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Appendix I
Representative samples of lesson plans
NEH Long Road from Brown Sample Lesson Plan 1
Hunter Clark
Clover Hill High School, Midlothian, VA
Introduction
In the 1954 case Brown v. Board of Education the Supreme Court of the United States
unanimously ordered the desegregation of schools in America. This landmark case helped spark
a new era of grassroots civil rights activism but struggled to meet its more basic ruling. The
difficult work of the NAACP in winning the case did not make school desegregation a short-term
reality for the overwhelming majority of African-Americans in the South. Ninety-eight percent
of Southern schools with white students remained segregated a decade later. This illustrates that
the power of the Supreme Court was severely tested by efforts to resist racial desegregation in
schools for fifteen years following the Brown decision.
Virginia was a leading state in the attempt at “massive resistance” of school
desegregation. The notion of integrated schools was perceived by the white governing
establishment and many white citizens as a grave threat to generations of Jim Crow social
traditions and the political status quo. As a result, Virginia’s political leadership at the federal,
state, and local levels mobilized in various ways to block implementation of Brown. This lesson
focuses on having students analyze primary and secondary sources and evaluate the roles played
by these political actors in this massive resistance campaign.
Guiding Questions
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What political actor bears greatest responsibility for the minimal progress of
desegregation in VA between 1954 and 1964?
What is the proper role of federal courts in the implementation of Supreme Court rulings?
Learning Objectives
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Demonstrate knowledge of judicial implementation by identifying the importance of the
Brown v. Board of Education decision and factors that made that implementation of the
ruling slow and confrontational.
Analyze, interpret and evaluate primary and secondary source documents to increase
understanding of events and life in the United States.
Develop skills in discussion and debate with respect to enduring issues and determine
how divergent viewpoints have been addressed and reconciled.
College and Career Readiness Standards
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VA SOL GOVT.10 The student will demonstrate knowledge of the operation of the
federal judiciary by e) evaluating how the judiciary influences public policy by
delineating the power of government and safeguarding the rights of the individual.
VA SOL GOVT.11 The student will demonstrate knowledge of civil liberties and civil
rights d) exploring the balance between individual liberties and the public interest;
e) explaining every citizen’s right to be treated equally under the law.
CCSS.ELA-Literacy.CCRA.R.8: Delineate and evaluate the argument and specific claims
in a text, including the validity of the reasoning as well as the relevance and sufficiency
of the evidence.
NCSS C3, D2.His.16.9-12. Integrate evidence from multiple relevant historical sources
and interpretations into a reasoned argument about the past.
Background
The NAACP’s legal campaign to overturn Plessy v. Ferguson began in the 1930s utilized
a variety of tactics. These litigation efforts ranged from lawsuits for equalization of teacher
salaries, facilities, and curricula as well as challenges to discrimination in graduate and law
schools. The Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v. Board of Education should not be viewed as
the culmination of this strategy but rather a new chapter in an ongoing legal battle for
desegregation. The need for continued court action by the NAACP’s Legal Defense Fund in
Virginia was necessitated by fifteen years of limited progress during era of massive resistance
and the approach of token desegregation and freedom of choice plans.
In this lesson, students consider the extent to which a variety of political actors were
responsible for the slow pace of desegregation in Virginia between 1954 and 1968. These
political actors range from local citizen organizations, to Virginia’s governors, to the U.S.
Congress, to local newspapers and the Supreme Court itself. Local citizen organizations such as
the Defenders of State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties became active in Virginia with
public meetings, newsletters, and organization of white segregation academies (private schools).
Virginia governors such as Thomas B. Stanley and J. Lindsay Almond both rhetorically and
institutionally pressed for legal obstacles to desegregation. Southern congressional delegations
of this period, led by U.S. Senator Harry F. Byrd (D-VA), spurred on intransigence with the
passage of the “Southern Manifesto.” Newspapers in the Virginia were also influential by
making the case for state nullification (James J. Kilpatrick, Richmond News Leader) and the
closing of public schools and use of public funds toward private segregation academies (J.
Barrye Wall, Farmville Herald). President Eisenhower’s preference for gradual change and
reluctance to act on desegregation is another factor for students to consider. The Supreme Court
weakened its ruling in Brown with Brown II, which refused to set a deadline for desegregation
and left federal district courts with the ambiguous “with all deliberate speed” to guide them.
