Resources for Teachers
The Outreach Program at the African Studies Center offers many ways to help teachers teach about Africa. Years of experience with developing curricula and lesson plans has led to the a large collection of teaching tips that focus on important aspects of the continent’s history, geography, culture, specific countries, literature, and art. The teaching tips are a great place to start the process of planning. Also, be sure to visit our Teaching Africa Library for hard-to-find Africana, award winning films, maps, curriculums and sample lesson plans, and materials useful for bringing Africa into the classroom such as our Kenya and Ghana kits.
Chimamanda Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single Story”
Teaching About Kony 2012
Teaching About Africa
- Bibliography on Africa
- How to Make Your Own Traveling Kit
- Checklist for Evaluating Materials on Africa
- Using Photos to teach about Africa
- Teaching About Africa in Elementary Schools (but really, just a lot of good advice on teaching about others generally)
- Teaching About Wildlife
- Useful Websites
- Lesson Plan: What do we know about Africa?
- Selecting Books on Africa
- Online Tutorial - Africa: True or False?
- Beyond War and Hunger
- Beyond Wildlife
- What do we know about Africa? (DVD created by the Outreach Program for sale/rent)
- Guiding Principles for Best Practice
- A Short List of Recommended Books for all Ages
- Africa: Myth and Reality
- Overcoming Stereotypes: Pictures of Muslims Wearing Things (tumblr site)
- Islam & Africa
- Islam Curriculum Development
Teaching African History
- Slave Trade: Africa (Recommended Children Books)
- Why this Epic? (word doc in media library too)
- Epic of Mali
- Ancient Manuscripts from the Desert (Library of Congress site)
- West African Kingdoms
- Image Comparisons
- Historical Fiction Bibliography
- Kingdom of Ghana
- Kingdom of Mali
- Kingdom of Songhay
- Mali and Djenne Figures (National Museum of African Art)
- The Story of Africa: West African Kingdoms (BBC World Service-Africa)
- Trekking to Timbuktu (Edsitement-NEH site)
- The Road to Timbuktu (PBS)
- Africa in the Cold War
- Gold Teaching Resources
- Colonialism Key Concepts
Teaching African Geography
- Thinking About…Teaching about Africa is a list of key pedagogical concepts and questions that a teacher must ask oneself in preparation for teaching most topics, but especially history and geography.
- Traveling Kits (for Kenya and Ghana)
- How Big is Africa? Poster
- How Big is Africa? Lesson Plans
- Teaching African Geography
- Using Photos to Teach About Africa
- Using BU’s Resources for Teaching About African Geography
- Africa is not a country...(also fin Word doc in the Media library)
- Lesson Plan: Indian Ocean Trade (Indian Ocean Trade)
- The Swahili
- Which Continent? Using Photos to Overcome Stereotypes
Teaching About African Cultures
- Lesson Plan: Children in Africa (Passport to the World)
- Game for Teaching about Africa: Bingo!
- Teaching AFrican Culture
- The Swahili
- Image comparisons
Teaching about Specific African Countries
- Africa is not a country…
- Ghana – Ghana Ghana Proverbs Kingdom of Ghana
- Kenya – Kenya
- Nigeria – Nigeria Nigerian Proverbs
- South Africa – South Africa
- Botswana – Tswana Proverbs
- Mail – Kingdom of Mali
- Using Photos to teach about Africa
Teaching about African Literature
- Children’s African Book Award winners.
- Bibliography of African Children’s Literature
- How to Write about Africa (external link)
- Guide to Multicultural Literature
- Lesson Plan: Children in Picture Books
- Lesson Plan: African literature worksheet
- Tswana Proverbs
- Ghana Proverbs
- Nigerian Proverbs
- Historical Fictions Bibliography
- Middle school literature
- Swahili Proverbs
Teaching about Africa Arts
Contemporary Political and Economic Issues in Africa
- Contemporary Political Issues Bibliography
- Pambazuka News
- H-AfrTeach: The H-Net List for Teaching About Africa
- All-Africa.com News from African newspapers and magazines.