Education Mission
The Education Department at the New-York Historical Society offers a wealth of resources and learning opportunities designed to make history come alive!
Education programs are made possible through endowments established by the National Endowment for the Humanities and The Hearst Foundations. Programs are supported, in part, by the U.S. Institute of Museum and Library Services, by public funds from the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs, in partnership with the City Council and by a grant from the New York State Council on the Arts, a State Agency. Additional support is provided by The Barker Welfare Foundation, The Hyde and Watson Foundation, the May and Samuel Rudin Family Foundation and Verizon.
Support the New-York Historical Society
Help us present groundbreaking exhibitions and develop educational programs about our nation's history for more than 200,000 schoolchildren annually.
Explore all the New-York Historical Society-created curriculum materials, which align with New York State Learning Standards and contain lesson plans and primary sources (documents, photos, maps and more). Materials are available digitally and/or for purchase in hard copy, as indicated in the list below.
Alexander Hamilton: The Man Who Made Modern America
Get to know New York’s favorite Founding Father Alexander Hamilton: a statesman and visionary whose life inspired discussion and controversy and shaped the America we live in today. This site offers teacher materials and links to exhibition highlights.
Click here to view online exhibition.
Big Apple Journal: New York Then and Now
In this newspaper-style classroom resource, students are introduced to New York as it was in 1901 and the ways in which immigrants living in New York shaped the city. Activities in this resource encourage students to compare New York then and now and explore their own neighborhoods while thinking about how they looked in times past.
Hard copy for purchase: $2 for one copy, $30 for class set (30 guides)
Click here to purchase
Cultures, Commerce and Community: A Teacher's Resource Guide for the Study of the 17th Century City of New Amsterdam
This guide is intended to enrich teaching and learning about the 17th century city of New Amsterdam. The guide includes activities and primary sources and tracks four themes: the relationship between Native American populations and European settlers; the role of New Amsterdam as a trade center in the 1600s; the experiences of Jews and enslaved Africans and their petitions to the West India Company for their rights; and the role of education and Dutch culinary traditions that influenced daily life.
Hard copy for purchase: $10
Click here to purchase
The DiMenna Children's History Museum
The DiMenna Children's History Museum is a great tool for teachers as well as a unique learning opportunity for students. Our curriculum will prepare your students to explore the museum with an understanding of how historians work to help us learn about the past, and highlights a variety of people, eras, and events in New York and American history. Included in the curriculum:
- Life stories provide more context, chart the historic figure’s life from child to adult and share key relatable moments from their history that connect to New York and the nation’s history,
- Primary sources highlight objects from New-York Historical's collection, support the content in the life stories, and suggest objects for classroom investigation,
- Lesson plans provide structured learning opportunities and suggested questioning strategies that directly relate to individual life stories,
- Pre- and post-visit activities provide a variety of classroom projects to prepare your students to become history detectives at the DiMenna Children's History Museum, as well as how to extend the museum’s themes into your classroom after your visit.
Click here to download the curriculum materials for the DiMenna Children's History Museum.
Examination Days: The New York African Free School Collection
In 1787, at a time when slavery was crucial to the prosperity and expansion of New York, the New York African Free School was created by the New York Manumission Society, a group dedicated to advocating for the rights of African Americans. What began as a single-room schoolhouse with forty students expanded to educate thousand of children in New York City’s public school system. The New-York Historical Society’s New York African Free School Collection preserves a rich selection of student work and community commentary about the school from the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries and includes lesson plans for the classroom.
Click here to view online exhibition.
Grant and Lee in War and Peace
Classroom materials explore key moments in Grant’s and Lee’s lives and in American history: cadetship at West Point; the Mexican American War; the Appomattox campaign and the end of the Civil War; and Reconstruction and the Lost Cause. These materials include a teachers’ guide, primary sources, Life Stories, and a timeline.
Hard copy for purchase: $15
Click here to purchase
Heroes and Patriotism: Exploring Lafayette’s Return to Washington’s America
These classroom materials explore the places, people, and events that marked Lafayette’s return to the United States and grand tour of the new nation in 1824–1825. These materials include a teachers’ guide, primary sources, Life Stories, and maps.