Students will question and analyze primary and secondary source documents (letters, petitions,
speeches, photographs, political cartoons, newspaper articles) to help them evaluate which
political actor most undermined the implementation of desegregation in Virginia’s schools.
Preparation and Resources
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Handout 1: Introductory Visuals
Handout 2: Primary Source Documents on Massive Resistance
Handout 3: Socratic Seminar Scoring Guide
Lesson Activities
Introduction – 10 minutes
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The goal of students looking at these documents is to have them review evidence of the
ineffectiveness of the Brown ruling in actual desegregation during its first decade (19541964).
Pass out the introduction documents (Herblock political cartoon from 1962 and a map of
desegregation rates in states where segregation was enforced by law in 1954).
Have students work in pairs to draw two conclusions about school desegregation based
on the documents.
Engage students in a whole-group discussion on their responses to the questions.
Documents Activity – 50 minutes
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Ask students: Why do you think there was such limited progress toward desegregation?
Provide students with digital or hardcopy access to the following documents:
o Editorial regarding the Stanley Plan and a transcript of Governor Almond’s 1959
State of the Commonwealth address
o An application for Defenders of State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties, a
secondary source account of the origins of the Defenders, a subscription
agreement for the Prince Edward Academy, and a promotional pamphlet for the
Charlottesville Education Foundation
o Newspaper editorials on interposition and massive resistance from the Richmond
News Leader and The Farmville Herald.
o A summary and excerpt of the Brown II decision.
o An overview and transcript of the Southern Manifesto.
Break students into small groups (3-5 students), provide students with a worksheet that
asks students to consider the following questions for each document:
o When was it created or produced?
o Who created it?
o What are the main arguments advanced by this source to maintain segregated
schools?
o How did this document contribute to massive resistance?
Closure/Debrief – 25 minutes
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To conclude the activity, review a timeline of massive resistance and discuss/get student
feedback regarding the role played by the political actors featured in the documents.
Seek out questions from students on each topic area to help clarify content as the
discussion unfolds.
Assessment
After reading a scholarly article describing the aspects of massive resistance for homework
(http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2013/septemberoctober/feature/massive-resistance-in-smalltown), students will be asked to prepare for a class seminar by creating two open-ended
questions to drive discussion and an evidence-based response to the essential questions (see
above). The “Socratic Seminar Scoring Guide” will be used as a rubric for evaluation purposes.
Extending the Lesson
Similarities and differences in the response to a recent Supreme Court decision (Obergefell v.
Hodges, the 2015 gay marriage decision) from local, state and federal officials and that given to
Brown can be examined to provide a recent context for judicial implementation controversies.
THE BASICS
Subject Areas
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History and Social Studies > State History
History and Social Studies > U.S. > Civil Rights Movement
History and Social Studies > Themes > Segregation and Desegregation
Skills
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Critical thinking
Evaluating arguments
Persuasive writing and speaking
Textual analysis
Using primary sources
Author
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Hunter Clark (Clover Hill High School, Chesterfield VA)
RESOURCES
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Herblock political cartoon from 1962
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/brown/brown-aftermath.html
Map of desegregation rates in states where segregation was enforced by law in 1954
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http://www.historytunes.com/images/cartoons/44-1.png
Editorial regarding the Stanley Plan
http://dc.lib.odu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/npsdp/id/968/rec/2
A transcript of Governor Almond’s 1959 State of the Commonwealth address
http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/brown/resistance.htm
Application for Defenders of State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties
http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/media_player?mets_filename=evr8033mets.xml
A secondary source account of the origins of the Defenders
http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Defenders_of_State_Sovereignty_and_Individual_L
iberties#start_entry
Subscription agreement for the Prince Edward Academy
http://historiansworkshop.richmond.edu/items/show/131
Promotional pamphlet for the Charlottesville Education Foundation
http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/brown/browndocs.htm
Newspaper editorials on interposition and massive resistance from the Richmond News
Leader and The Farmville Herald.
http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/brown/resistance.htm
http://historiansworkshop.richmond.edu/items/show/130
A summary and excerpt of the Brown II decision.
