Student Texts
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Our searchable library of short texts offers a diverse mix of stories and perspectives. This multigenre, multimedia collection aligns with the Common Core's recommendations for text complexity and the Learning for Justice Social Justice Standards.

Choose from informational and literary nonfiction texts, literature, photographs, political cartoons, interviews, infographics and more. You can also filter by text type, grade level, subject and topic.

“The leveled texts have really helped me engage students and introduce them to complex topics in a way they can understand.”

Text Type
Grade Level
Social Justice Domain
Subject
Topic

622 Texts

Informational

Always Running

In this excerpt from his memoir, Rodriguez provides a stirring recollection from his adolescence: the first time he experienced racism as a result of being an immigrant in America. As he says, the experience "stays with [him] like a foul odor."
by
Luis J. Rodriguez
Grade Level
Social Justice Domain
July 2, 2014
Informational

An Abolition Traitor

A Democratic laborer comments on the problem of abolitionism in the North as well as the South, claiming that the emancipation of enslaved people will result in the damaging of white labor rights and opportunities.
by
Democratic Workingman (Anonymous)
Grade Level
Topic
Subject
History
Social Justice Domain
December 15, 2017
Informational

An Act for Prohibiting the Importation of Negroes, June 1774

With this text, the colony of Rhode Island outlawed the importation of enslaved Africans and established the immediate emancipation of enslaved people in the colony in 1774. However, the law stipulated some important exceptions that made this change particularly ineffective.
by
Colony of Rhode Island
Grade Level
Topic
Subject
History
Social Justice Domain
December 15, 2017
Informational

An Aesthetic of Blackness: Strange and Oppositional

This text by bell hooks shares her experiences involving her upbringing, space, culture, family and more in order to reflect about her identity, community and aesthetics of Blackness. hooks also emphasizes freeing the creative spirit, supporting artistic expression and acknowledging social hierarchies, the African diaspora and cultural production.
by
bell hooks
Grade Level
Subject
Social Studies
History
Social Justice Domain
July 18, 2022