Guide
Angel Island Immigrant Journeys
Angel Island Immigration Station's curriculum guides, called "Immigrant Journeys," provide strategies and background material designed for teachers of Grades 3-12. These guides contain lessons, student worksheets, primary source documents from the National Archives, historical photographs, and list of resources to introduce students to the experience of immigrants on Angel Island.
History
Curriculum Guide - Historical Background
(11 pages)
Where is Angel Island? An introductory geography lesson
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 1
(8 pages)
The Chinese Exclusion Act
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 2
(6 pages)
Conditions in China: Why might one leave home forever?
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 3
(5 pages)
Leaving Home Forever: What would you put in your suitcase?
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 4
(3 pages)
Film Screening: Carved in Silence
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 5
(4 pages)
Exclusion Activity
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 6
(3 pages)
Interrogation of Immigrant
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 7
(7 pages)
Interview a Family or Community Member: Taking oral histories
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 8
(4 pages)
Exploring Oral Histories of Angel Island Immigrants
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 9
(6 pages)
Immigration Case File Investigation
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 10
(59 pages)
How do pictures tell the story of Angel Island?
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 11
(5 pages)
Images - Lesson 11
Student Handout
Moving to the poems of Angel Island
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 12
(5 pages)
Making Your Mark: Free verse poetry
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 13
(3 pages)
Culminating Writing Project - Reporting on Angel Island
Curriculum Guide - Lesson 14
(3 pages)
Other Classroom Resources
Facing History and Ourselves’ Angel Island Immigration Station: Exploring Borders and Belonging in US History
Inquiry and Activity - How does the history of the Angel Island Immigration Station help us understand how borders are erected, enforced, and challenged?
Scholastic’s Asian Pacific American Heritage Month Activity
Activity - Angel Island: Li Keng Wong’s Story
What Does It Mean To Be An American?
Student Lesson - Immigration
AIISF’s Stop Asian American and Pacific Islander Hate
Presentation
(11 pages)
KQED’s Discovering Angel Island: The Story Behind the Poems
Website Link | Discovering Angel Island Video
These lesson plan units were developed to work with the video-short “Discovering Angel Island” and the Pacific Link website. There are three elementary level lesson units and one for 8th-12th grade students studying U.S. history or area studies.
Poems Lesson Plan - Grades 4, 5, 6
(9 pages)
Interactive Lesson Plan - Grades 3, 4, 5
(8 pages)
Social Studies Lesson Plan - Grades 4, 5, 6
(11 pages)
Poems Lesson Plan - Grades 8 - 12
(11 pages)
AncestryClassroom™
Access here
AncestryClassroom™ provides educators with access to classroom resources, professional learning tools, and Ancestry® historical record collections at no cost to help students find their personal place in history.
Articles
Dr. A. Vincent Ciardiello
The following two articles by Dr. A. Vincent Ciardiello, Associate Professor of Education, Iona College offer insights on how to use the Angel Island immigrant poems in social studies education.
Published July 2012 in The Social Studies, 103, pages 171-176.
"Talking Walls: Presenting a Case for Social Justice Poetry in Literacy Education"
Published in The Reading Teacher, a journal of the International Reading Association.
Teaching about Angel Island through Historical Empathy and Poetry
Dr. Noreen Naseem Rodriguez wrote the article, "Teaching about Angel Island through Historical Empathy and Poetry" and it was published in Social Studies and the Young Learner in 2015. It is about a lesson on Angel Island she developed for a third/fourth grade class (but also adaptable to other grades). She made this article available to our readers below:
Reading and Writing Cultures
Angel Island Poetry
This lesson demonstrates how history and culture can be integral to our understanding of poetry, even poetry that is deeply reflective and personal in nature; by requiring students to model and produce their own poetry, it also makes evident that writing poetry is a creative instinct and outlet that people have turned to regardless of time, education level, or culture.
Multi-Ethnic Program
San Francisco Chronicle's Education Series
This 5-part series is designed for upper elementary, middle and high students and their teachers. This series first appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle in Spring 2003 and highlights the experience of a few of the immigrant groups that passed through Angel Island Immigration Station:
Mixed Media Art
Guggenheim’s Angel Island Monuments
After studying and reading personal accounts of immigration, students can create mixed-media monuments to memorialize the experiences of those who came through Angel Island, the West Coast immigration post.
Activity books
APIA’s Angel Island Immigrant Voices
Our friends at the Asian Pacific Islander American (APIA) Biography Project created this activity book with help from AIISF, the Association of Chinese Teachers (TACT), and students enrolled in the Asian American Children’s/Adolescent Literature course at San Francisco State University.
The activity book includes brief biographies from former Angel Island detainees and activities that teachers can bring into the classroom.
Angel Island State Park Junior Ranger Guide
Created by Dr. Lieser’s 2018 Public History course at Dominican University, this unofficial immigration station guide book presents an assortment of activities appropriate for ages 5 - 12.