Texas Originals Curriculum
Texas Originals, developed by Humanities Texas and Houston Public Media, is a radio series profiling individuals who have had a profound influence on Texas history and culture, many of whom are featured in the seventh-grade Texas history TEKS. Episodes can be found here.
This curriculum from Humanities Texas provides activities and lessons to integrate Texas Originals into the classroom with expectations for reading, writing, and using accepted social studies conventions and practices. Spanish translations of transcripts from all three seasons are now available.
Curriculum Guide
This guide introduces teachers to the Texas Originals curriculum and related instructional materials.
Meet the Originals
This lesson uses Texas Originals episodes to introduce students to important figures in Texas history and challenges them to answer questions and draw conclusions. Teachers can use these lessons as a tool to introduce new units or as an ongoing warm up activity, selecting historical figures who support classroom goals. More»
Write Your Own Texas Originals Script
In this lesson students are asked to examine the life of someone who has made an important contribution to Texas history and write a short radio script based on the methods used by Humanities Texas writers. More»
Dinner Party Discussions
This activity requires students to select three people who share the same time period, profession, or some other trait and identify and evaluate their individual contributions to Texas history. More»
TEKS Correlation
Lessons are designed to support the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) but are also widely relevant to the Common Core standards. This document correlates each lesson to TEKS standards.
Additional Resources
These additional resources offer teachers and students the chance to explore any of the Texas Originals in greater depth.
Questions about Curriculum Resources
Call 512.440.1991 (press 2) or email institutes@humanitiestexas.org.