PBS Learning Media is an enriching resource-bank on a comprehensive range of topics, including those related to nuclear weapons. Through short videos, original documents, and tailored lesson plans, PBS aims to help teachers and students not only understand key issues but also develop an interest in them. CIF has selected the following videos, which are relevant to the main themes of its different projects, including nuclear nonproliferation and disarmament.  

  1. Nuclear Reactors vs. Nuclear Weapons | PBS LearningMedia 

This 6-minute video helps students differentiate between nuclear reactors and nuclear weapons. It is aimed at making students understand that the science that powers nuclear reactors is quite different from that which powers nuclear weapons. 

2. The Cold War and the Nuclear Weapons Threat | Retro Report | PBS LearningMedia 

This video introduces students to the nuclear dimension of the Cold War. It discusses how strategic concepts, crises, issues of nuclear proliferation, and arms control shaped the War and global politics. One of the objectives of this video is to compare nuclear dangers that were prevalent in the Cold War with those that the world confronts today.  

3. Why Only 9 Countries Have Nuclear Weapons | Above the Noise | PBS LearningMedia 

This seven-minute video enriches students with a fundamental understanding of why and when some states build nuclear weapons, and other states do not. It also introduces students to the basics of the nuclear nonproliferation regime.  

4. Cuban Missile Crisis: Three Men Go to War | Potential Outcomes of a Nuclear Strike | PBS LearningMedia 

This short video briefly discusses the Cuban Missile Crisis through a/an historical lens, shedding light on how close the world was to a nuclear exchange. The video will help students assess some of the dangers associated with nuclear weapons.  

5. Atomic Fears and the Arms Race: Nuclear Testing | Retro Report | PBS LearningMedia 

This video shows students how U.S. soldiers were exposed to the harmful effects of nuclear testing and other experiments. Students will be introduced to some of the unrecognized costs of America’s rise up the power ladder.  

 6. Nuclear Fission | PBS LearningMedia 

This animation essay summarizes what happens inside of a nuclear reactor’s core. It will make students understand how engineers and technicians design nuclear facilities so as to control fission, contain radiation, and process electricity.  

7. The Lowdown | How to Stop a Nuclear War: The Non-Proliferation Treaty, Explained (Lesson Plan) | PBS LearningMedia 

This lesson focuses on the history of nuclear proliferation, with a view to helping students understand the  risks and dangers associated with it.  

 

8. Test Ban Treaty (1963) and Resource Materials | PBS LearningMedia 

 These original documents of the Limited Test Ban Treaty (1963) will enrich students’ understandings about the context that made the U.S., Great Britain, and Soviet Union sign it.