Examining the featured nineteenth- and early twentieth-century documents from women to Congress regarding voting rights can launch a fascinating classroom lesson on women’s suffrage and the First Amendment right to petition.

This 2020 issue of Social Education, marking the centennial anniversary of the Nineteenth Amendment, seeks to broaden understanding of the suffrage story in several ways: by considering the strategies and tactics used by the suffragists to foment their agitation; by acknowledging the ways in which further work was needed to secure voting and other rights for all women; by acknowledging the need for women in positions of political leadership and for stories about their accomplishments; and by placing the U.S. women’s suffrage story within the context of the larger struggle for women’s rights…

The featured telegraph to President Abraham Lincoln from a gas-filled balloon, along with accompanying photographs, can launch a fascinating lesson on the Civil War and nineteenth-century technology. 

Examining statistical atlases from the nineteenth century offers students a unique opportunity to practice geographic thinking and data literacy skills.

The authors describe five types of inquiry that keep students engaged, promote student agency, and meet the need of teachers for curriculum flexibility.   

This inquiry, which explores the current debate on what should be done with Confederate monuments, engages students in historical, geographic and civic skills.

It’s like solving a puzzle!” was the consensus of students fascinated by transcribing letters of a Civil War soldier. They were using a curriculum developed for middle- and high-school classroom through a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission, a division of the National Archives. The curriculum has been tested in classrooms and a summer camp. It is available on the website of the Historical Society of Cheshire County, who with Keene State College and Keene High School, comprised the grant team. The URL is: http://hsccnh.org/education/making-history-now/…

An examination of the two featured letters, one by a Leavenworth prisoner and the other by his warden, to President Wilson's attorney general, can spark an engaging study of America's criminal justice system and the Eighth Amendment.

Students will gain a deeper understanding of issues related to the First Amendment and religious freedom when they study two renowned Supreme Court flag-saluting cases.

A close look at the struggle to pass the 13th Amendment will ignite a stimulating classroom debate on the legacies of slavery that persist today.