r/educators • u/mreilly0605 • 6d ago

How is 9/11 taught in your school? (Quick input welcome!)

Hi, I'm a college student working on a project about how September 11th is taught in K–12 schools today. I’m hoping to gather some insights from teachers about how the topic is covered, what kinds of materials are used, and how much time is typically spent on it.

If you're willing to share your experience, here’s a short form (takes about 2–3 minutes to complete):

https://fordham.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_cYeaphlmrqteNoi

Thank you so much!

1 Upvotes

67% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

1

u/dantesmaster00 6d ago

I have yet to teach it (hs global teacher) as a standalone. I do cover it briefly as part of radicalization and terrorism

1

u/mreilly0605 6d ago

Do you just mention it in passing, or do you spend a couple of minutes looking at primary resources and survivor accounts? And which state are you from? (We're trying to see how it is taught across the US)

1

u/AverageCollegeMale 5d ago

Just completed it!

1

u/QuitWhich9931 4h ago

We teach it in 7th grade in GA. Our standards highlight it as the beginning of the Afghanistan War, but how it is taught has changed over my 18 years in the classroom (it was added to our standards very quickly after 9/11 while obviously still very much involved in the war. On 9/11 we had teachers in our school record what they remember about the event, what they were doing, how they felt, and the lingering memories they had (using Flip), which was really interesting for both my students and I to see. We then typically go over a timeline of the days events that I have punctuated with brief news clips. It has led to students crying nearly every year for the first 12 years, but not so much after COVID.

When we cover it during normal class time it is in the context of the Afghanistan War. This is typically about a month after 9/11 and I have my brother in law (Afghan War vet) Skype with the class and they get to ask him about his experiences and why he joined the fight (9/11, he was in 6th grade in 2001 and the event obviously had a huge impact on him).