History in Our Everyday Lives

Activities

The unit will begin with a close reading of Brown v the Board of Education including a summary of the cases against the Board of Regents in Oklahoma. There are many close reading strategies, but the one I find most useful in this situation is the “Reading for Meaning” from the Silver Strong and Associates group.²⁶ Students have already been introduced to Plessey v Ferguson, so after close reading of Brown, students will be create a visual map of some kind to trace the changes from 1896 to 1954, including Sipuel and McLaurin. We will probably use an online technology such as Mindmo or Prezi to do this part. Later, we will add the changes seen from the Civil Rights Acts and the Alexander and Swann cases. This can also be done in the “low tech” way by having the students create a group or whole class annotated timeline.

The next part of the unit is going to have an analysis of the differences between the integration of Little Rock Central High School and Tulsa’s Old Central. We will start with the video of Eyes on the Prize: the Little Rock Nine. After watching the video, students will produce some kind of writing (perhaps a quick write, journal entry or the like) to imagine themselves as students in Little Rock. We will also discuss what our Central was probably like. They will then read the newspaper accounts (interviews) with our Central’s five first black students. Perhaps at this point, depending on time, we will create a Venn diagram comparing and contrasting the two Centrals. This could also be done with a “Triple Entry Journal” or “What I thought, Now I think” activity. We will also spend a day using the yearbooks as primary source artifacts to see if we can see trends and ideas. Hopefully, the students will find trends such as the very low participation of black students in some clubs and activities. They may give me some ideas about why they think that happened and does that perceived inequality still exist today? We will be documenting trends using groups, table talk and/or large papers on the wall. I will be using “Chalk Talk” which is explained on various internet sites. I suggest Googling it.

Through this whole time the students will be working on a project/art piece that will form the illustrated Civil Rights Movement. In the hallway in front of my classroom is a very long wall, (about 90 feet). I have in the past put the dates of the Civil Rights movement starting in about 1950 – 1968. They have filled it in with posters, art, and signs to illustrate the movement. Since my school is a fine and performing arts magnet school, some of the work produced is excellent. The students will be encouraged to select events from our discovered history to post alongside national events. Once it is all displayed, students will do a gallery walk using post-its to add their thoughts to those of the artist.

At this point, the US History classes (both on-level and APUSH) will have to move to other topics in order to meet time restraints. However, the African American History class will be able to deepen their study with an oral history project. Students will interview grandparents or other relatives alive during this time (1958 – 1976), which will possibly be filmed and sound edited in a joint project with the film and studio recording students. There is also a local radio host, John Erling, who does interviews with people for an online archive called Voices of Oklahoma, which ironically includes a lot of Central graduates. Perhaps we will ask him to tape our students doing the interviews so they are formatted to be part of the archive. Some special emphasis will be given to the students who are mentioned in this story: Juan Dola Washington, Louis Moore, and Night Train Lane. After 1969, the Black Power and Black Panther movements grew considerably in the Tulsa area. Last year, I heard a grandparent tell her granddaughter, while looking at our illustrated timeline, that she herself had been a member of the Black Panthers. Perhaps some of our students will find that their grandparents were also participants in these or other civil rights activities. 

Another project that can be done by the African American history class to really deepen their understanding and perhaps see a different point of view could come from Toni Morrison’s short story Recitatlif. This story follows two girls from childhood to adulthood during the time of the civil rights movement and social unrest of the 60s and 70s. One is black and one is white. They choose different paths, taking them to separate worlds in economic, social and political stands, all the while showing how they interact. What makes this an excellent story is that Morrison never says which one is white and which one is black. I think this will provide a safe yet intriguing way for students to find themselves in the dialogue, without having to identify just because of race. I also think it can add some perspective to the textbook stories of what it was like to be in the civil rights movement. With my African American history students, I will probably use this story to introduce this era.

The last way of closing the circle of public history will be a walking tour. Since Old Central was closed as a public school, it has been fully renovated to be the corporate headquarters of PSO. In addition to their ties to Central through the physical building, they are also Central’s “partner in education.” This means that they sponsor scholarships for students and small grants for classroom projects. We could take a tour of Old Central. Even if we cannot make the short trip to Old Central, we can make a short tour of our Central and have discussions about the Walk of Fame, the Hall of Fame and lastly, the Appeal to Great Spirit statue. Oddly enough, when I went to Central to take the pictures found in Appendix A, I found out that most of the valuable art works that hung in the halls of Old Central are now housed at the Gilcrease Museum for their protection. Perhaps, we can get encourage the school and museum to do a showing of that work for us and the community?