School Materials:
Curriculum Materials, Scholarships, Contests

Curriculum Materials

Our goal is to have materials together so that a teacher could have lesson plans, audio and visual materials to aid in the introducing of Robeson to students.

We want to bring teaching about Paul Robeson into the classroom. There are many avenues into a classroom. In some cities the Board of Education will aid with the weaving of Robeson into the curriculum. Sometimes this can be accomplished through the teachers union or a progressive caucus within the union. Or maybe you have contact with a progressive teacher. Sometimes ideas are brought into a school from a student or parent or community pressure.

By and large, the educational system in the U.S. has been unable to incorporate Robeson into the system for 1998. It's unfortunate. However there are people and school groups around the country who have been working on curriculum for the schools -- and it's never too late. Let's aim for 1999 to have Paul Robeson lesson plans in school all over the country!

MODEL PROPOSAL TO A BOARD OF EDUCATION

PAUL ROBESON LESSON PLANS

In 1998 the Paul Robeson 100th Birthday Committee put out a call for lesson plans to span any and all grades, about the life and teachings of Paul Robeson. We are very pleased to offer the following plans that cover first grade thru high school. With all of the excitement generated by the Centennial it is time to urge boards of education to take up the teaching of Paul Robeson so that by January, 1999 there is curriculum available to all young people. The Paul Robeson Committee urges you to continue to send us drafts of lesson plans from your community. We will continue to add curriculum of good quality to this site and we hope to assess the plans that we collect so that we can all learn from different approaches to teaching. Please continue to refer interested parties to our web site for reference materials.

We have listed the lesson plans in full by the people who wrote them rather than by grade or some other manner. Feel free to use what you need in full, as a guideline, or adapt it to your needs. We welcome comments on the curriculum we have provided here -- please send it to the Robeson Committee via mail or e-mail.

We are very pleased to offer the following plans and proposals:

Paul Robeson: Educators Guide and Student Learning Activities, by Douglas Calvin
An Introduction to Paul Robeson Unit, by Howard Emmer
Paul Robeson for 7th & 8th grade, by Carol Friedman
Paul Robeson: A Curriculum Guide For Educators, by Paula Rogovin
Paul Robeson: An American Life, by Paul Von Blum
Paul Robeson 1898-1976, from Detroit Public Schools

TEACHER PACKETS

HISTORY FAIRS

In over 300 cities across the U.S. there are history fairs. Students select research topics relating to their city. Winners go on to state wide competitions. Paul Robeson performed live in over 160 cities and many of those cities he was involved in numerous events besides performances. We believe this would be a great opportunity to bring the name Paul Robeson to hundreds of thousands of grade and high school students. In late September the Chicago Metro History Fair sends out fair topics to all grade and high schools in the Chicago area.
We will list the web site of National History Day - which is the body to which local history fairs affiliate. Find your state or city fair coordinator and see how you can weave Robeson as a topic for research. Believe us when we say that grade and high school kids will come up with original research! We have the listing of state and city coordinators at our office - send us a message.

Scholarships

Contests

As ideas come in, we will suggest a variety of contests and "non-competitive" events.
We will include templates for contest rules, discussion on prizes etc.

How Many Do You Know?
Name the African-American person who accomplished each of these achievements PRIOR TO the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s.