Hard copy for purchase: $15
Click here to purchase
Lincoln and New York
Trace the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln and his turbulent relationship with New York City, investigating Lincoln the man, the candidate, the president, and the martyr. These materials include a teachers’ guide, primary sources, Life Stories, a Lincoln chronology poster, and a facsimile of an 1865 issue of Harper’s Weekly.
Hard copy for purchase: $15
Click here to purchase
Nation at the Crossroads: The Great New York Debate Over the Constitution
This exhibition of letters, newspapers, pamphlets, and portraits documents the lively and dramatic debate over the ratification of the Constitution in New York State. Embedded in the debate was the persistent question of slavery, as well as critical issues of government and rights that are still relevant today. This site includes primary documents and images, as well as interviews with contemporary scholars and lesson plans.
Click here to view online exhibition.
New York Divided: Slavery and the Civil War
Slavery ended in New York State in 1827, yet this victory did not sever the city's connections to enslaved labor. New York City capitalized on the expanding trade in southern cotton and sugar to become the leading American port, a global financial center, and a hotbed of pro-slavery politics. At the same time, it nurtured a determined anti-slavery movement. New York Divided explores the turbulent half-century of the city's history with southern slavery. These materials include a teachers’ guide, primary sources and Life Stories.
Click here to view online exhibition.
Nueva York: 1613–1945
Discover the vital role the Spanish-speaking world played and continues to play in New York City’s trade, politics and culture through investigating artifacts and artwork from the exhibition Nueva York: 1613–1945, organized in collaboration with El Museo del Barrio. These materials include a teachers’ guide, primary sources, Life Stories, and a visual arts unit.
Objects Tell Stories: Learning History through Object Study
This teachers’ guide is designed to be used in conjunction with a class visit—either staff-guided or self-guided—to the Luce Center. By studying objects people left behind, we can find clues that tell us about the past, and about the people who made, owned, and used these things in their everyday lives. Includes museum activities, classroom extensions, and primary sources.
Hard copy for purchase: $10
Click here to add to purchase
Revolution! The Atlantic World Reborn
Trace the Age of Revolution (1763-1815) in a global narrative, including the American struggle against British rule, the British struggle toward the abolition of slavery, the French attack on aristocracy, and the Haitian slave revolt-turned revolution. The classroom materials include a teachers’ guide with background information, lesson plans and extension activities; primary sources; Life Stories; and a multi-layered timeline.
Hard copy for purchase: $15
Click here to purchase.
Seneca Village
This guide teaches students how to work with a variety of primary sources from images to newspapers to historical records and more. Through exploration of these documents, students learn the fascinating history of a multicultural 19th-century community that was razed for the construction of Central Park.
Hard copy for purchase: $10
Click here to purchase
Slavery in New York
New York was the capital of American slavery for more than two centuries. These materials explore slavery in New York from the 1600s to 1827, when slavery was legally abolished in New York State. They focus on the rediscovery of the collective and personal experiences of Africans and African Americans in New York City. These curriculum materials include a teachers’ guide, charts and graphs, primary sources, maps, and Life Stories.
Click here to view online exhibition.
Vergara’s Harlem
This curriculum guide introduces the life and work of Camilo José Vergara. Photographing urban communities in American cities, Vergara creates a visual portrait of urban decline and renewal over a span of 40 years, sharing a unique perspective on our relationship to the built environment. Activities in this resource provide educators and students with an opportunity to examine the connections between an individual’s personal story and the way that story can shape and influence one’s life work. We invite you to participate in Vergara’s Harlem and share these images and Vergara’s story with your students.
Click here to view online exhibition.
WWII & NYC: Classroom Materials for the Exhibition
When World War II broke out, New York was a cosmopolitan, heavily immigrant city whose people had real stakes in the war and strongly held opinions. WWII & NYC explores the war's impact on the metropolis, which played a critical role in the national war effort, and how the city was forever changed. Using primary documents, images, and documentary film clips, your students will discover how wartime changed New York.
Click here to view and download the curriculum.
