Do you have an original lesson on Maine history that you would like to share through the MMN Lesson Plan Library? Please refer to the following guidelines to help you create and upload your lesson plan. If you would like to bookmark our submission page, we recommend bookmarking this page as guidelines are subject to change.
Ready to get started? Take me to the Lesson Plan Submission Form! Questions before you get started? Email us at education@mainehistory.org or give us a call at (207) 774-1822.
Thank you for your interest in sharing a lesson plan with us and with teachers throughout Maine!
Naming and Describing your Lesson Plan
Your lesson plan can be any topic you like, as long as it relates to the history of Maine. Is there an interesting historic site in your town that could be the focus of your lesson plan, to share with educators and learners throughout the state? Do you regularly teach a unit about a particular event from Maine or town/county history in your classroom? Have you been doing research about material culture in Maine? What unique perspective does living in Maine bring to cultural traditions, or national or international history? If you need any additional help or inspiration, check out some of our current lesson plans, or feel free to email us at education@mainehistory.org.
You may utilize the lesson plan template created by Maine Historical Society, or use your own template. If you use your own template, we ask that the following information is still available.
Title: All lesson plans must have a title. Please give your lesson plan a name that will give other educators a quick glance at the type of content the lesson plan will contain. Find inspiration in the names of our current lesson plans.
Summary/Overview: Please describe your lesson plan in roughly one brief paragraph (2-3 sentences). This will give other educators a quick overview of the content of your lesson plan. Please note that the first ~100 characters of your summary will appear in search results on Maine Memory Network; start with the most informative information, or a sentence starting with something akin to "Students will learn..."
Objectives: What will students be able to demonstrate that they have learned by the end of this lesson? What will be achieved in this lesson?
Big Idea/Essential Questions: You do not need to include these in your lesson plan, but they can help guide instruction. The bicentennial lesson plans created by MHS utilize Big Ideas and essential questions. What is the main theme? What questions will students be able to answer?
MMN Themes: Maine Memory Network divides lesson plans into five major themes: Civics & Citizenship, Community, Economy, Environment/The Land, and The People/Peopling of Maine. Please choose the theme that best aligns to the content in your lesson plan and choose all that apply.
Duration: MHS will list the duration as a range of days—we define "days" in this context as number of times the class will meet. Because not all class periods are the same across schools, we suggest estimating a range of days as a guideline for other instructors. If a lesson will take only 30 minutes, you may choose to list 1 day. However, if the lesson relies heavily on classroom discussion and primary source examination and may take 1.5-2 hours, you may want to choose a range of 1-2 days.
Lesson Plan Contents and Additional Resources
We suggest detailing your lesson plan as a series of steps for future instructors. Include within your main lesson plan document any relevant information or resources teachers and students may need access to. You may choose to upload additional resources as a separate packet - for example, if you have created a document such as a worksheet, map, or timeline that students will use during the lesson, you may include this either within the lesson plan itself or as a separate document/packet of documents.
If your lesson plan relies on use of a video, podcast, or other external resource, please link to each resource separately.
If your lesson plan utilizes images, please ensure that you hold the copyright to the image (you are the photographer/artist) or you have permission from the owner to reproduce the image. If you have any questions regarding copyright, please refer to the standards at copyright.gov. We cannot host unsourced images on Maine Memory Network.
Maine Memory Network
Maine Memory Network (MMN) is a free online tool that contains thousands of images from the Maine Historical Society collection, as well as images uploaded by our school and community partners. We ask teachers uploading lesson plans to choose an image from MMN to represent their lesson plan (for example, if your lesson plan is about Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, it may look something like this: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow & Harriet Beecher Stowe).
We also encourage teachers to create free accounts to make use of MMN items in slideshows. You have the ability to align your own text with images from MMN using the slideshow tool. If you have any questions about making the most of MMN's database for educational purposes, please contact the Manager of Educational Programs.
Your lesson plan(s) will be hosted through Maine Memory Network. Each lesson plan will have its own detailed page with an overview for other teachers to view prior to downloading the plan and additional document(s). When filling out the form, please think about the ideas and outcomes that best describe your lesson plan.
If you are submitting a lesson plan for consideration and for entry into the drawing for a particular month, we suggest submitting your form as early in the month as possible (by the 15th). If our Education staff request revisions, submitting your initial lesson plan early allows for revision time within the month you wish to enter the drawing. If you submit your form toward the end of the month and our Education staff request revisions, your lesson plan may likely be entered into the following month’s drawing, or the month in which we receive your finalized lesson plan. Only finalized lesson plans following staff review will be entered into the drawing and featured on Maine Memory Network. While we welcome multiple entries from the same participant, each participant is only eligible to win the drawing once.
Participating in Lesson Plan Submission
Who can participate?
Public and private school educators for grades Pre-K through 12, and all postsecondary and adult learning educators are invited and encouraged to participate. Librarians, archivists, amateur and professional historians, former teachers, and staff and volunteers of historic sites in Maine are also invited to participate and eligible for the monthly drawing; we only ask that your lesson plan still be formatted for classroom learning either for Pre-K through 12 classrooms (aligning to Maine State Standards), or postsecondary or adult education classrooms. You do not need to live in Maine to participate, but your lesson plan must relate to the history of Maine (and, for Pre-K through 12 lesson plans, align to the Maine State Standards).
When should I submit my lesson plan?
Lesson plans can be submitted at any time.
Will my lesson plan be added to the MMN Lesson Plan Library?
All submission are subject to review by MHS Staff. Submission does not guarantee that your lesson plan will be added to the MMN Lesson Plan Library and our educators may also ask for revisions to your lesson plan. We are only able to feature finalized lesson plans vetted by our Education staff on Maine Memory Network. As soon as your lesson plan has been reviewed, and if and when it is approved by our Education staff, we will let you know when it goes live online. All accepted lesson plans will be accessible from and searchable here on Maine Memory Network.