http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1954/1954_1/
An overview and transcript of the Southern Manifesto.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/rights/sources_document2.html
Homework Reading on Massive Resistance “Massive Resistance in a Small Town”
http://www.neh.gov/humanities/2013/septemberoctober/feature/massive-resistance-insmall-town
Opening Visuals
Document 1:
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http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/brown/brown-aftermath.html
Document 2:
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Political Actor(s) #1: Virginia Governor’s—Thomas Stanley and Lindsay Almond (2
documents)
8
http://dc.lib.odu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/npsdp/id/968/rec/2
9
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Political Actor #2: Local Citizens Organizations (ex: Defenders of State Sovereignty and
Individual Liberties)
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http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/media_player?mets_filename=evr8033mets.xml
The Defenders of State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties
The Defenders of State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties, a grassroots political organization
created in Petersburg in October 1954, was dedicated to preserving strict racial segregation in
Virginia's public schools. One month after the Brown decision, prominent Southside Virginia
leaders—such as state senators Charles Moses and Garland Gray, U.S. congressmen Watkins
Abbitt and William Tuck, and newspaper editor J. Barrye Wall of the Farmville Herald—began
to hold meetings at a Petersburg firehouse in order to discuss ways of fighting the threat of
public school integration. Wall wanted to create a white segregationist organization that would
advocate for whites the way the National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People (NAACP) had advocated for blacks. Eventually, representatives from eighteen Southside
counties joined the Petersburg firehouse group and began calling themselves the Defenders of
State Sovereignty and Individual Liberties. They selected Robert B. Crawford, of Farmville, as
their first president. By September 1955, the Defenders had twenty-eight chapters and 12,000
members throughout the state.
On August 30, 1954, Governor Thomas B. Stanley created the Gray Commission (named for
Garland Gray) to study the situation imposed by the Brown ruling and make necessary
recommendations on future policy. When the Gray Commission unveiled its recommendations
on November 11, 1955, it was clear that the Defenders had greatly influenced the commission.
On June 8, 1955, the Defenders had issued their 7,500-word Plan for Virginia. Of the seven
proposals outlined in the Defenders' Plan for Virginia, the commission recommended two. The
first was that the General Assembly be allowed to provide tuition vouchers for parents wishing to
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send their children to segregated private schools. The second was that the General Assembly
enact legislation that would maintain segregated schools throughout Virginia and allow the state
to withdraw funds from any integrated schools.
In the autumn of 1955, the Defenders successfully petitioned Governor Stanley to call the
General Assembly into special session on November 30. The Defenders wanted a statewide
referendum to determine whether Section 141 of the state constitution should be amended to
implement tuition vouchers to allow public funds to go to private schools. On January 9, 1956,
voters backed the Defenders-bred initiative by a vote of 304,154 to 146,164. Additionally, on
August 27, 1956, the General Assembly enacted even tougher Massive Resistance laws, many of
which had first been proposed by the Defenders. The most extreme of these ordered the governor
to close all schools under an order to integrate and to cut off all state funding to any school
forced to open as an integrated institution.
http://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Defenders_of_State_Sovereignty_and_Individual_Liberties
#start_entry
Political Actor #2 (continued): Local Citizens Organizations
http://historiansworkshop.richmond.edu/items/show/131
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http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/brown/browndocs.htm
Political Actor #3: The Media
(2 documents)
Interposition
Opponents of the Brown ruling and integration used the doctrine of
interposition, which argued that the state could "interpose" between an unconstitutional federal
mandate and local authorities based on State Sovereignty. The General Assembly adopted a
resolution of interposition in 1956 that clearly defied the authority of the federal courts. James
Jackson Kilpatrick, editor of the Richmond News Leader, vigorously criticized the court
decisions to end segregation and was one of the leading public advocates of interposition.
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James Jackson Kilpatrick (left) and Guy Friddell (right), Richmond News Leader. 1952.
Courtesy of the Richmond Newspapers Inc.
Interposition. Editorials and Editorial Page Presentations. The Richmond News Leader, 1955-
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1956. Richmond: Richmond News Leader, 1956.
http://www.lva.virginia.gov/exhibits/brown/resistance.htm
http://historiansworkshop.richmond.edu/items/show/130
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Political Actor #4: The Supreme Court of the United States
Brown II (1955)
Facts of the Case
After its decision in Brown I which declared racial discrimination in public education
unconstitutional, the Court convened to issue the directives which would help to implement its
newly announced Constitutional principle. Given the embedded nature of racial discrimination in
public schools and the diverse circumstances under which it had been practiced, the Court
requested further argument on the issue of relief.
Question
What means should be used to implement the principles announced in Brown I?
