Focusing on Diversity with Maps101

While many of the GNN articles you and your class can read weekly are meant for middle school and high school, Maps101 includes topics for younger learners as well, through GNN Junior. 

This week, take a look at Princess Tiana, from Disney’s The Princess and the Frog. Disney Studios has addressed inclusivity in the modern era by creating and releasing a full-length animation film featuring a princess who happens to be Black. The story is based on a fairytale by the Brothers Grimm. Grimms’ stories are classics of children’s literature. The princess in this story could be anyone. Disney did not pick a story set specifically in Africa. That is why this film stands out as a touchstone for inclusivity. 

Notice that the PDF version provides more room in the margin for younger readers to take more notes in larger handwriting. The word choices and sentence length are lower-leveled to meet Lexile scores for grades 3-5.

Although Black History Month is celebrated in February, content that is appropriate for that month is ideal for developing DEI sensitivity in the classroom anytime. Browse through our curated collection of articles, interactive Field Trips, maps, and more to strengthen DEI in your classroom.

Maps101 also features content that specifically celebrates the achievements of women throughout history up through today. Featured women may be from history, politics, the arts, authors, the sciences, and more. Browse this curated collection to strengthen the inclusivity of women throughout our culture.

Our exclusive Lesson Map “Landmark U.S. African American Civil Rights Cases” focuses on the road to African Americans achieving civil rights through the judiciary branch of government and, in particular, through the Supreme Court. This Lesson Map focuses on answering the following Essential Questions:

• In what ways were Thomas Jefferson's ideas on human freedom contradictory to his actions?
• What did the U.S. Supreme Court rule about the legal status of African Americans in the Dred Scott v. Sandford case?
• What is meant by the idea of separate but equal in regard to African Americans?
• What arguments did Thurgood Marshall make in Brown v. Board of Education?
• What civil rights issues has the U.S. Supreme Court addressed since its ruling in Brown v. Board of Education?

Using dynamic images and text, this Lesson Map provides all of the content needed for students to be able to answer these questions and more. To teach the lesson, we also provide a teacher wraparound edition with point-of-use suggestions for teaching the material and engaging student interest. Each teacher version also includes leveling for remediation, ELL, and extending the content for gifted and talented.

Focusing on DEI is impossible without understanding the experiences of individuals. Maps101 includes an entire collection devoted to biographies for learning more about the people who have shaped our world. While many of the people are figures you may expect to see, such as Abraham Lincoln, Alexander the Great, or Rosa Parks, here at Maps101, we delve into a diverse range of people with whom students should be familiar. For examples, with Maps101, students can read GNN articles about Greta Thunberg, Ida B. Wells, Kobe Bryant, Maya Angelou, Amanda Gorman, Mohammad Ali, Heidi Hawkins, Juan Manuel Santos, Usain Bolt, and Robert Johnson, among many others from a wide variety of fields and backgrounds. Engage students with biographies of people they may already admire, discover anew, and, most importantly, learn from. 

The Civil Rights Movement of the 1950s and 1960s helped ensure that African Americans and others, such as Native Americans, achieved the rights other Americans had. From a famous march, to a boycott, to numerous murders, these events shook America and helped open the door to legislation that would grant rights that had been denied. This map points out many of these key events on the road to equality under the law.