+ Teachers: Primary Resources at the Library of Congress

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Teachers can subscribe to a free quarterly newsletter, “Teaching with Primary Resources (TPS) Quarterly,”  offered by the Library of Congress.  Visit http://www.loc.gov/teachers/tps/quarterly/

In the most recent online issue, Danna Bell-Russel writes “Beyond Typescript and Photographs: Using Primary Resources in Different Formats.”

Bell-Russel is a reference librarian and archivist working in the Educational Outreach Division of the Library of Congress.  She answers questions from teachers who want to help their students engage in real inquiry, construct knowledge  and develop critical thinking skills.

She hopes to encourage teachers to use a wider range of formats than the standard photographs and photocopied documents so widely available.

Among the Library of Congress’s digitized collections are materials that students can use to explore multiple points of view and the varying documentary methods people have implemented throughout history.

Handwritten Manuscripts 

Before email and tweeting existed — people relied on pen and paper to document their experiences. 

Handwritten manuscripts offer unique and intimate perspective on historical events.  While some of the Library’s manuscripts have been transcribed, there is excitement and insight available when viewing a person’s original writing.

Bell-Russel suggests that students might value letters from Civil War participants and their families.  One of the collections is called “A Civil War Soldier in the Wild Cat Regiment.”  This collection includes letters to and from Tilton C. Reynolds, who was a member of the 105th Regiment of Pennsylvania Volunteers.  His correspondence documents the difficulties faced by the soldiers, and even covers his prisoner-of-war experiences among his Confederate captors.

Also available  is Orlando Gray’s letter describing the Battle of Williamsburg.  

“A Teacher’s Guide to Analyzing Manuscripts” is also available.  And students can complete the “Primary Source Analysis Tool,” in order to document and organize their thinking.   Bell-Russel suggests that the question, “How did Confederates view the Battle of Williamsburg,” could lead to analyzing manuscripts written by soldiers on the opposing side.

Posters, Prints and Drawings

Search the Library’s “Prints and Photographs Online Catalog.” This collection includes architectural drawings, baseball cards and cartoon drawings.

The WPA Poster Collection collects the posters commissioned to tell communities about upcoming events, healthcare messages and other information during the Depression.    Of course, teachers can use the Teacher’s Guide to Analyzing Photographs and Prints.  Students might create their own posters to highlight current issues.

History and the Movies

Before YouTube and Hulu, films were black and white, and some were silent.  Films provide a visual moving reminder of the ways people lived and thought at that time.

Check out The Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures, or Raising Old Glory Over Morro Castle.  Of course, there is a Teacher’s Guide.

Oral Histories

The Library of Congress has a number of oral history collections such as American Life Histories, Born in Slavery, and Voices From the Days of Slavery which provide stories of life during the Civil War, Reconstruction and the early 20th century.

The Veteran’s History Project collects stories of American war veterans — from World War I to current conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Students can read transcripts when available as they listen to interviews.

Historic Sheet Music and Sound Recordings

Check out the selections from the Historic Sheet Music Collection, 1800-1922.  Collections also include musical and spoken word sound recordings.  The Library also has several “folklife” collections that feature sound recordings of people’s songs, stories and history.  One example is Voices from the Dust Bowl.

Maps

 Maps are portable and provide images that document places at certain times in history.  They give visual documentation of terrain and claimed territory, environmental characteristics and more.  They can offer clues to a particular mapmaker’s point of view. 

Student might choose ”A mapp of Virginia discovered to ye hills.”    There are Railroad maps, “Broadside and Printed Ephemera.”

“Endless Instructional Possibilities”

Bell-Russel suggests that teachers will find millions of digitized items to be used by students across all grade levels and subjects.

For assistance, she suggests that teachers check out the self-guided professional development modules, Themed Resources for Teachers, web guides developed by the Library’s Digital Reference Section, or Ask a Librarian.

sole source: Danna Bell-Russel’s article in the current TPS Quarterly from the Library of Congress.  Bell-Russel is an Educational Resources Specialist at the Library of Congress. 

She previously served as a member of the Library’s Digital Reference Section, the first reference division created to specifically answer questions about the online resources found on www.loc.gov.

tutoring in Columbus OH:  Adrienne Edwards  614-579-6021  or email aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com

 

+ High School Course CDs / DVDs on Sale at Teaching Company

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Once a year, The Teaching Company   at www.TEACH12.com puts all of their High School courses on sale. 

For the next five days only, until August 27th at midnight, every High School course on CD or DVD is on sale at up to 70% off. 

It may be possible to get free shipping with no minimum purchase (not sure about that.)