Conclusion
Decision: 9 votes for Brown, 0 vote(s) against
The Court held that the problems identified in Brown I required varied local solutions. Chief
Justice Warren conferred much responsibility on local school authorities and the courts which
originally heard school segregation cases. They were to implement the principles which the
Supreme Court embraced in its first Brown decision. Warren urged localities to act on the new
principles promptly and to move toward full compliance with them "with all deliberate speed."
http://www.oyez.org/cases/1950-1959/1954/1954_1/
Brown v. Board of Education, 349 U.S. 294 (1955) (USSC+)
Opinion and judgments announced May 31, 1955
APPEAL FROM THE UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT FOR THE DISTRICT OF
KANSAS.
Syllabus
“1. Racial discrimination in public education is unconstitutional, 347 U.S. 483 , 497, and all
provisions of federal, state or local law requiring or permitting such discrimination must yield to
this principle.
2. The judgments below (except that in the Delaware case) are reversed and the cases are
remanded to the District Courts to take such proceedings and enter such orders and decrees
consistent with this opinion as are necessary and proper to admit the parties to these cases to
public schools on a racially nondiscriminatory basis with all deliberate speed.
(a) School authorities have the primary responsibility for elucidating, assessing and solving the
varied local school problems which may require solution in fully implementing the governing
constitutional principles.
(b) Courts will have to consider whether the action of school authorities constitutes good faith
implementation of the governing constitutional principles.
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(c) Because of their proximity to local conditions and the possible need for further hearings, the
courts which originally heard these cases can best perform this judicial appraisal.
(d) In fashioning and effectuating the decrees, the courts will be guided by equitable principles -characterized by a practical flexibility in shaping remedies and a facility for adjusting and
reconciling public and private needs.
(e) At stake is the personal interest of the plaintiffs in admission to public schools as soon as
practicable on a nondiscriminatory basis. . . “
https://www.law.cornell.edu/supremecourt/text/349/294
Political Actor #5: The United States Congress
The Southern Manifesto
From Congressional Record, 84th Congress Second Session. Vol. 102, part 4. Washington, D.C.:
Governmental Printing Office, 1956. 4459-4460.
DOCUMENT DESCRIPTION
In 1956, 19 Senators and 77 members of the House of Representatives signed the "Southern
Manifesto," a resolution condemning the 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Board of
Education. The resolution called the decision "a clear abuse of judicial power" and encouraged
states to resist implementing its mandates. In response to Southern opposition, in 1958 the Court
revisited the Brown decision in Cooper v. Aaron, asserting that the states were bound by the
ruling and affirming that its interpretation of the Constitution was the "supreme law of the land."
TRANSCRIPT
The unwarranted decision of the Supreme Court in the public school cases is now bearing the
fruit always produced when men substitute naked power for established law.
The Founding Fathers gave us a Constitution of checks and balances because they realized the
inescapable lesson of history that no man or group of men can be safely entrusted with unlimited
power. They framed this Constitution with its provisions for change by amendment in order to
secure the fundamentals of government against the dangers of temporary popular passion or the
personal predilections of public officeholders.
We regard the decision of the Supreme Court in the school cases as clear abuse of judicial power.
It climaxes a trend in the Federal judiciary undertaking to legislate, in derogation of the authority
of Congress, and to encroach upon the reserved rights of the states and the people.
The original Constitutional does not mention education. Neither does the Fourteenth Amendment
nor any other amendment. The debates preceding the submission of the Fourteenth Amendment
clearly show that there was no intent that it should affect the systems of education maintained by
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the states.
The very Congress which proposed the amendment subsequently provided for segregated
schools in the District of Columbia. When the amendment was adopted in 1868, there were
thirty-seven states of the Union. Every one of the twenty-six states that had any substantial racial
differences among its people either approved the operation of segregated schools already in
existence or subsequently established such schools by action of the same law-making body
which considered the Fourteenth Amendment.
As admitted by the Supreme Court in the public school case (Brown v. Board of Education), the
doctrine of separate but equal schools "apparently originated in Roberts v. City of Boston (1849),
upholding school segregation against attack as being violative of a state constitutional guarantee
of equality." This constitutional doctrine began in the North-not in the South-and it was followed
not only in Massachusetts but in Connecticut, New York, Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota,
New Jersey, Ohio, Pennsylvania and other northern states until they, exercising their rights as
states through the constitutional processes of local self-government, changed their school
systems.
In the case of Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896 the Supreme Court expressly declared that under the
Fourteenth Amendment no person was denied any of his rights if the states provided separate but
equal public facilities. This decision has been followed in many other cases. It is notable that the
Supreme Court, speaking through Chief Justice Taft, a former President of the United States,
unanimously declared in 1927 in Lum v. Rice that the "separate but equal" principle is within the
discretion of the state in regulating its public schools and does not conflict with the Fourteenth
Amendment."
