Fabulous Friday Freebies: Celebrating African American History

There are so many ways to celebrate African American History throughout the year, but since it often receives special attention during February, I'm preparing you to jump start the month's activities with some fabulous freebies across the content areas.


Math

1. Scholastic has a Math Hunt game that teaches students a bit about African American history and requires them to use math to answer the questions.  The skills tested are not super advanced (reading graphs, estimating, adding, etc), but it is worth checking out.  It covers a range of topics and is interdisciplinary.
2. Beatrice Lumpkin has created an excellent pdf complete with some of the history of math in Africa.  There are games and drawing activities you can have your students do to practice proportions and logic.   

Language Arts 

1. Check out 10 African American authors everyone should read. 
2. The Harlem Renaissance was a time when African American arts and literature thrived.  PBS has an online lesson plan to teach your students more about it.

History

1. Check out these biographies of 10 great African Americans who fought justice.  The lesson packet includes a couple activities.
2. One of the coolest resources I've found this year is an oral history archive devoted to famous African American leaders.  There is a wealth of primary sources here.  Your students can listen to   Maya Angelou and 100's of others tell their stories.

Science

1. Check out the online article Black Inventors A-Z.
2. Want to turn a lesson on African American inventors into a project?  Check it out.

General (other websites with useful collections)

1. http://www.africanamericanhistorymonth.gov/
2. http://www.educationworld.com/a_special/black_history.shtml
3. http://www.smithsonianeducation.org/educators/resource_library/african_american_resources.html