My Favorite TED-Ed Lessons
For the High School Social Studies Class
A TED-Ed Lesson at its core is a 3–5 minute animated video that focuses on topics ranging from chemistry to Shakespeare to origami, with each animation created by TED-Ed in collaboration with an educator, an insanely talented scriptwriter, and an equally talented animator.
A typical TED-Ed video looks like one I authored with the TED-Ed team in 2016 and entitled “Why is the U.S. Constitution so Hard to Amend?”
“A truly delicious, healthy, bite-sized snack that you can not only put before your students, but that your students are sure to like.” This is how I often describe the typical TED-Ed Lesson.
And what are the best TED-Ed lessons for the typical high school social studies class? To answer that question, see below (my list of recommended TED-Ed lessons to consist of those produced prior to October 1, 2017)
For the US Government Course
- How do executive orders work?
- How does impeachment work?
- What happened to trial by jury?
- The oddities of the first American election
- The Electoral College explained
- A 3-minute guide to the Bill of Rights
- Gerrymandering: How drawing jagged lines can impact an election
- Why do Americans vote on Tuesdays?
- What you might not know about the Declaration of Independence
- The fight for the right to vote in the United States
- Why is the US Constitution so hard to amend?
- Equality, sports, and Title IX
- How is power divided in the United States government?
- How do US Supreme Court justices get appointed?
- What are the universal human rights?
For the US History Course
- What is McCarthyism? And how did it happen?
- Why wasn’t the Bill of Rights originally in the US Constitution?
- How does fracking work?
- The story behind the Boston Tea Party
- The historical audacity of the Louisiana Purchase
- The history of the Cuban Missile Crisis
- The Watergate scandal: United States vs. Nixon
- What you might not know about the Declaration of Independence
- What does it mean to be a refugee?
- What are the universal human rights?
For the Modern World History Course
- The rise and fall of the Berlin Wall
- The Akune brothers: Siblings on opposite sides of war
- What caused the French Revolution?
- The history of the Cuban Missile Crisis
- What does it mean to be a refugee?
- What are the universal human rights?
