Labor History Links

Home Reference Teachers Chronological Topical Biography Place Culture Current Union Search

Teachers Corner – Lesson Plans and helpful links

.

Sites of special interest :

History Matters - Many documents and website links relating to labor. Site is keyword-searchable.  Links to other labor history websites and on-line exhibitions. Links to syllabi, lesson plans and information on teaching. Links to discussion groups for subjects that include labor and social history

Women and Social Movements, 1820-1940 - A fabulous teaching resource, with some of it geared toward labor history--though most of it is now subscription-based only. Example: primary documents and lesson plans on women and labor, including the 1909-1910 New York shirtwaist strike,  Lawrence, Massachusetts textile strike of 1912, the 1938 Pecan Shellers strike in San Antonio, and much much more;

American Labor Studies Center " mission is to collect, analyze, evaluate, create and disseminate labor history and labor studies curriculum and related materials to kindergarten through 12th grade teachers nationwide."

Curriculum plans from the Wisconsin Labor History Society curriculum --most of these are usable beyond Wisconsin

Zinn Education Project including Civil War and Class Conflict

Lawrence 1912: the Singing Strike

The Singing Strike and the Rebel Students: Learning from the Industrial Workers of the World

Southern Tenant Farmers’ Union: Black and White Unite?

Curriculum guide for k-12 from the Illinois Labor History Society some of these are very well developed, with handouts, etc; some have rough ideas for approaching the topic

Labor in the Schools Committee of the California Teachers Federation --- multiple ideas and lesson plans, See also their resource list

Workers and Work in America, 1600 to the Present: A Multimedia Course Professor Zahavi has posted his course on-line, with links to sources. This might be a good starting point for an introduction to labor history

Picturing U.S. History by Josh Freeman "digital project based on the belief that visual materials are vital to understanding the American past. This website provides online "Lessons in Looking," a guide to Web resources, forums, essays, reviews, and classroom activities to help teachers incorporate visual evidence into their classrooms." Great for labor history at all levels

Teacher Lesson Plan: Using Oral History: This lesson presents social history content and topics through the voices of ordinary people. It draws on primary sources from the American Memory Collection, American Life Histories, 1936-1940.

Tenement Museum Lesson Plans including "teaching with objects" "doing oral history" "primary source activities" from elementary level to high school

Center for Working Class studies syllabus library- mostly not history, but great ideas here

Teaching About Class includesReadings about Class Class Theory Table and ideas developed by participants in the 2006 "Class in the Classroom" Summer Institute

Teaching the Local These sample teaching projects represent the work done by Mahoning Valley teachers in Center for Working Class Studies Summer Institute. 

Teaching Students to Become Producers of New Historical Knowledge on the Web by Kathryn Kish Sklar S.U.N.Y. Binghamton

Special Issue on Labor History (OAH Magazine of History) includes articles such as



American Social History Project dedicating to revitalizing the study of history by challenging the ways that people learn about the past

Steeltown USA: A Digital Library of Poetry, Images, and Documents
Another site "provides a variety of resources for secondary and college teachers who want to include attention to work and working-class studies in their courses.

A brief history of the labor movement (audio) Historian Jeff Cowie on NPR (5:49 minutes) for the completely uninitiated, a broad brush overview

See this site's booklist and/or filmlist for specific subjects for classroom use

Glossary of Labor Terms from the American Labor Studies Center

 

Call for Syllabi - Southern Labor Studies Association

The Southern Labor Studies Association is pleased to announce its newest project, the SLSA Syllabus Exchange. The association solicits submissions of completed course syllabi on themes related to labor and working-class history in the American South. We welcome both surveys of this topic as
well as specialized classes on employment in a particular industry or place (such as mining in Appalachia, textile work in the Piedmont, etc.), different systems of work (slavery, indentured servitude, convict labor, waged labor, housework, etc.), or the relationship of labor and class to larger forces such as electoral politics, social movements, white supremacy, and patriarchy. We also encourage courses that explore oral history methodology, service learning, and other forms of field work in the Southern context.

Please send your submissions in PDF or Word format to mk63@duke.edu. The Exchange will be password protected, and only SLSA members will have access to the syllabi. If you are not yet a member of SLSA, please consider joining at the same time that you renew your membership in the Labor and Working-Class History Association, by visiting www.dukeupress.edu/ lawcha/.


 

Broad chronological or topical lesson frames

Who Really Built America Library of Congress site with lesson plans

Curriculum plans from the Wisconsin Labor History Society curriculum --most of these are usable beyond Wisconsin --including "What are unions?", "why did they develop", lessons on the Jungle, women's labor, WWII and labor --all are connected to Wisconsin standards, but many of these standards are transferable to other state standards

Curriculum guide for k-12 from the Illinois Labor History Society some of these are very well developed, with handouts, etc; some have vague ideas for approaching the topic

Servitude to Service: African-American Women as Wage Earners Rita G. Koman

Creating a Right to Childhood: Child Labor and Social Reform -timelines, background, primary sources, photos, teaching ideas, classroom assignments

documents from the Fulton Cotton Bag mill on child labor

Exploring child labor with young students - Rethinking Schools article see also confronting child labor

Child Labor, safety and health, and other "performance task" Lesson plans f rom Wisconsin Labor History Society

Child labor website page for students

Your Rights on the Job "information assembled is designed to help young workers understnad their rights in the workplace as protected in federal law"

U.S. Steel Gary Works – Lesson plans on the steel industry and the workers

Harry Bridges Project High School Lesson Plans including surveillance, cold war, unions

The Pursuit of Happiness:  Labor History in Chicago

Strikes in US and Texas history compare famous strikes in U.S. and Texas history.

 

Teaching plans for specific chronological time frames, arranged according to chronology