1. Fifth Grade Social Studies
Looking at Unit 8
Overcoming the Past:
The Age of Civil Rights
March 10, 2009

2. Importance of Technology
Television & space exploration (H8d)
Importance of visual imagery:
During WWII, people saw footage in newsreels
During Vietnam & the Civil Rights Movement, people saw footage in television – in their living rooms
Beginning of nearly-immediate access to information

3. Thurgood Marshall

4. Rosa Parks
Student interview with Mrs. Parks shortly before her 1995 death:
Detroit News’s coverage of Mrs. Parks’s life:
Rosa Parks Library & Museum in Montgomery, AL:

5. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
The King Papers Stanford:
Kid-Friendly MLK Biography from the Library of Congress:
Slide Show from later in MLK’s life at Scholastic:
Martin Luther King, Jr. National Historic Site:
The King Center for Non-Violent Social Change:

6. Protest Movements
Why is this image significant?
* What events does it tie together?
Image: - cotton pickers on strike in Orangeburg, SC in 1963

7. Protest Movements Why is this image significant?
* What do you notice about the people in the image?
Image: Taken in 1965

8. What do people in Vietnam today call this conflict?
Who’s Who of the Vietnam conflict:
Timeline of US involvement (teacher reference:
Information for teachers (from a Vietnam Veterans’ Organization) & a “virtual Wall”:
Photographic story of the conflict from the National Archives:

9. Brown v. Board of Education
Complete text of Brown ruling (for exposure – not as a reading lesson):
Actual document:
Contemporary articles from the Topeka, Kansas Capitol-Journal, as well as coverage of the 50th anniversary of the ruling:

10. Civil Rights Act & Voting Rights Act
Civil Rights Act: Signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson in 1964.
Equal access to public accommodations
Demanded school integration
Ended discriminatory hiring practices
Voting Rights Act: Signed into law by President Johnson in 1965.
Reinforced 15th amendment
Outlawed literacy tests & other discriminatory pre-voting measures
Image of the Civil Rights Act:
Document-based lesson plan on Civil Rights Act: Image of the Civil Rights Act:
Image of the Voting Rights Act:
Introduction to Voting Rights Act:

11. Passing the 24th Amendment (1962-1964) “There can be no one too poor to vote.” ~ LBJ
Library of Congress mini-presentation:
1964 article from Time magazine:
Image of the Congressional resolution calling for the amendment:

12. Resources! http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/rfkonmlkdeath.html
Remember! These are only suggested resources. Make sure to preview these sites before sharing them with your students. You know your students better than I do!
Resources!
RFK’s speech on the night of MLK’s assassination - semi-commercial site
Voices of Civil Rights online exhibit from the Library of Congress – begins with internment of Japanese-Americans and goes through current disability activism – includes documentary images & modern commentary from activists
Annotated images from America.Gov
Homepage of the Civil Rights Movement veterans’ organization – includes first-hand accounts of the Movement, along with numerous images, timelines, news reports, and more
Images & narrative particular to the Albany Movement & subsequent Civil Rights actions in Georgia
Fascinating article about Philo Farnsworth, the “real” inventor of television
Maya Lin’s original designs for the Vietnam Veterans’ Memorial

13. Resources for Integration
Freedom on the Menu
Carole Boston Weatherford
The Wall
Eve Bunting
Rosa
Nikki Giovanni
10,000 Days of Thunder
Philip Caputo
Linda Brown, You Are Not Alone
Joyce Carol Thomas, ed.
Young Thurgood Marshall
Eric Carpenter
The Civil Rights Freedom Train
Bentley Boyd
Philo Farnsworth and Television
Ellen Sturm Niz