This interpretation, restated time and again, became a part of the life of the people of many of the
states and confirmed their habits, customs, traditions and way of life. It is founded on elemental
humanity and common sense, for parents should not be deprived by Government of the right to
direct the lives and education of their own children.
Though there has been no constitutional amendment or act of Congress changing this established
legal principle almost a century old, the Supreme Court of the United States, with no legal basis
for such action, undertook to exercise their naked judicial power and substituted their personal
political and social ideas for the established law of the land. This unwarranted exercise of power
by the court, contrary to the Constitution, is creating chaos and confusion in the states principally
affected. It is destroying the amicable relations between the white and Negro races that have
been created through ninety years of patient effort by the good people of both races. It has
planted hatred and suspicion where there has been heretofore friendship and understanding.
Without regard to the consent of the governed, outside agitators are threatening immediate and
revolutionary changes in our public school systems. If done, this is certain to destroy the system
of public education in some of the states. With the gravest concern for the explosive and
dangerous condition created by this decision and inflamed by outside meddlers.
We reaffirm our reliance on the Constitution as the fundamental law of the land.
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We decry the Supreme Court's encroachments on rights reserved to the states and to the people,
contrary to established law and to the Constitution.
We commend the motives of those states which have declared the intention to resist forced
integration by any lawful means.
We appeal to the states and people who are not directly affected by these decisions to consider
the constitutional principles involved against the time when they too, on issues vital to them,
may be the victims of judicial encroachment.
Even though we constitute a minority in the present congress, we have full faith that a majority
of the American people believe in the dual system of government which has enabled us to
achieve our greatness and will in time demand that the reserved rights of the states and of the
people be made secure against judicial usurpation.
We pledge ourselves to use all lawful means to bring about a reversal of this decision which is
contrary to the Constitution and to prevent the use of force in its implementation.
In this trying period, as we all seek to right this wrong, we appeal to our people not to be
provoked by the agitators and troublemakers invading our states and to scrupulously refrain from
disorder and lawless acts.
Signed by:
Members of the United States Senate:
Alabama-John Sparkman and Lister Hill.
Arkansas-J. W. Fulbright and John L. McClellan.
Florida-George A. Smathers and Spessard L. Holland.
Georgia-Walter F. George and Richard B. Russell.
Louisiana-Allen J. Ellender and Russell B. Lono.
Mississippi-John Stennis and James O. Eastland.
North Carolina-Sam J. Ervin Jr. and W. Kerr Scott.
South Carolina-Strom Thurmon and Olin D. Johnston.
Texas-Price Daniel.
Virginia-Harry F. Bird and A. Willis Robertson.
Members of the United States House of Representatives:
Alabama-Frank J. Boykin, George M. Grant, George M. Andrews, Kenneth R. Roberts, Albert
Rains, Armistead I. Selden Jr., Carl Elliott, Robert E. Jones and George Huddleston Jr.
Arkansas-E. C. Gathings, Wilbur D. Mills, James W. Trimble, Oren Harris, Brooks Hays, F. W.
Norrell.
Florida-Charles E. Bennett Robert L. Sikes, A. S. Her Jr., Paul G. Rogers, James A. Haley, D. R.
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Matthews.
Georgia-Prince H. Preston, John L. Pilcher, E. L. Forrester, John James Flint Jr., James C. Davis,
Carl Vinson, Henderson Lanham, Iris F. Blitch, Phil M. Landrum, Paul Brown.
Louisiana-F. Edward Hebert, Hale Boggs, Edwin E. Willis, Overton Brooks, Otto E. Passman,
James H. Morrison, T. Ashton Thompson,
Mississippi-Thomas G. Abernethy, Jamie L. Whitten, Frank E. Smith, John Bell Williams,
Arthur Winsted, William M. Colmer.
North Carolina-Herbert C. Bonner, L. H. Fountain, Graham A. Barden, Carl T. Durham, F. Ertel
Carlyle, Hugh Q. Alexander, Woodrow W. Jones, George A. Shuford.
South Carolina-L. Mendel Rivers, John J. Riley, W. J. Bryan Dorn, Robert T. Ashmore, James P.
Richards, John L. McMillan.
Tennessee-James B. Frazier Jr., Tom Murray, Jere Cooper, Clifford Davis.