• High School Level  Basic Math –Professor Murray H Siegel, Central Arizona College
• High School Level Algebra II — Professor Murray
• Argumentation: the Study of Effective Reasoning — Professor David Zarefsky, Northwestern University
• High School Level Chemistry 2nd Edition — Professor Frank Cardulla, retired, Niles North HS Chicago IL
• High School Level Algebra I — Professor Monica Neagoy, National Science Foundation
• Change and Motion: Calculus Made Clear 2nd Edition –  Professor Michael Starbird, University of Texas at Austin
• High School Level World History: The Fertile Crescent to the American Revolution — Professor Linwood Thompson, Bellflower High School
• The Joy of Mathematics –  Professor Arthur T Benjamin, Harvey Mudd College
• High School Level Geometry — Professor James Noggle, Pendleton Heights HS
• Understanding the Human Body: An Introduction to Anatomy and Physiology — Professor Anthony A Goodman, Montana State University
• High School Level Early American History: Native Americans through the Forty-Niners — Professor Linwood Thompson, Bellflower HS
• History of the United States 2nd Edition — Various Professors
• American Civil War — Professor Gary W Gallagher, University of VA
• A History of European Art — Professor William Koss, Independent Art Historian, The Smithsonian Associates, Smithsonian Institution
• Einstein’s Relativity and the Quantum Revolution: Modern Physics for Non-Scientists 2nd Edition — Professor Richard Wolfson, Middlebury College

This is just a sample; go to the site for a more complete list.

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com

+ ELECTIONS: More Web Sites for Teaching & Lesson Plans

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• Primaries, Voting and Elections  – Lesson plans, Internet sites, and curriculum ideas will help your students understand the impact of elections.   http://www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/lesson202.shtml
• Presidential Election Coverage: Vote 2008 / Lesson Plans  –  Students examine the candidates and analyze the role of the Internet in the race for president.  http://www.pbs.org/newshour/vote2008/lessonplans.html
• Elections: Lessons and Teacher Resources  – Features a large collection of lesson plans to teach your students about elections.  http://www.lessonplanspage.com/Elections.htm
• By the People: Election for Kids, Parents, and Teachers  –  Young people who do vote often do so because they learned about the importance of elections when they were kids and they grew to believe it was an honor and a privilege.  http://www.pbs.org/elections/kids/
• Ben’s Guide:  Elections  – These pages explain the election process for Federal officials.  Designed for grades 3-5.  http://bensguide.gpo.gov/3-5/election/index.html
• The Electoral College  – When Americans are casting our votes for the presidential candidates, we are actually casting our votes for electors- who will cast their votes for the candidates.  http://www.socialstudiesforkids.com/articles/government/theelectoralcollege.htm
• The Steps to Elected Office  –Create a sequence chart and run-for-office board game.  http://etgredirect.1105web.com/redirect.aspx?id=80  

source: EduHound’s “Classroom Tools & Tips” newsletter, which also provides useful ed tech information and educational topics, templates and tutorials..  Sign yourself up for the newsletter at  JRajala@eduhound.com.  Contact Judi Rajala with your own ideas for topics.

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com

+ Justice O’Connor Promotes Web-Based Civics Lessons

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This is Seth Schiesel’s article in the NY Times:

 

Sandra Day O’Connor, the former Supreme Court justice, began her remarks at the Games for Change conference in New York by saying aloud what the few hundred people in the audience were already thinking.

“If someone had told me when I retired from the Supreme Court about a couple of years ago that I would be speaking at a conference about digital games, I would have been very skeptical, maybe thinking you had one drink too many,” she said to laughter Wednesday in an auditorium downtown at Parsons the New School for Design.

Yet there she was, a notable figure in modern history, at once engaging and imposing as she explained why she had embraced the Internet and interactive digital media as an essential tool for preserving American democracy. In cooperation with Georgetown University Law Center and Arizona State University, Justice O’Connor is helping develop a Web site and interactive civics curriculum for seventh-, eighth- and ninth-grade students called Our Courts (www.ourcourts.org). The initial major elements of the site are scheduled to become available this fall.

Since retiring from the bench in 2006, Justice O’Connor, 78, has spoken forcefully and often about the dangers posed by efforts to politicize the judiciary. Her thoughts are well known to legal scholars. With Our Courts she hopes to foster a deeper understanding of American government among schoolchildren. The site will have two parts, an explicitly educational component for use in schools and a more entertainment-oriented module that will more closely resemble games. As one would expect from such a significant jurist, she made a neat case.

“In recent years I have become increasingly concerned about vitriolic attacks by some members of Congress and some members of state legislatures and various private interest groups on judges,” she said in her speech. “We hear a great deal about judges who are activists, godless secular humanists trying to impose their will on the rest of us. I always thought an activist judge was one who got up in the morning and went to work.”

She said she embarked on this campaign after a conference she and Justice Stephen G. Breyer convened in 2006 on the state of the judiciary.

“The overwhelming consensus coming out of that conference was that public education is the only long-term solution to preserving an independent judiciary and, more importantly, to preserving a robust constitutional democracy,” she said. “The better educated our citizens are, the better equipped they will be to preserve the system of government we have. And we have to start with the education of our nation’s young people. Knowledge about our government is not handed down through the gene pool. Every generation has to learn it, and we have some work to do.”

Justice O’Connor said that most citizens know very little about their government. “Two-thirds of Americans know at least one of the judges on the Fox TV show ‘American Idol,’ but less than 1 in 10 can name the chief justice of the United States Supreme Court,” she said.

And for that she did not lay responsibility solely at the feet of popular culture.

