Lesson Plans

• The Maya: Illuminated Offspring of the Makers (Free online text suited for middle or high school classroom use, guided reading questions, and suggested activities): The Maya people’s rich history can be traced back nearly four thousand years, during which time they have refined and extraordinary and vibrant culture all their own.
  • The Basics of Ancient Maya Civilization.
  • The Ancient Maya in Time and Space.
  • Ancient Maya Society.
  • The Maya City.
  • The Written Language of the Maya.
  • Documentary Shorts:
    • The Maya: Collapse at Ek’ Balam
    • Uxmal: Thrice-Built City of the Maya
• Teotihuacan: The Place Where the Gods were Born (Free online text suited for middle or high school classroom use, guided reading questions, and suggested activities): Who built these incredible ruins outside of present day Mexico City, which include one of the largest pyramids in all of history?  How did this mysterious civilization influence its neighbors and successors?
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• The Aztec: Life Under the Fifth Sun in Old Mexico (Free online text suited for middle or high school classroom use, guided reading questions, and suggested activities): A basic overview of the Aztec-Mexica, one of the final great civilizations to arise in the western hemisphere before the paradigm-shifting Columbian Exchange, including the dramatic ways in which they harnessed and changed the environment around them to grow their capital city into one of the largest in the world.
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• The Birth of Huitzilopochtli and the Mexica World – A Comic Book Lesson (Free online text suited for middle or high school classroom use, guided reading questions, and suggested activities): Looking for an engaging way to teach mythology in your classroom?  Go beyond Greece and Rome, and introduce your students the folklore of ancient Mexico with Comix Azteca Volume One: Old Mother Coatlicue gives birth to Huitzilopochtli, the iridescent god of war and sun – scandalizing her adult children and setting off a war that will change the world forever.
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