Texas-Wright Patman, John Dowdy, Walter Rogers, O. C. Fisher.
Virginia-Edward J. Robeson Jr., Porter Hardy Jr., J. Vaughan Gary, Watkins M. Abbitt, William
M. Tuck, Richard H. Poff, Burr P. Harrison, Howard W. Smith, W. Pat Jennings, Joel T.
Brothill.
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/supremecourt/rights/sources_document2.html
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NEH Long Road from Brown Lesson Plan 2
Lauren Wells
Summit High School, Summit, NJ
NEH Landmarks Seminar – Long Road to Brown
Lesson – Student led strikes against school segregation
Unit: Civil Rights Era
Introduction:
The Civil Rights movement in United States history textbooks throughout the country is
often told through flash points between 1954 with the Brown v. Board of Education decision
ultimately culminating with the 1964 and 1965 passages of the Civil Rights and Voting Rights
acts respectively. Moments such as the freedom summer, violence in Birmingham, Alabama and
March on Washington are often staple discussions and lessons in Civil Rights units. However,
this is a limiting representation of the Civil Rights Movement. While these are significant
moments that should not be overlooked, students are presented a limited view of the scope and
legacy of the civil rights movement. Histories such as struggles with school desegregation
beyond the 1954 timeline are often missing from curriculums.
This lesson seeks to highlight a significant region and moment in the Civil Rights
Movement, Virginia’s plight with school desegregation and the history of Barbara Johns and
Moton High School’s role in the desegregation of Virginia Public Schools. In response to the
deplorable conditions of the segregated school facilities that Black students in Prince Edward
County in Virginia (a trend that can also be seen nationally), Barbara Johns, a Junior at Moton
High School led a strike against these conditions in 1951. This sparked a countywide effort to
equalize the schools, leading to the eventual support of the NAACP. Gaining the attention of
Virginia-based NAACP lawyers, Oliver Hill and Spotswood Robinson, Barbara Johns and the
student’s protest over school conditions became the Davis v. Prince Edward County, a case that
would eventually be bundled into one of the five cases in Brown v. Board of Education. This
lesson uses local history to tell a national story, focusing on how the contributions of one can and
does impact the lives of others in an attempt to broaden the scope and spectrum of the Civil
Rights Era in American history.
Guiding (Compelling) questions
 Why did students and their parents want to fight for equal opportunities in education?
 How far is one willing to go to achieve their goals?
Learning Objectives:
 Using both photographic and oral history primary source evidence, students will be able to
discuss and analyze why students and parents protested and fought for integration during the
Civil Rights Era.
 Students will be able to debate and discuss the legacy and impact of school integration
movements reflecting on the importance of desegregation movements throughout the
country.
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Common Core State Standards:
 CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.1: Cite specific textual evidence to support analysis
of primary and secondary sources, connecting insights gained from specific details to an
understanding of the text as a whole
 CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.2: Determine the central ideas or information of a
primary or secondary source; provide an accurate summary that makes clear the
relationships among the key details and ideas.
 CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.6: Evaluate authors' differing points of view on the
same historical event or issue by assessing the authors' claims, reasoning, and evidence.
New Jersey State Standards:
 6.1.12.D.14.b: Assess the effectiveness of actions taken to address the causes of
continuing urban tensions and violence.
 6.1.12.D.14.d: Evaluate the extent to which women, minorities, individuals with gender
preferences, and individuals with disabilities have met their goals of equality in the
workplace, politics, and society.
 6.1.12.B.14.b: Analyze how regionalization, urbanization, and suburbanization have led
to social and economic reform movements in New Jersey and the United States.
Background:
On May 17th, 1954 The Supreme Court of the United States declared: “We conclude hat
in the field of Public Education, the Doctrine of Separate but Equal has no place.” In many
classrooms and curriculums throughput the country, this is the starting point for what history and
those who study it call the Civil Rights Era. In reality and practice, however, this is only the
beginning of the story. This lesson looks at how Brown happened and looks to study the legacy
and impact of student led desegregation movements around the nation that officially made the
1954 decision occur.
While the Brown v. Topeka Kansas Case was an integral moment in the fight for the
desegregation of schools nationally, it certainly was not the only one. A prominent case in
Virginia, Davis v. School Board of Prince Edward County helped to desegregate schools
throughout the state. Barbara Johns, a Junior at the R.R. Moton high school in Farmville,
Virginia felt that her dilapidated conditions of her segregated school lacked the educational,
extracurricular, and physical amenities and facilities at the white schools in the county.
