Language and Religion: The Diffusion of Islam | GeoInquiries
While Islam is a world religion, this map activity helps students grasp how Islam spread to Southeast Asia and became a major center for the religion.
Lesson Plan
Explore a curated collection of resources designed specifically for educators teaching about East Asia and Asian America. Below, you’ll find links to primary sources, structured curriculums, comprehensive resource collections, and other classroom materials to enrich your lessons. You can filter your search by grade level, region, state standard, and resource type, or just search for a specific topic or keyword. Additionally, don’t miss the excellent content available through NCTA’s Partner Sites, tailored to support K-12 educators in bringing East Asia into the classroom.
Southeast Asia Digital Library | Northern Illinois University
This collection contains a wide variety of materials published and produced in Southeast Asia. There are many interviews, videos, posters, photographs, periodicals, maps, manuscripts, and other archival materials.
Primary Source Teacher Resource
Teaching and Learning about Southeast Asia | Education About Asia
This short article from the journal Education About Asia highlights themes and questions teachers may want to focus on in teaching about Southeast Asia.
Teacher Resource
Southeast Asia Central Themes | Asia for Educators
An initiative of the Weatherhead East Asian Institute at Columbia, Asia for Educators aggregates materials to serve K-12 teachers across disciplines. This specific page outlines major themes about the region of Southeast Asia.
Lesson Plan
Belt and Road Tracker | Council on Foreign Relations
This tracker shows how China’s 2013 Belt and Road Initiative (BRI)—a plan to promote infrastructure development across Africa, Asia, and Europe with Chinese financing—changed countries’ bilateral economic relationships with the nation over time.
Teacher Resource
Yale Silk Road Database | Yale University Library
This collection includes 11,000+ images of major sites along the Silk Road taken between 2006-2010. These photographs take the viewer on a trip through multiple Chinese provinces and the regions of Inner Mongolia and Tibet to map out the modern-day Silk Road that was shaped by the interconnected web of trade routes linking medieval Asia.
Teacher Resource
Travels of Xuanzang (629-645 CE) – Google Arts & Culture
“Travels of Xuanzang” is an interactive depiction of the pilgrimage of Xuanzang, a Chinese monk who traveled 10,000 miles along the Silk Road and the Indian subcontinent in search of Buddhist texts.
Student Resource Teacher Resource
ArcGIS Interactive Silk Roads Map
ArcGIS is a web-based mapping tool developed by Environmental Systems Research Institute (ESRI) that allows users to create maps based on Geographic Information System data. This map, created by Dr. Tom Mueller of California University of Pennsylvania, displays both water and land routes of the Silk Roads.
Student Resource Teacher Resource
The Center for East Asian Studies | University of Chicago
The Center for East Asian Studies at the University of Chicago has a great list of digital resources for educators and learners. Included in this list are links to engaging lesson plans and classroom materials, as well as professional development organizations. Educators can reference this resource compilation for subjects ranging from contemporary issues to ancient history.
Teacher Resource
St. Malo, Manila Men, and Filipino Louisiana History | Filipino La
In 1763, a group of Filipino men escaped from a Spanish trade vessel and formed the beginnings of the first permanent Asian-American settlement in the United States, St. Malo, a fishing village thirty miles east of New Orleans in present-day St. Bernard Parish. The above link is to “Filipino La,” a nonprofit organization dedicated to archiving resources on the history of Filipinos in Louisiana. These archives include resources and information on St. Malo, as well as generations of Filipino community well-established in this southern state.
Teacher Resource
Bluff City Chinese – Film and Chinese American History Discussion Guide
This discussion guide includes activities and discussion questions to facilitate learning and conversation on the Chinese American history presented in Bluff City Chinese, a short documentary film directed by Thandi Cai. Bluff City Chinese follows two storytellers of different generations on a mission to share the untold history of Chinese American immigrants in Memphis, Tennessee. The film observes the complex nature of crafting historical narratives from scratch and explores how a yearning for identity can bring generations of people together to break ground for a more hopeful future.
Lesson Plan Teacher Resource
Bluff City Chinese – Film and Community Memory Discussion Guide
This discussion guide includes activities, discussion questions, and a chapter-by-chapter breakdown to facilitate learning and conversation on themes of community memory established in Bluff City Chinese, a short documentary film directed by Thandi Cai. Bluff City Chinese follows two storytellers of different generations on a mission to share the untold history of Chinese American immigrants in Memphis, Tennessee. The film observes the complex nature of crafting historical narratives from scratch and explores how a yearning for identity can bring generations of people together to break ground for a more hopeful future.
Lesson Plan Teacher Resource