• This website offers engaging activities and easily downloadable materials, created and reviewed by educators, that you can use immediately in your classroom.

• The lessons are intended to raise awareness about Defenders of Human Rights and Democracy in our past and to make connections with the advocacy of defenders in our communities today.  The Gallery of Defenders offers additional examples of historical defenders with links to information about them.

 

• Designed using project-based Learning strategies, the lessons offer students many choices about what questions to explore, how to express their ideas, and how to share their work.

 

• The lessons and related materials on this website also lend themselves to supporting student capstone projects in many areas, including civics, social studies, and the arts.

 

• Each lesson includes five steps which can be adapted, extended or omitted to fit the needs of your students.

Step 1: 
​Use the Hook to engage student interest

Step 2:
​Use the Profile of the Defender to build
background knowledge

Step 3: 
​Use Discussion Questions to guide learning
and to make connections with your community

Step 4: 
​What Can Students Do? 

Link Defenders of the past to activists of the present who are advancing racial justice in your communities

Step 5: 
​Use additional resources to adapt or extend
​lessons