August Curriculum Calendar - Lesson Plan Ideas by Date

Enhance your current curriculum with this fun reference calendar. Whether you want to highlight historic events, honor birthdays of significant people, or celebrate holidays, this is a valuable tool for every teacher. Click on any event to find a breadth of related teaching resources that will spark new ideas to spice up your daily lessons. There's something worth celebrating every day!

Curriculum Calendar

Sun Mon Tue Wed Thur Fri Sat
28
National Parents' Day
Also try: families, mothers, fathers
World Nature Conservation Day
Also try: conservation, ecology
World War I begins (1914)
Also try: The Great War
29
Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkien first published (1954)
NASA established (1958)
30
Emily Bronte born (1818)
Also try: Wuthering Heights
31
Uncommon Instrument Awareness Day
J.K. Rowling born (1965)
Also try: Harry Potter
1
National Water Quality Month Begins
Herman Melville born (1819)
Also try: Moby Dick
Justinian I becomes sole ruler of the Byzantine Empire (527)
Also try: Byzantine Empire
2
Declaraton of Independence is signed in Philadelphia by 56 members of Congress (1776)
Also try: equality, government
Trial run of San Francisco cable car on Clay St. (1873)
The Lincoln Penny first issued (1909)
Also try: currency, US Mint
3
Christopher Columbus sets sail on his first voyage (1492)
Also try: Age of Discovery
Calvin Coolidge becomes president after the death of President Warren G. Harding (1923)
4
Louis Armstrong born (1901)
Also try: jazz
Barack Obama born (1961)
Also try: US presidents
Anne Frank and family arrested (1944)
Also try: Holocaust, World War II
5
First transatlantic telegraph cable completed (1858)
Also try: telecommunications
6
Hiroshima Day (1945)
Alfred Lord Tennyson born (1809)
Also try: poetry, Ulysses
7
Purple Heart Day
Also try: war heroes
First performance of Shakespeare's play, Macbeth (1606)
8
International Cat Day
Also try: pets
Juan Ponce de Leon founds Caparra, the first European settlement in Puerto Rico (1508)
9
Nagasaki Day (1945)
Walden by Henry David Thoreau first published (1854)
Richard M. Nixon resigns (1974)
Also try: Watergate scandal
10
Herbert Hoover born (1847)
Also try: US presidents
Ruth Bader Ginsburg sworn in as an Associate Supreme Court Justice (1993)
Also try: judicial system
11
The Watts Riots begin in Los Angeles (1964)
12
World Elephant Day
Also try: mammals
Cleopatra commits suicide with an asp (30 BC)
Also try: Ancient Egypt
Issac M Singer parents first practical sewing machine (1851)
13
Hernan Cortes captures Tenochtitlán from the Aztecs (1521)
Opha May Jacob Johnson becomes first woman to join the US Marine Corps (1918)
14
President Roosevelt signs the Social Security Act (1935)
Also try: FDR, New Deal
First photograph taken of Earth from space (1959)
Also try: satellite imagery
Largest blackout in US history (2003)
15
Napoleon Bonaparte born (1769)
Also try: Napoleonic Wars
Panama Canal formally opens (1914)
India gains Independence from Great Britain (1947)
First new solar system found (2001)
16
Cyprus gains its independence from the United Kingdom (1960)
Also try: European Union
17
Davy Crockett born (1786)
Kind of Blue by Miles Davis released (1959)
Also try: jazz
18
Pierre Janssen discovers helium (1868)
Also try: noble gases, elements
Mars moon Phobos discovered (1877)
Also try: Mars
19
William J. Clinton born (1946)
Also try: US presidents
Five people executed after being convicted of witchcraft at the Salem Witch Trials (1692)
Adolf Hitler becomes Fuhrer (1934)
20
Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture debuts (1882)
Also try: classical music
Leon Trotsky assassinated (1940)
21
Nat Turner leads a slave rebellion (1831)
Also try: slave rebellion
Mona Lisa painting stolen (1911)
Also try: Leonardo da Vinci
22
Saint Columba reports seeing a monster in Loch Ness, Scotland (565)
Also try: sea monsters
12 nations sign the First Geneva Convention (1864)
Also try: war crimes
23
First Opium War begins with the siege of Hong Kong (1839)
Also try: Hong Kong, Qing Dynasty
24
Mount Vesuvius erupts, burying Pompeii (79)
Also try: Pompeii, volcanoes
Pluto is reclassified as a dwarf planet (2006)
25
Amelia Earhart completes transcontinental flight (1932)
Nationwide opening of the film Wizard of Oz (first color movie) (1939)
Also try: film, cinema
26
Mother Teresa born (1910)
Also try: humanitarians
Krakatoa erupts (1883)
19th Amendment takes effect (1920)
27
Lyndon B. Johnson born (1908)
Also try: US presidents
George Bissell and Edwin L. Drake drill first US oil well (1859)
Also try: petroleum
28
First radio commercial airs in New York City (1922)
Also try: marketing, advertising
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. delivers "I Have a Dream" speech (1963)
29
First Indian reservation established (1758)
Hurricane Katrina hits the Gulf Coast (2005)
30
Thurgood Marshall confirmed as Supreme Court Justice (1967)
31
Henry VI becomes King of England at the age of 9 months (1422)
First solar-powered car demonstrated in Chicago (1955)
Also try: renewable energy