Welcome to our collection of toolkits designed to help teachers and parents discuss sensitive and complex topics at school and home. We created most of them for use alongside our award-winning reporting projects, documentaries and outreach events, as well as high-profile documentaries from PBS.
The toolkits below provide:
• Lesson plans, discussion questions and other teaching guidance
• Links to news articles, biographies, background essays on noteworthy people and events
• Video and audio clips of people speaking about their lives, work, beliefs and historical events in which they participated.
» How To Engage With The 2020 Elections
To help North Texans understand some key election processes and issues, KERA commissioned a Dallas history teacher to create lessons and activities to explain the electoral college, caucuses and primaries, political parties, and presidential campaigns and debates.
» War, Vietnam And American Life (pdf)
This toolkit provides materials to teach about wars through American history and their social and political effects from multiple sources, from recordings of veterans describing their experiences to historians’ interpretations of causes and effects to archaeology, poetry and newspaper clippings. It was created to accompany the 2017 documentary The Vietnam War.
» Lesson Plan On Budgeting And Personal Finance
Life is worlds apart on $20,000 per year and $90,000. This educational resource for teachers — a lesson plan and student worksheet — drives home that reality for students. It’s part of the 2018 KERA News reporting series One Crisis Away: The Price of Prison.
» What You Should Know About Debt, Loans And How To Manage It All
This collection of resources about the major types, how to calculate your credit score, definitions on the variety of loans, links to local resources for debt relief and more ran with the 2017 KERA News series One Crisis Away: Drowning In Debt.
» Resources To Prepare For College
This collection of resources, which was created in 2016 as part of KERA News’ years-long American Graduate reporting project, includes tools to help demystify the college application process. Topics include financial aid, preparation and testing and finding colleges.
» A Toolkit For Family Caregivers
This toolkit, which pairs with the 2019 The Caregivers series from KERA News’ On Our Minds mental health project, pulls together national and local resources from expert sources to help caregivers in a range of situations find support and help with common needs.
» Toolkit For Conversations On Protests, Race & African American History
This toolkit — videos, essays, background papers, discussion questions, lessons and more — provides historical and social context on protests and African American history in the wake of George Floyd’s killing by police. It also provides insight on talking to children about race, violence and traumatic events.
» Educational Resources For Race In America Film Series
This toolkit contains resources for teaching and discussion on three civil rights activists whose lives and work were the focus of PBS documentaries in the winter and spring of 2018: writers James Baldwin and Lorraine Hansberry (pictured) and labor organizer Dolores Huerta. It was created to accompany KERA’s Race in America Film Series community engagement project in 2018.
» Educational Resources On Racial Issues In Schools
This package includes a rich array of lesson plans, videos and discussion questions and links to articles, essays and news coverage of notable figures. It accompanied the 2017 KERA news series American Graduate: Race, Poverty and The Changing Face of Schools.
» Maya Angelou (pdf)
The online resources, video clips and selected lesson plans in this toolkit can help parents and teachers discuss the life and legacy of the African-American poet and activist, Maya Angelou. The poems, videos, biographical sketches and articles bring her vivid personality to life, letting viewers hear her voice and watch her face as she reads her poetry.
» Matisse & Picasso
This collection includes lesson plans, resource guide for teachers, information guide on selected paintings and links to extensive information on the artists and their work. It accompanied a 2000 KERA TV production on Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso.*
*Citations of Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) standards have not been updated.
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