Timely resources to help K-12 educators encourage social responsibility and foster social & emotional learning. Find out more.
TeachableMoment Lessons
Featured Lessons
In honor of Teacher Appreciation week, Morningside Center offers this Circle-based lesson as an invitation for students and Circle keepers to reflect on the impactful teachers and “teachers” in their lives; what lessons were learned; and ways they’ve passed this learning forward.
Spring is a natural time for transformation, for embracing new beginnings while shedding those attitudes or mindsets that no longer serve us. It’s also an ideal time to consider the changes in our lives and their impact. In this lesson students reflect on change, grief, and loss through a scrawl wall, a circle, and building a collective playlist.
In this lesson students examine New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani’s inauguration speech to learn what a speech can reveal about a leader’s values, priorities and vision for democracy—and how a speech can shape how people see themselves and others in a community.
SEL & RP
Activities to support students' social and emotional learning and restorative practices
Current Issues
Classroom activities to engage students in learning about and discussing issues in the news
Tips & Ideas
Guidance and inspiration to help build skills and community in your classroom and school
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Readings and activities on wartime threats to civil liberties, the history of such threats, and the Constitutional basis for civil liberties.
In a talk at the recent Educators to Stop the War Conference, ESR Metro executive director Tom Roderick reflects on the creativity of teachers during these trying times.
Readings and activities to help high school students better understand the growing gap between rich and poor and consider the issue in light of this year's presidential election.
Three student readings examine the growing instability of Afghanistan.
A classic guide for how to explore sensitive issues in your classroom.
Uses a student role play to help young people consider the choices of assertiveness, aggressiveness, and passivity.
These two classroom practices give your students time and space to reflect on and discuss their thoughts and feelings.
Students consider stereotypes, beginning with stereotypes of "teenagers."
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In this lesson, students learn about the controversy over new federal guidelines aimed at ensuring that "transgender students enjoy a supportive and nondiscriminatory school
A major strike by workers at Verizon offers a teachable moment: Why do people join unions? Why do they strike? And why are they now striking Verizon?
Consider giving students a few moments of silence and calm by asking them to focus on an object. If students respond positively to the experience, repeat it.
The demand for reparations surfaced during the 2016 presidential election, creating a teachable moment on this long-debated issue. In this activity, students learn some background
Presidential candidate Ted Cruz's plans to speak at a Bronx high school were scrapped after students there wrote a letter to their principal describing how Cruz's views were
We use plastics all the time. So often, in fact, that they’re practically invisible to us. In this lesson, students keep a log of their plastic use, take action to decrease it, and