Teaching of Immigration in K-12 schools.

http://its.guilford.k12.nc.us/webquests/immigration/immigration.htm#process

The website I found above is an online recourse for Guilford County Schools, Greensboro NC. Several K-12 schools in North Carolina run by one board. The curriculum area immigration falls into is 'Social studies' and the information/links and activities on the website are aimed at children in grade 5, (10-11 years old) and includes basic information, focusing on the history of immigration, and Ellis island.

"In this activity, you will learn about the greatest human migration period in the United States history as well as the events that took place at Ellis Island. You will understand why the United States is called the nation of all nations.

During the years between 1820 and 1924, thirty-five million people came to America from countries around the world. For most of them, the trip to America was difficult and dangerous. When they arrived in America, most immigrants had to go to a place called Ellis Island outside of New York City. At Ellis Island, immigrants were inspected before they were allowed into the United States. By completing these activities, you will learn about some of these experiences."

However there is a section about exploring immigration further, which links to this worksheet: http://teacher.scholastic.com/activities/immigration/index.htm called stories of today and yesterday. On that worksheet it gives examples of not just history, but more recent immigration to the U.S. It has a section where children who have recently moved to the U.S tell their story, and children have submitted questions for them. The focus is on legal immigration, often stated for 'a better life' from places such as Vietnam and India, there isn't any mention of European or illegal immigration.

This may be due to various reasons, such as, the young age of the children, 21st century immigration and the laws behind it are complex, historical immigration paints a 'nicer' fairer picture of a country that allows anyone to live there if they wanted a better life, and because little information is actually known about illegal immigration. The countries picked to showcase immigration are countries with typically lower standards of living, and countries that children might expect people to want to move from. There is no mention of acts that restricted the type of people entering (Chinese immigration acts) or of Slavery, again, because of the children's age, and the sensitive nature of the topics.