Gathering the supports of her peers and classmates, Barbara Johns led the student body on strike
and protested for equal treatment and facilities in Prince Edward County. Her and her fellow
classmates spoke loud enough for the local chapter of the NAACP to hear and together, along
with Oliver Hill and Spotswood Robinson, NAACP lawyers they fought for desegregation of
schools in the county and won. While this is only the beginning of Virginia’s long and
tumultuous history with school desegregation, the Davis v. School Board of Prince Edward
County is an important moment for students to not only learn, but connect with.
Every time I write a lesson, I like to discuss what students can gain by studying this
content and what skills they are taking away from participating in this lesson. I have centered
this lesson on two compelling questions: Why did students and their parents want to fight for
equal opportunities in education and, How far is one willing to go to achieve their goals? With
these two questions, I hope my students gain two important skills and mores to help them
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navigate through the history curriculum and life beyond my doors. First skill is historical
perspective. I believe it is important for student to gain a sense of the individuals impacted
during that time area, not just in a linear one dimensional sense, but really grasp and understand
who was involved and how they were shaped and impacted by the events and ideologies around
them. This skill can be found in the opener and assessment activities. The second skill that my
lesson focuses on is developing interpersonal relationships and social skills. I firmly believe that
as a social science educator that one of the main goals in the classroom is for students to learn
how to interact with diversity, difference, and variety. Talking with others and getting to know
one for their history and perspective is the core of any well done historical analysis and research,
and should be the core of any history classroom. Developing these communication and
interpersonal skills can be seen in the oral history and monument activities.
Preparation and resources:
Worksheet 1: do now activity
Worksheet 2: Oral history analysis graphic organizer
Worksheet 3: Exit ticket (monument analysis)
Sources used throughout the lesson
 Photographs of RR Moton School
o http://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/121brown/121visual2.htm
o http://www.pbs.org/beyondbrown/history/photogallery1_08.html
o http://www.nps.gov/nr/twhp/wwwlps/lessons/121brown/121visual1.htm
 Photographs of the Barbara John’s monument in Richmond, Virginia
 Oliver Hill interview: http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/ref/collection/voices/id/5
 Raymond H. Boone interview:
http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/0/rec/1
 John A. Stokes interview:
http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/10/rec/10
 Elizabeth Cooper and Jane Cooper Johnson Interview:
http://dig.library.vcu.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/voices/id/1/rec/2
Lesson Activities: This is a one-day lesson in the middle of a unit on the Civil Rights Era. This
lesson has been created for a 60-minute block, with extension activities at the end of the lesson
plan. This lesson would be located in the approximate middle of a unit on the civil rights era.
Such topics such as non-violent protests, origins of the civil rights movements, Martin Luther
King and the March on Washington, and Brown v. Board. This lesson would then be followed
with a discussion on the little rock 9, Malcolm X and the rise of Black Nationalism, and the postCivil Rights era case study of the Race Riots in Newark, New Jersey.
Introduction 5-10 minutes:
 Students will be presented with four different pictures of segregated schools in Prince
Edward County Virginia. Using the primary source photographs, students will write and then
verbally discuss differences between the African American schools and their own. In the
space provided below the pictures, students will answer the following questions:
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o In the photos provided, compare these images to to your own school. What would be
the challenges of someone going to school in those conditions?
o How would you personally be impacted by the conditions of this learning
environment? Write your analysis in the space provided below
 Have students discuss their findings in a whole group discussion.
Oral History Primary source analysis: 35-40 minutes
 Students will be broken up into groups, no more than 5 students large. (Note: split the groups
according to class size and ability levels. I usually split the groups up according to learning
styles/needs and behavioral issues but the format is up to teacher discussion) Have these
groups set up before time to save time.
 In their groups, students will be given an oral history to listen to. Students may go out into
the hallway in order to listen to the interview. Together, students will assign one student to be
the scribe and will then complete the oral history graphic organizer as a group. Interviews
range in (25-35 minutes.) Students will answer the following questions:
o What is the tone/mood of the recording?
o What time period/event/historical era is your interviewee discussing?
o What is the major focus of this discussion?
o Whose oral history are you taking/listening to?
o What is the date of this recording/interview?
o What was occurring in the United States at the time of this interview?
o List (at least) five new facts about this time period that you have gained from
listening to this interview:
o Why do you think the original broadcast was made and for what audience?
o What evidence in the recording helps you to know why it was made?
o Write at least two questions that you would have asked your interviewee if you had
the opportunity to discuss this history with them in person.
o What information do you gain about this event that would not be conveyed in a
textbook or other written source?
