Lesson Plans

American Women: A Gateway to Library of Congress Resources
The online presentation provides a gateway to the American Memory collections and other Library of Congress resources that relate to womens history while also providing guidance to the non-digital womens history resources found at the Library. For each Library reading room there is an introductory essay that provides an overview of the materials relating to womens history found in that particular reading room.

Einstein's Wife - Mileva Maric Einstein
Introduce students to the life and times of Einstein and his wife, female scientist Mileva Maric Einstein, through a biographical study of Mileva, her scientific accomplishments, and her break from the scientific community.

Family and Friendship in Quilts
In this unit of three EDSITEment lessons, students recognize how people of different cultures and time periods have used cloth-based art forms to pass down their traditions and history. Quilting continues to be largely a home-based form of art, primarily engaged in by women. This unit heightens students' awareness of how quilts have reflected the lives of the people who create them, and of how quilts record the cultural history of a particular place and time.

Her Story -- Community Center, The Learning Page
offers photos, diaries, and timelines for learning about women pioneers, women during the Civil War, women's suffrage in the Progressive Era, eight women who served "on the front" during World War II, First Ladies, literature about women and discrimination, African-American women in the sciences, women in Muslim societies, Native American women writers, Zora Neale Hurston, Margaret Mead, research in women's history, and more.

Ladies, Contraband, and Spies: Women in the Civil War -- Students look at a series of document galleries to see the perspectives of slave women, plantation mistresses, female spies, and Union women during the Civil War. Ultimately, students understand the human consequences of this war for women.

Nobel: Visions of Our Century - Nobel Women
This lesson will focus on women in science, specifically as reflected in the Nobel Prize.

The American Experience - Fly Girls
The video and resources on the Web site help students explore the many roles American women played during World War II, especially women aviators enlisted as Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASPS).

The American Experience - Miss America
Miss America offers insights into American history topics including the Jazz Age, the Depression, World War II, the Baby Boom, feminist and civil rights activism of the 1960s, the women's liberation movement, women's changing roles in society, women and the workplace, leisure, the rise of television, beauty ideals, individualism, self-image, and consumerism. You can use part or all of the film, or delve into the rich resources available on this Web site to learn more, either in a classroom or on your own.

The Women Writers Project
An effort to digitize texts by pre-Victorian women writers to make them accessible to a wider audience.

Two American Entrepreneurs: Madam C.J. Walker and J.C. Penney
This lesson features the life stories of two business people who lived the American Dream and who helped make that dream a reality for others in their communities. It tells how Walker, an African American woman, and Penney, a former tuberculosis patient, built from scratch their multi-million and billion dollar businesses.

War and Peace -- Community Center, The Learning Page
This lesson presents photos, maps, and documents related to America's wars. Features include a Civil War timeline, letters from soldiers, homefront contributions during World War I and II, American women workers during World War II, man-on-the-street interviews after Pearl Harbor, "The Stars and Stripes" newspaper (for Army troops in France 1918-19), Winston Churchill, the Marshall Plan, Ansel Adam's book on a World War II internment camp, and the Veterans History Project.   

Women Come to the Front: Journalists, Photographers, and Broadcasters During WWII -- Exhibit
Spotlights 8 out of over 100 American women who secured official military accreditation as war correspondents, if not actual front-line assignments during World War II.

Women in Medicine: Past and Future
The purpose of this lesson, from Science NetLinks, is to explore scientific enterprise in relation to the role of women in science as it has developed over the last 150 years. In this investigation, students compare the careers of two women, a century apart, involved in medical research. They also learn about xenotransplantation, the use of animal organs and tissues for transplant into human patients.

Women Writers Resource Project
This is a collection of edited and unedited texts by women writing in English from the 17th century through the 19th century. The project offers graduate and undergraduate students the opportunity to edit texts. A complete list of unedited texts, suggestions for assignments, bibliographic resources, and examples of graduate student work are available.

Women's Lives Before the Civil War
In this lesson, one of a multi-part unit from EDSITEment, students learn about the lives of women before the Civil War.

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Student Activities

Women In History -- What was life like for women in the late nineteenth century? Today you will compare the role of women in our society from different viewpoints.

Counting the Miles To Freedom -- Travel the Underground Railroad with Harriet Tubman as your guide in this NTTI lesson plan that introduces students to the Underground Railroad using two interactive Internet sites.

"Why oh Why…Nellie Bly?" -- This would probably be the question most asked when people in 1885 first heard of Nellie Bly.  In the late 1800s, there were few career women, and a woman in the newsroom of a large newspaper was totally against all standards of the time! 

A Ribbon Around a Bombshell - A Glimpse into the Life and Art of Frida Kahlo -- Explore how Frida Kahlo expressed her Mexican heritage and physical disabilities through her art and have your students create a PowerPoint presentation about their own heritage by using this lesson plan

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Video

Anna Ella Carol (Windows Media) and (RealVideo) --
Anna Ella Carol was a propagandist, writer, and military war strategist during the Civil War era. The daughter of Governor Thomas King Carol, she lived on Maryland's Eastern Shore. As an unofficial member of the U.S. Secret Service, operating under President Lincoln's orders, she slipped behind enemy lines and devised a plan to penetrate southern defenses. Historians hail Anna Ella Carol as a most distinguished Marylander.

Mary Garrett (Windows Media) and (Real Video) --
John W. Garrett, the man who captained the extensive growth of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad during the last half of the nineteenth century, left stocks, land, and five and a half million dollars to his heirs. Garret’s daughter, Mary, devoted her share of his fortune to the cause of women’s education. In this piece, learn how Mary and four close friends expanded opportunities for women’s education.

Beatrix Potter: Artist, Storyteller, and Countrywoman -- Learn about the life of author and illustrator Beatrix Potter in this documentary film. Interesting facts about her life and times are presented against a backdrop of some of her beautiful watercolors.

Verda Freeman Welcome (Windows Media)  and (RealVideo) -- This clip features Verda Freeman Welcome, a politician, civil rights crusader, and community activist from Baltimore. In 1959 Welcome became the first African-American woman elected to Maryland's House of Delegates. In 1962 she was elected as the country's first African-American state senator.

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