Putting the Movement Back into Civil Rights Teaching

The Civil Rights Movement is one of the most commonly taught stories about the fight for democracy and equal rights. However, the powerful stories of everyday people organizing and working together for social change are lost in the focus on a few major heroes and dates.

Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching and the companion website offer a collection of lessons, essays, articles, primary documents, and poetry to help educators move beyond a “heroes and holidays” approach to teaching about the Civil Rights Movement in K–12 classrooms. The focus is on the themes of women, youth, organizing, culture, institutional racism, and the interconnectedness of social movements. The resources are organized in eight sections: Critiquing the Traditional Narrative, Framing the Movement, Desegregation of Public Spaces, Voting Rights, Black Power, Labor and Land, Transnational Solidarity, and Student Engagement.

For more information, visit www.civilrightsteaching.org.

ISBN: 9781878554147 | Teaching for Change

The updated and revised Putting the Movement Back Into Civil Rights Teaching is a veritable tour de force.

Capturing the challenges and struggles of the people who propelled the movement to success, it provides a bird’s eye view of best practices in teaching about one of the most important movements in world history.

From well known figures like Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King Jr., to lesser known personalities like Barbara Johns and Edna Griffin, it demonstrates conclusively that movement building required not only bravery and courage, but a deep commitment to developing the skills that would better the lives of all peoples, not just one or two races or ethnicities.

Its mythbusting quizzes, role play exercises, and well thought out writing assignments make it a must for those educators seeking to give their students the tools they need to become active citizens who work to expand the meaning of “liberty and justice for all.” This new version of an old standard will go far in serving not just the school districts, teachers and students who utilize it, but the millions of Americans and other citizens of the world who value truth as a well-worn path to perfecting our precious democracy. — Curtis Austin, associate professor, Arizona State University