 In a whole group setting, students will then discuss the facts they learned from their
interviewee and discuss the questions they would have liked to ask this interviewee had they
had the opportunity to talk in person. (10 minutes)
Debriefing activity: (5-10 minutes) Monument Analysis ~ 5-10 minutes
 Using pictures from the Barbara Johns monument in Richmond, Virginia, students will
analyze the monument using the following questions. This exit ticket can be located on
Worksheet 3.
o What does this monument say about school desegregation movements?
o What can visitors to this monument learn about the issues with school desegregation
in Virginia?
o Why do you think school desegregation movements nation wide are commemorated
using monuments?
Assessment:
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 For their final assessment on the school desegregation movement, students will complete a
journaling reflection. This can be handed in typed or hand written format (Note: I use an online drop box for handing in assessments). This journaling reflection should be at least 1.5
pages long and follow conventional formats. Using the facts information obtained in class,
students will answer the following questions:
o With this information, how are you going to use what happened in Farmville,
Virginia and throughout the Civil Rights Era in your own life?
o Do you have any personal experiences with discrimination or prejudice in your own
life? How have you dealt with it?
Extending the Lesson:
 Historical Perspective writing: After examining the textual and photographic primary
sources, have students write in the perspective of a student who was enduring the segregated
conditions to their local school board advocating for integration of schools. Students should
use at least five facts from class to write their persuasive letter to the School Board,
advocating for integration in schools.
 Having students create a monument to commemorate the student-led protests. Students will
“build” a memorial based on the research they have done on the protest movements of school
integration during the Civil Rights Movement. This can be a 3D model or hand drawn.
Computer models are acceptable as well if you first run it by the teacher. Students will then
write a one-paragraph description about why students chose to build the memorial you did
and how the monument commemorates the history of school desegregation movements.
Students should use 5-8 facts learned in class as well as reference primary sources discussed
and analyzed in class. The paragraph about the memorial should be typed. Format: 12-point
font, Times New Roman (or comparable font) one inch margins, 1-2 pages in length.
 Current Events Connection: since the fifty/sixty year anniversary of the Brown decision,
there have been many articles arguing that school districts across the country have been
battling against the legacies and impacts of the integration movement, many experiencing defacto segregation. In a Socratic Seminar/persuasive essay, have students debate and trace the
legacies of school desegregation, ultimately debating the difference between desegregation
and integration and whether or not these school integration movements achieved their goal.
The article below is a New Jersey example of such an article:
o http://www.northjersey.com/news/education/rutgers-study-compares-racial-divide-inn-j-schools-to-apartheid-1.637261
o http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/04/six_decades_after_brown_vs_board_of
_education_njs_schools_are_still_segregated_opinion.html
Worksheet 1: Lesson Starter:
Examine the four photographs. Discuss differences between the African American schools in the
photos below to your own school.
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What would be the challenges of someone going to school in those conditions?
How would you personally be impacted by the conditions of this learning environment?
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How do these classroom/school conditions compare to your own school?
Worksheet 2: Oral History analysis
*adapted from the National History Archives graphic organizer.
Part II: Listening
1. What is the tone/mood of the recording?
2. What time period/event/historical era is your interviewee discussing?
3. What is the major focus of this discussion?
Part I: contextualizing the source:
1. Whose oral history are you taking/listening to?
2. What is the date of this recording/interview?
3. What was occurring in the United States at the time of this interview?
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Part III: Interview Analysis:
1. List (at least) five new facts about this time period that you have gained from listening to this interview:
a.
b.
c.
d.
e.
2. Why do you think the original broadcast was made and for what audience?
3. What evidence in the recording helps you to know why it was made?
4. Write at least two questions that you would have asked your interviewee if you had the opportunity to
discuss this history with them in person.
5. What information do you gain about this event that would not be conveyed in a textbook or other written
source?
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Worksheet 3: Exit ticket
Using pictures from the Barbara Johns monument in Richmond, Virginia, students will analyze
the monument using the following questions. This exit ticket can be located on Worksheet 3.
What does this monument say about school desegregation movements?
What can visitors to this monument learn about the issues with school desegregation in Virginia?
Why do you think school desegregation movements nation wide are commemorated using
monuments?
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