DISTANCE LEARNING RESOURCES

Circuit Judge Guido Calabresi and Eastern District Judge Jack B. Weinstein are two judges in the Second Circuit interviewed for the oral history project created by The Institute of Judicial Administration (IJA) Oral History of Distinguished American Judges. See their videos, and video interviews of other jurists, including several Supreme Court Justices, here: https://www.law.nyu.edu/centers/ija-oral-history

Constitution Center

• Middle school and high school students can learn more about the U.S. Constitution in a series of live webinars hosted by the Constitution Center. Learn more about the Fourth Amendment’s rules on search and seizure, and how the First Amendment protects the free exercise of religion. The high school and college-level seminars will be recorded and posted to the Center’s website.

KidCitizen

• This resources focuses on the work of Congress and how it affects us in our daily lives. The lessons, for grades K-5, draw on primary resources from the Library of Congress. Lesson topics include the regulation of child labor, the symbolism of the U.S. flag, and the life of Rosa Parks.

FDR Presidential Library

• Want to know more about the lives of President Franklin D. and Eleanor Roosevelt and their impact on the United States and the world? The FDR Presidential Library offers 20-minute videos on the Great Depression, the New Deal, labor law reforms and more.

National Archives

• The U.S. National Archives offers a host of distance learning opportunities, drawing on its collection of primary documents from all eras of United States history. Lessons for high school students include a close reading of the Declaration of Independence. Middle school resources include “The Constitution at Work,” which details the role of the Constitution in maintaining the government’s checks and balances. Elementary school students can learn more about how the First Amendment protects citizens’ rights.

Annenberg Classroom Videos

• The video library contains two series: The Constitution Project, which comprises award-winning documentaries of landmark Supreme Court cases, and Conversations on the Constitution, in which Supreme Court justices discuss constitutional topics with high school students.

Open Courses from the Center for Civic Education

• These self-paced online courses are offered at no cost. The two courses are “We the People” and “Strengthening Democracy in America.”

Curated collections from the Smithsonian Learning Lab

• These collections bring together annotated, digitized objects from the collections of the Smithsonian Institution and its constituent entities. They include: Voting Rights in American History, Demanding the Vote: the Woman Suffrage Movement, National History Day: Brown v. Board, National History Day: Freedom Rides, National History Day: African American Civil Rights Movement, National History Day: Chinese Exclusion Act, National History Day: Origins of the U.S. Constitution.

Lessons from Presidential Libraries

• Harry S Truman Library: 3 Branches of Government: (grades 5-8).
• Jimmy Carter Library: The Panama Canal Treaties: How Treaties are Ratified (grades 9-12).