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Lesson Planet Article
Curated OER

Celebrate Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the Most Meaningful Way

For Teachers 6th - 8th
Lead your class on a journey into the Deep South so that they understand the true meaning of what inspired this holiday.
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Lesson Plan
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: Civil Rights Special Collection

For Students 9th - 10th
Multimedia collection of video, primary text documents and audio on Civil Rights, especially Brown vs. Board of Education.
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Article
Other

Civil Rights Movement Veterans: Rock Hill and Charlotte Sit Ins

For Students 9th - 10th
Timeline is provided from May, 1954 when the Supreme Court rules "separate but equal" is unconstitutional to 1982 when Friendship College closes it doors. Brief entries for each important date of the sit-in movement, including the Rock...
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Website
Other

Civil Rights Greensboro: Greensboro Sit Ins at Woolworth's

For Students 9th - 10th
A very detailed description of the sit-ins at the Greensboro, North Carolina, Woolworth's store and other businesses in that city during the first part of 1960. These sit-ins were to call attention to the segregation of public businesses...
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Primary
NBC

Nbc Learn: Finishing the Dream: 1960 1962: Freedom Fighters

For Students 9th - 10th
A collection of archival video clips covering protests against racial segregation in the United States in the period 1960-1962. Features clips on the Greensboro sit-in at Woolworth's lunch counters, Freedom Riders who fought bus...
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Graphic
Time

Life: Life and Civil Rights: Anatomy of a Protest, Virginia, 1960

For Students 9th - 10th
View a gallery of 27 photos, many of which were never published in LIFE magazine at the time, from a series of protests and sit-ins in Petersburg, Virginia, in May 1960. These photos also capture some of the unusual training methods that...
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Article
NBC

Nbc Learn: Free Resources: Finishing the Dream: Learning From Civil Rights Era

For Students 9th - 10th
Over one hundred video clips, culled from NBS News archives, document events and issues of the civil rights era, from 1954-68. Also includes contemporary perspectives on civil rights, with videos of town hall-style conversations about...
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Article
A&E Television

History.com: Greensboro Sit Ins

For Students 9th - 10th
The Greensboro Sit-In was a critical turning point in Black history and American history, bringing the fight for civil rights to the national stage. Its use of nonviolence inspired the Freedom Riders and others to take up the cause of...
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Website
Smithsonian Institution

National Museum of American History: Stories of Freedom and Justice

For Students 9th - 10th
To celebrate the 50th anniversary of the student sit-ins at the Greensboro, NC. lunch counter, the NAMH has produced this excellent collection of resources centered on the theme of freedom and justice. Experience this important part of...
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Graphic
Other

Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement: The Sit Ins

For Students 9th - 10th
Find photographs of many of the sit-ins at lunch counters in stores in the South to protest "whites only" laws. Each photo has information about the sit-ins and the results.
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Website
Stanford University

Mlk and the Global Freedom Struggle: Sit Ins

For Students 9th - 10th
Read about the organization behind the sit-ins at southern businesses, first in Greensboro, North Carolina, then spread throughout the south. Of interest is the prominence of student-led protest. Be sure to look at the related events and...
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Website
Other

Civil Rights Movement Veterans

For Students 9th - 10th
Remembrances of Civil Rights Movement workers who were active in the 1960s and '70s. Excellent site to gauge the impact of the movement on the workers themselves. Information about the Movement with eyewitness stories, poetry,...
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Website
Other

New York Public Library: Africana Age: The Civil Rights Movement

For Students 9th - 10th
This is an extensive review of the Civil Rights movement from the 1940s to the 1960s. Read about the ways African Americans protested discrimination in employment and education over several years. Be sure to click on the images to find...
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Primary
PBS

Pbs Learning Media: Segregation Ordinances: Birmingham, Al

For Students 9th - 10th
This document from 1951 spells out Birmingham's segregation ordinances, the laws requiring the separation of the races.
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Handout
ibiblio

Ibiblio: Greensboro Sit Ins

For Students 9th - 10th
This site, which is provided for by Ibiblio, contains a background of the beginning and subsequent spread of the sit-ins during the 1960s.
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Handout
Country Studies US

Country Studies: The Civil Rights Movement 1960 1980

For Students 9th - 10th
Brief, yet comprehensive, summary of the Civil Rights movement from 1960 until 1980. Includes civil rights policies of presidents Kennedy through Nixon.
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Website
Digital History

Digital History: Freedom Now

For Students 9th - 10th
When four African American North Carolina Agricultural and Technical College students refused to leave the lunch-counter at the F.W. Woolworth store in Greensboro they started the first non-violent, "sit-in" movement. Although the...
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Website
Digital History

Digital History: Discrimination in Public Accommodations [Pdf]

For Teachers 9th - 10th
Segregation and Jim Crow laws codified a color line in the United States. African-Americans began pushing back against segregation in the 1950s and 1960s. Read about the non-violent actions taken and how these actions resulted in the...
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Handout
Smithsonian Institution

National Museum of American History: Students "Sit" for Civil Rights

For Students 3rd - 8th
Read the book, "Freedom on the Menu" about the Greensboro Sit-Ins and use the background information and follow up activities provided to enhance the story.
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Website
Other

Ahc: Civil Rights Movement: The Surge Forward: 1954 1960

For Students 9th - 10th
Detailed discussion of the civil rights movement between 1954-1960 including summaries of events such as Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Rosa Parks & the Montgomery Bus Boycott, 1955-1956, school desegregation, Sarah Keys v....
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Graphic
Other

International Civil Rights Center & Museum: The Sit in Movement

For Students 9th - 10th
This interesting list shows how the sit-in movement spread in just three months across the South. Students from Historically Black Colleges and Universities encouraged the non-violent actions to protest segregation.
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Graphic
Other

International Civil Rights Center: Explore History: Civil Rights Movement

For Students 9th - 10th
In 1960, four students at North Carolina A&T University decided to protest segregation laws by staging a sit-in at the Woolworth store lunch counter. Their action sparked a nation-wide protest by students that spread from just...
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Unit Plan
University of North Carolina

Unc University Library: "I Raised My Hand to Volunteer"

For Students 9th - 10th
This online exhibit contains digitized documents, images, and other archival materials relating to 1960s student protests in Chapel Hill, N.C. The exhibit is divided into four parts, relating to four different periods of protest in 1960s...
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Website
Independence Hall Association

U.s. History: The Sit in Movement

For Students 4th - 8th
Just like the Montgomery Bus Boycott, the first sit-in at a Woolworth's lunch counter was the beginning of a nonviolent movement to challenge "white only" laws. Read about how the sit-in movement spread across the South. See how...