societies.
Grade level: 🎓
Middle School
Subject: 🕮
Current Events, U.S. Government
Literacy Skills: ✎
Video Comprehension; Spatial Representation
Time Required: 🕗
30 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Mapping - Brown v. Board Lesson Plan
This lesson invites students to draw connections between demographic qualities using mapping practices. Students will analyze the complexity of both the data and its meanings.
Grade level: 🎓
Middle School
Subject: 🕮
Civics & Government, Current Events
Literacy Skills: ✎
Reading source documents (x2) and drawing conclusions about people's perspectives on the impact of segregation on their lives; Supporting claims with text evidence
Time Required: 🕗
45 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 1: Introduction
Secondary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Political Activism (Petitions) - Brown v. Board
Petition-writing offers citizens an opportunity to engage with the ideas and values of their community.
Following the ruling of Brown v. Board, this petition employs civic engagement in order to apply national rulings to local organizations.
Grade level: 🎓
Middle School
Subject: 🕮
Civics & Government, Current Events
Literacy Skills: ✎
Reading primary source materials; Critique effectiveness of petitions as action
Time Required: 🕗
45 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 2: Impact of Brown (K-12) (Legacy of Brown)
Secondary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Political Activism (Sit-Ins & Protest) - Brown v. Board
This lesson explores how protest (and specifically sit-ins) influenced the course of desegregation and the Civil Rights Movement in America. Students will evaluate the effects that sit-ins had on local and national behavior and policy.
Grade level: 🎓
Middle School
Subject: 🕮
Civics, Government, Public Activism
Literacy Skills: ✎
Reading primary source materials; Critique effectiveness of petitions as action
Time Required: 🕗
45 - 60 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 2: Impact of Brown (K-12) (Legacy of Brown)
Secondary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
The Fight for Brown
This lesson supports foundational learning about life in America and the efforts of leaders and organizations to fight for equitable education at the intersection of concepts (separate but equal; segregation) and historical practices (source analysis and contextualization).
Grade level: 🎓
Grades 9-10; Adaptable for Grades 6-8
Subject: 🕮
Efforts for desegregating schools in the U.S.; English Language Arts; U.S. History or U.S. Government and Politics
Literacy Skills: ✎
Reading excerpts from primary documents and academic articles; Communicating ideas about different perspectives
Time Required: 🕗
90 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy
Secondary: Unit 1: Introduction
What Does DEI Mean in a Multiracial Society?
This lesson will allow students to think about the role of DEI in a multiracial democracy and the institutions that help it function. By examining what DEI is supposed to do and how it is enacted, students will create their own conceptions of equity in this world.
Grade level: 🎓
High School
Subject: 🕮
History, Current Events, Economics
Literacy Skills: ✎
Reading Academic Sources, Research, News Literacy
Time Required: 🕗
90 minutes
Lesson Pairing:
Primary: Unit 5: Life in a Multiracial Democracy