The recent row over Bill Maher and Ben Affleck's heated discussion of Islam on HBO's Real Time with Bill Maher strikes me as an opportunity for a civic lesson–one rooted not in debating who is right or wrong, or who is bigoted or not, but one, that, in true Facing History and Ourselves fashion, is rooted in history. At Facing History, we have learned that history often provides a needed distance from which we can illuminate the present and inform more productive civic dialogue.
Topics: Antisemitism, Choosing to Participate, Human Behavior, Human Rights, Facing History Resources, Religious Tolerance, News, Readings, Identity, Facing History and Ourselves, Teaching Resources, History
Thursday marks the 51st anniversary of the March on Washington, at which Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech.
Topics: Civil Rights Movement, Teaching Strategies, Democracy, Human Rights, Readings, Identity, Teaching Resources, Video, History
The long-awaited film adaptation of Lois Lowry’s young adult dystopian novel The Giver arrives in theaters on Friday.
Topics: English Language Arts, Human Behavior, Teaching, Readings, Identity, Teaching Resources
Nearly 54 years to the day after it was first published, the Pulitzer Prize-winning To Kill a Mockingbird comes out as an ebook for the first time on July 8.
Topics: To Kill a Mockingbird, English Language Arts, Democracy, Choosing to Participate, Human Behavior, Human Rights, Readings, Identity, History
Here are a few of the words that the Oxford English Dictionary (OED) added in 2013: twerk, selfie, and srsly (short-hand for seriously).
This year, two former Facing History and Ourselves students are working to get the OED to consider including a word with a bit more significance: upstander.
Topics: Student Voices, Choosing to Participate, Readings, Identity, Facing History Together, Upstanders, Teaching Resources, Video, History
Dear Facing Today readers,
We are excited to announce the launch of the new facinghistory.org! We hope you will visit us and enjoy our new look and feel, mobile-friendly design, intuitive navigation, and enhanced search capabilities.
Topics: Online Tools, Teaching Strategies, Readings, Common Core, Teaching Resources, Video