Intersectionality - Brown v. Board Lesson Plan

Essential questions

1. Why does our society exist in its current form?

2. What is intersectionality?

3. How does intersectionality present itself in people’s lives?

Outcomes and objectives

After the lesson students will…

• Explain intersectionality.

• Analyze intersectionality as it relates to their lives and behavior.

• Hypothesize about the effects of intersectionality on the general American public.

Preparing to teach

• Students do not need any significant background information for this lesson. This lesson can be introduced and included in many different units or courses.

• Teachers should:

  • Prepare the video ahead of class.

  • Collect paper and markers for identity mapping.

Scaffolds and accommodations to support learners

Reading support

Teachers may create a transcript of the video to support different readers. They may also invite students to use more visual or verbal forms of representation in creating their maps or their reflections.

Differentiation

The ideas listed above for reading support can be helpful for differentiation. Teachers may also invite students to complete tasks with partners for added assistance.

Adjusting for HIGH school grades

This lesson is applicable for all secondary grades. Teachers may be interested in adapting the discussion questions depending on their class, but the provided questions are applicable to students in spite of age.

Instructional activities sequence

• Invite students to create an identity map (such as the one included below). Explain that students are meant to visually represent the parts of their identity (as many as they can think of within the allotted time). Encourage students to be as creative as possible with this assignment.

• Collect the class and watch this video from Kimberlé Crenshaw: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ViDtnfQ9FHc
• Work together as a class to create a definition for intersectionality. Teachers and students may also brainstorm examples of intersectionality as a class to support student understanding.
  1. Teachers may begin this definition activity by having students dump words or phrases on a whiteboard and then combining those collectively, or by having students draft definitions with a partner first, or some other scaffold activity.
• Allow students time to return to their identity maps and draw connections between their identity pieces to label their intersectionality. Students should both make connections mentally/verbally and also physically with arrows and lines on their map.
• Invite students to write a reflection about their identity map where they explain:
  1. one of the intersectionalities they found in their map;
  2. why this intersectionality is important to them and how this intersectionality affects their life; and
  3. why intersectionality as a concept is important (make a guess about how other people in America are affected by intersectionality).

Assessment

The closing reflection in this activity can serve as the major assessment. Teachers may choose to add additional assessment materials depending on their class.

Materials needed and additional resources for enrichment

• Video as included above.