At a Glance

Description
The economy's on everyone's mind. Take advantage of that fact to teach a bit of financial history.

Federal Reserve Board

According to the Federal Reserve Board (FRB) website, the "Federal Reserve Board, the Central bank of the United States, provides the nation with a safe, flexible, and stable monetary and financial system." Still not sure exactly what that entails? There's an additional short (2:37) video available which goes into more detail.

The most useful item on the main FBR website, having not been created to address educator needs, is a collection of statistics, both current and historical. Unfortunately, most of the data is likely too technical to be of great use without extensive planning in a K-12 classroom.

That's where Federal Reserve Education comes in. This site, entirely separate from the main official site, exists to provide you with the tools to tackle economics in a classroom setting. Offerings include lesson plans, labelled with topic area (including history) and grade level appropriateness. Publications cover the 1933 banking collapse and the history of U.S. currency.

In addition to the above, the classroom section offers activities and simulations. Note that, while a video section exists, none of its content is tagged as being pertinent to the history classroom.

Finally, you may be interested in the history of the FBR itself. You can access a quiz and word search on FBR history through links at the top of the historical summary.