Research Guides: Teaching Activities and Lesson Plans: Free DLOs for K-12

Don't Reinvent -- Re-Use!

See below for a curated listing of free-to-you digital learning objects, learning resources, and classroom activities, including the following categories:

Discipline-specific
Cross-disciplinary
Diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI)
INFOhio -- free to all educators, students, and caregivers in Ohio

Free Websites for Teaching Activities and Lesson Plans

These free websites provide educators with online access to open educational resources (OER) such as lesson plans, teaching activities, timelines, diagrams, videos, frameworks for developing curricula and more.

See below for a selection of cross-disciplinary resources, or view resources by discipline using the navigation menu.

Annenberg Learner Lesson Plans
Resources for K-12 classroom instruction and teacher professional development. No account required.
Anti-Defamation League Lesson Plans
Our collection of K-12 classroom blended and online learning solutions for educators and students promotes critical thinking and learning around historical and current events topics through the lens of diversity, bias and social justice.
BrainPOP Educators Lesson Plans
Every topic and game has a unique matching collection of teacher support materials, from lesson plans and teaching tips to printables and support videos. No account required.
Learning for Justice Classroom Resources
Classroom resources and lesson plans on social justice and anti-bias topics. Formerly titled Teaching Tolerance.
Education World
Search or browse lesson plans by subject. Also includes a worksheet library, templates, and more.
Funbrain | Activites for students
Funbrain, created for kids in grades Pre-K through 8, offers hundreds of free interactive games, books, videos, and printables that help kids develop skills in math, reading, problem-solving, and literacy.
Human Rights Educators USA Lesson Plans on Racism
Activites, lesson plans, and curricula on racism from Human Rights Educators USA.
New York Times Learning Network
Lesson plans, writing prompts, quizzes and vocabulary, photos, graphs, videos, and more from The New York Times.
OER Commons (Open Educational Resources)
OER Commons is a public digital library of open educational resources. Explore, create, and collaborate with educators around the world to improve curriculum.
OpenStax
Free and openly licensed e-textbooks for high school and college.
PBS Learning Media
Free, standards-aligned videos, interactives, lesson plans, and more for teachers from PBS and local affiliate CET. No account required; free account optional.
TeachersFirst
TeachersFirst is a rich collection of lessons, units, and web resources designed to save teachers time by delivering just what they need in a practical, user-friendly, and ad-free format.
Teaching for Change Teaching Resources
Lesson plans, activities, articles, recommended resources and more from Teaching for Change: Building Social Justice Starting in the Classroom.
Yale-New Haven Teacher's Institute
Each curriculum unit contains: content objectives – a clear statement of the subject matter the unit seeks to cover; teaching strategies – a unified, coherent teaching plan for those objectives; classroom activities; and resources for teachers and students.