Useful Links

This page is designed to give teachers a guide to internet teaching resources that can be applied to teaching about the Middle East. All of the links will be to outside sources and therefore, the Outreach Office cannot be responsible for their content. The Outreach Office would like to thank Barbara Williams of Buena High School in Sierra Vista, Arizona for supplying some of the links listed below.

If you have a link that you believe would be helpful to other teachers, please email Assistant Director, Outreach Abby Limmer at alimmer@arizona.edu 

Resources To Use in the Classroom:

YouTube Videos:

Discovering the Atlas Mountains (geography of Morocco)

Hassan II Mosque (Casablanca, Morocco)

Ancient Mesopotamia

A Land Called Paradise (a great introduction to the variety of Muslims living in the U.S. and the world)

1001 Inventions and the Library of Secrets (about medieval Muslim contributions)

How Facebook Changed the World: The Arab Spring (in 4 parts - about 15 minutes each)

a fun Palestinian music video (everyday life and fun, no politics)

Lesson Plans/Curriculum Units:

Book by high school teacher Tara Seger designed for teachers and high school students full of interviews with refugees from all over the Middle East. Includes guiding questions for teachers and students.
 
Media Construction of the Middle East: A Digital Media Literacy Curriculum
A site which provides useful lessons with visuals and the use of primary sources which high school/college students analyze to understand the role of the media in interpreting Middle East issues.
 

Sultan Qaboos Cultural Center Indian Ocean History
A site which provides an interactive tour through the history of the Indian Ocean trade routes. The many lessons which go with it cover world history, economics, geography, and literature standards.

Choices
The Brown University Watson Institute for International Studies is developing project-based teaching units for high school classes, many of which are free for teachers to use. Check out their recent lessons on Afghanistan and on the 2011 Arab Spring revolts that you'll find in the middle of the webpage.  

Arizona Geographic Alliance Lesson Plans

This website has a HUGE number of lesson plans, including geohistory, geoliteracy, geoSTEM, and other versatile lessons. All are listed by grade level and are easily implemented in a classroom.
 
A full downloadable curriculum.
 
A World History curriculum about the region around the Mediterranean Sea.
 
Curricular materials by Edsitement.

Other Types of Resources:

A website created by a high school teacher as part of a Fulbright project, there are short videos, interviews, and texts about everything from Palestinian skateboarders to Israeli comic book creators.

Children and Youth in History
A site that has teaching resources about various regions of the world. This site includes lesson plans and primary source documents.

15-minute podcosts on different historical topics, many of them Middle East-related.

The African and Middle East Reading Room
A division of the Library of Congress with images and literature from Africa and the Middle East.

A site that provides geography online games in order to learn the countries, capitals and bodies of water of the Middle East.

Bank Notes.com
A site that provides information about and pictures of currency from around the world.

The University of Chicago Middle East Library Archive
A site that provides an archive of photos from the Middle East.

Perry-Castañeda Library Map Collection

A site from the University of Texas at Austin which contains maps of the Middle East from various time periods.

Education World
An education website that provides professional development articles for teachers, lesson plans, and lists of resources that give accurate information about Islam. Just type the subject into the search box.

Center for Israel Education
This site is for the Center for Israel Education, a group dedicated to depicting Israel accurately. The site provides useful background information, lesson plans and other curriculum building information.

National Geographic - Classroom Resources
A vast site encompassing all geographic areas of the globe, including the Middle East and North Africa. National Geographic supports geography education through high-quality lesson plans, current maps and map outlines, a teacher store and much more.

A teachers' resource of up-to-date scholarship and classroom ready materials and research. Superb quality and variety.
 
EdSitement - National Endowment for the Humanities
This has a huge variety of lessons and resources on all sorts of history, culture and language. Strongest Middle Eastern resources are those on the ancient world.
 
Best of History Websites
Links to over 1000 sites that have lesson plans, activities, games, quizzes and solid information. A product of the Center for Teaching History with Technology.
 
Mideast Images - Lessons from the Past for the Future
An online archive of images from the Middle East concerning topics of religion, people, design and architecture, and historic events. Also includes a showcase of ancient cities of the Middle East.
 
Women in World History Curriculum
Biographies, lesson plans, and other Web resources on women in world history including Shagrat al-Durr, a Sultan of Eqypt and Melisende, a Queen of Jerusalem.
Information/Professional Development for Teachers: 
 
Middle East Outreach Council (MEOC)
Established in 1981, the Middle East Outreach Council (MEOC) is a national nonprofit organization working to increase public knowledge about the peoples places, and cultures of the Middle East, including the Arab world, Israel, Iran, Turkey, and Afghanistan. MEOC’s target audience is non-specialists at the K-12 and college levels, although its services are also relevant to broader community needs.
 
Middle East Studies Association (MESA)
This site provides materials, links, and professional opportunities 
 
Friends of Morocco: Learning Moroccan Arabic
A site which provides resources for learning Moroccan Arabic.
 
Project Hijab
Published by Radio Free Europe Radio Liberty, this is a set of interviews with women from the Muslim world about why they do or do not choose to wear hijab.
 
WebChron - The Web Chronology Project
A spectacular array of hyperlinked chronologies for the whole world. Particularly includes a chronology of Islam and of other religions, of the Middle East and Southwest Asia, of technology, art, music, literature and speculative thought.
 
The World History Association
Full of links, resources, activities, and current scholarship.
 
H-Net - Humanities and Social Sciences Online
This is a phenomenal and ever growing list of newsletters, postings, discussion boards, multi-media materials, and much more. Targeted to particular areas of interest and scholarship.
 
The Virtual Library
This Swiss site has links to many regional studies and history locations.  It is especially good for different viewpoints and links to journals, publications, etc.
 
Maps of War
A visual history of war, religion and government. Of particular interest are the maps chronicling the Iraq War.
 
Teaching Tolerance - Tolerance.org
Founded in 1991 by the Southern Poverty Law Center, Teaching Tolerance is dedicated to reducing prejudice, improving intergroup relations and supporting equitable school experiences for our nation's children. Great resources on teaching about Arab-American experiences in the classroom.

Title VI National Resource Centers in Middle Eastern Studies

Title VI National Resource Centers in Middle Eastern Studies are funded by the Department of Education and charged with committing resources to Middle East outreach. Click here for a list of centers and links to their websites.

 

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