High School Social Studies textbooks are exceptional at removing the humanity from every topic covered. Despite attempts by the Common Core and the Massachusetts Curriculum Frameworks to increase the visibility of women and people of color, textbooks are still very much a "white man's political history". This is glaringly apparent in the units leading up to the Civil War. Women as a gender are relegated to a small box about Harriet Tubman, and slavery is only briefly mentioned as a cause of tensions between North and South.



In his book Lies My Teacher Told Me, James Loewen asserts that students of at-risk demographics perform significantly better in their history classes when exposed to material they can identify with. As teachers, we see this every day and can tell when students are engaged and when they are not. How many times have we been asked, "Why does this matter?" or "When am I ever going to use this?" By making history relevant and accessible, students learn better. But more important than that, students want to learn. When students want to learn, they are motivated to perform well.

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When I design my lessons, I always ask myself, "What is the purpose of education? Why am I teaching?" I educate to foster learning. For me, education is not solely job preparation. I want my students to love learning, to want to learn just for knowledge's sake. It is my hope that these lessons inject humanity into the lessons and that my fellow educators benefit from them.