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Living in History: Teaching In Tragedy

© Teresa Higginbotham

I've always enjoyed teaching history. I have to say I don't enjoy living in history quite so much. As this incredible sadness, anger and resolve to keep freedom a part of America sweeps our nation our children share an important part of it. So what happens is we have, as homeschool educators, an opportunity to guide our children through this experience with lessons in geography and current events, tolerance, resourcefulness, patriotism and the beauty of helping one another through a crisis.

Geography, History and Current Events

There is so much to teach about this area of the world. I have included links for map making and learning about Afghanistan. This will help if you let your kids watch our movements in Afghanistan. There is not too much out there in an educational mode in Bin Laden but there is plenty right there on CNN.

Here is a page of links on Afghanistan and the Talaban http://www.politicalresources.net/afghan...

Here are more resources from Cable in the Classroom. This passage was taken from their email newsletter:
"RESOURCES FOR TEACHING ABOUT TERRORISM
In the wake of the tragic events of September 11th, Cable in the Classroom members have created numerous video and online resources to help teachers and students cope with and understand the situation. From the home page at http://www.ciconline.org, you can click to a roundup of program information and links to discussion guides, geographic and historical facts, maps, time lines, advice on helping kids deal with the disaster, and information about how to help."

Washington DC Map Printout and Questions--I love this but there is no Pentagon on the map. You'll have to put it on. http://www.enchantedlearning.com/usa/sta...

Tolerance

I recently saw a child in an Islamic school here in the U.S. and she was puzzled why everyone now hated her. What a rough thing for anyone to have to go through, especially a child. Teach tolerance!

An Approach to Teaching Religious Tolerance http://askeric.org/cgi-bin/printlessons....

Learning About Islam http://www.infoplease.com/ce6/society/A0...

Resoucefulness

Of course here I'm talking about YOUR resources. If you've been wanting to donate but are not sure what to give your money too here are the many choices out there with I'm sure...more to come. Here is Helping Resources with a giant list of all of the funds you can donate to. http://www.helping.org/

The Red Cross-This site gives you many ways to share resources but also an excellent resource for information on the countries state of crisis. http://www.redcross.org

Helping One Another

There are two sets of people I'm covering in this section. One is your children as they witness so much of this horrible act on television (we practice the "just the facts, maam" policy at our house. No need to see the twin towers of the World Trade Center go down over and over and over) here are just some of the many articles coming out on teaching, talking to and helping your children to cope.

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