Explore The Civil Rights Era With Google Cultural Institute

#EdTechELA

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to take your students to any museum in the world to experience our culture first hand? Unfortunately, because of funding and geography constraints, many schools are lucky to stay open, much less fund a trip to even a local museum.

Thanks to Google Cultural Institute, you can now take students on a virtual tour of primary documents, photographs, speeches, videos, and more of historical events and places all over the world — including the civil rights era.

Exhibits include:

These exhibits are full of commentary regarding the original photographs, videos, letters, legislation, and other artifacts of the times.

You can listen to President John F. Kennedy’s speech on Civil Rights:

You can view original legislative documents.

Senators Mike Mansfield and Everett Dirksen - Democrat of Montana and Republican of Illinois - have taken President Kennedy's bill, and revised it. Now there are multiple versions.
Senators Mike Mansfield and Everett Dirksen – Democrat of Montana and Republican of Illinois – have taken President Kennedy’s bill, and revised it. Now there are multiple versions.

You can see photographs of the people and events of the time.

Members of the Little Rock Nine
Members of the Little Rock Nine and Former Governor Faubus at the Eisenhower Presidential Library Civil Rights Conference

This is a wonderful resource for students and teachers. You can also look for other topics to explore here.

 

About the author 

Michelle Boyd Waters, M.Ed.

Michelle taught secondary ELA in public schools for 10 years. She served as an award-winning journalist before transitioning into education and is now Assistant Director of the OU Writing Center and a teacher consultant for the Oklahoma Writing Project. Michelle co-edited the Oklahoma English Journal for five years. She is a PhD candidate in Instructional Leadership and Academic Curriculum at the University of Oklahoma. She started reThink ELA LLC as a teacher blog in 2012.

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