One of four murals painted on the walls of the Library of Congress' Hispanic Reading Room by Brazilian artist, Cândido Portinari. The scene is a 16th-century coastal settlement, a village where such Jesuit fathers as Anchieta and Nóbrega labored in peaceful penetration to instruct the Tupi Indians and save their souls.

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Use these lesson plans (created by educators for educators) to explore women's history in America with your students in your classroom:

Exploring Cultural Rituals - (General Reference,) In this lesson, students investigate rituals and customs of various cultures and then explore their own cultural rituals through interviews with family. This lesson could be adapted to focus on Hispanic immigrants.

Learning About Immigration Through Oral History - (Grades 6-8, Grades 9-12,) Students engage in visual and information literacy exercises to gain an understanding of how to identify and interpret primary historical sources, specifically oral histories. This lesson could be adapted to focus on Hispanic immigrants.

Exploring Community Through Local History: Oral Stories, Landmarks and Traditions - (Grades 9-12,) Students explore the local history of their own community to learn the value of local culture and traditions as primary sources. This lesson could focus on Hispanic influences in a community.

Using Oral History - (Grades 7-12) Students study social history topics through interviews that recount the lives of ordinary Americans. This lesson could be adapted to include interviews with Hispanic Americans.

Create your own collaborative lesson plans using material related to this month's theme assembled from The Learning Page Collection Connections:

California Gold: Northern California Folk Music from the Thirties. Collected by Sidney Robertson Cowell - (Summary and Teaching Resources) This collection can be searched by ethnic group and includes recorded folk music of Basque, Mexican, Portuguese, Puerto Rican and Spanish origins.

Hispano Music and Culture from the Northern Rio Grande: The Juan B. Rael Collection - (Summary Only) This collection documents 1940s religious and secular music of Spanish-speaking residents of rural Northern New Mexico and Southern Colorado. Essays in both English and Spanish are included.

Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures, The - (Summary and Teaching Resources) This collection contains the first movies made of American troops in wartime and features troops, ships, notable figures, parades, reenactments of battles and other war-time events.

South Texas Border, 1900-1920: Photographs from the Robert Runyon Collection, The - (Summary and Teaching Resources) This collection features early 1900s photographs documenting the history and development of the Lower Rio Grande Valley. More than 350 images depict events in Northeastern Mexico during the Mexican Revolution.

Parallel Histories: Spain, the United States and the American Frontier - (Summary and Teaching Resources) This bilingual collection explores the history of the Spanish presence in North America from Columbus to the continued exploration and settlement of California and the American Southwest in the early 19th century.

United States and Brazil: Expanding Frontiers, Comparing Cultures, The - (Summary Only) This collection, presented in both English and Portuguese, studies the interactions that have taken place between the United States and Brazil and the parallels and contrasts in the histories of these countries.

Kraus Collection of Sir Francis Drake - (Summary Only) View items related to travels in Spanish America.

Puerto Rico at the Dawn of the Modern Age: Nineteenth- and Early-Twentieth-Century Perspectives - (Summary and Teaching Resources) This collection portrays the early history of the commonwealth of Puerto Rico through first-person accounts, political writings, and primary source items drawn from the American Memory collections.

These terms may be useful when searching for items related to this theme in the American Memory collections.