“One unintended effect of the No Child Left Behind Act, which is intended to help fund teaching of science and math to young people, is that it has effectively squeezed out civics education because there is no testing for that anymore and no funding for that,” she said. “And at least half of the states no longer make the teaching of civics and government a requirement for high school graduation. This leaves a huge gap, and we can’t forget that the primary purpose of public schools in America has always been to help produce citizens who have the knowledge and the skills and the values to sustain our republic as a nation, our democratic form of government.”

Enter the Internet. Justice O’Connor said she didn’t play games and was hardly a computer expert. But she added that she had seen in her children and especially her grandchildren how involving interactive media can be and noted that interactive education can in some ways be more effective than traditional methods.

“We’ll have them arguing real issues, real legal issues, against the computer and against each other,” she said. One of the first interactive exercises in the Our Courts program, she said, would take up First Amendment issues involving the ability of public schools to censor students’ speech, as in student newspapers or on T-shirts.

“I believe that when we learn something, a principle or concept, by doing, by having it happen to us, which you can do by that medium of a computer, and you exercise it and you make an argument and you learn, ‘Oh yes, that’s an argument that prevails,’ you learn by doing.”

That’s an argument even the most hardened game geek would approve.

source: Seth Schiesel wrote this article; NYTimes on 6/9/08 www.nytimes.com

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com  

+ Branches of Government: Web Sites

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Eduhound’s latest Ed Tech Newsletter, “Classroom Tools & Tips” offers

BRANCHES OF GOVERNMENT

• Ben’s Guide: Branches of Government (gr 3-5) – Learn about the three branches of the US Govenment: legislative, executive and judicial   www.bensguide.gpo.gov/3-5/government/branches.html
• Charting the Three Branches of Government  – Student work in groups to create charts showing the structure and functions of the three branches of government as outlined in the first three Articles of the Constitution         www.educationworld.com/a_lesson/00-2/lp2051.shtml    
• Kids in the House  – Learn about the US Government the fun way with this site.  There are games, puzzles and activities that teach you about your government  http://clerkkids.house.gov                
• Three Branches of Government: Unit   – An interactive teaching unit.  Our Three Branches of Government & Balance of Power.  Designed for grades 5-8.     http://www.trumanlibrary.org/whistlestop/teacher_lessons/3branches/front.htm
• Balancing Three Branches At Once: Our System of Checks and Balances   – Using primary source documents, students can see clear demonstrations of how one branch of our government can check another      http://edsitement.neh.gov/view_lesson_plan.asp?ID=222
• PBS:  The Democracy Project   –Helps students gain a basic understanding of the branches of the federal government and balance of power     http://pbskids.org/democracy/mygovt/capitol1.html
• Time for Kids: Branches of Govenment   – Students learn about the branches of the government    http://etgredirect.1105web.com/redirect.aspx?id=8

source: “Classroom Tools & Tips” is a free educational newsletter and is sent to my inbox.  Other sites they offer are EduHound, Awesome Clipart for Educators, EduHound Site Sets, Educator Templates, EH Schools on the Web, EH Classrooms on the Web, T.H.E. Journal, and Campus Technology.   www.eduhound.com  

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com

+ Teacher Websites: Free Resources, Lesson Plans, Worksheets, More

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Thanks to Shay Donohue for finding this great resource: First School Years from the UK!  Which led me to many, many more sites.

Visit www.firstschoolyears.com  for “free worksheets, flashcards and resources for eary years.”

Don’t forget to check back regularly, they say: new primary worksheets and other teaching and learning resources are added on a weekly basis.

You will find material under these categories: Literacy, Numeracy, Science, Geography, History, Art, Music, P.E, and General. 

First School Years was created by a small number of primary teachers to provide worksheets and resources for parents and teachers of children in the early years.  Many of the resources are available as free downloads; there is a small selection of purchasable items (in order to cover the costs of staffing, software, etc.).  

Although all links from this site are tested for quality and relevance, they say, responsibility for content on these sites lies entirely with the site’s creators.

The site led me to  Teaching Ideas, at www.teachingideas.co.uk/ .  The site’s creator, Mark Warner, is a primary school teacher.  He sees it as a place to find and share ideas. 

Topics are Literacy,  Art, Music, Early Years, Classroom Management, Math, Foreign Language, Seasonal Ideas, Science, PE, Assemblies, History, Geography, Special Needs, Displays and Time Fillers. 

Each of these subject/topic areas has a contents page (sometimes more than one).  There are thousands of ideas and resources here, says Warner.

Each of these sites will lead you to many, many more.  Go explore!

thanks to Shay Donohue for turning me on to these.

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com

+ In the Field of Natural Sciences: Great Web Site

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Rich and interesting site, with massive information and stories:  check out Science Centric at www.sciencecentric.com .  They specialize in breaking news.

Topics include physics, chemistry, geology and paleontology, biology, environment, astronomy, and health.

Today, February 6th, the “Latest Headlines” (for today only) must number 60 or more.  A wealth of information!

tutoring in Columbus OH:   Adrienne Edwards   614-579-6021   or email  aedwardstutor@columbus.rr.com