Teaching American History

DECEMBER 17, 2024

Excerpts for discussion, a pre-webinar discussion board, and links to webinar recordings and relevant primary sources will be made available to registrants. Our webinars meet monthly on select Saturday mornings from 10.45am12pm ET. hours of professional development.

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources American History Professional Development History 52

The Hechinger Report

AUGUST 13, 2024

Patty Topliffe, who teaches social studies at Woodstock High School in Vermont, said teaching vocabulary and other literacy skills to her students helps them understand primary source documents. Credit: Image provided by Patty Topliffe Poor reading skills are a nationwide issue.

High School 145

High School Teaching Primary Sources K-12 145

Teaching American History

MARCH 11, 2024

As Publications Manager at Teaching American History , I frequently hear the following from our teacher partners: I love teaching with primary sources! My district has dropped our textbook and we are switching to primary sources. There is a dizzying number of websites out there that promote the use of primary sources.

Library 105

Library Primary Sources American History Social Studies 105

Catlin Tucker

AUGUST 5, 2023

Historical Events: When studying historical events, people, or places encourage students to analyze primary sources. Media and Current Events: Use this with news articles or multimedia sources. Historical Perspectives: When studying historical events, encourage students to analyze multiple sources and perspectives.

Primary Sources 130

Primary Sources Critical Thinking Education 130

ED Surge

NOVEMBER 1, 2023

I knew of ChatGPT from reading articles online, but I didn't know how it worked. Especially in a social studies classroom where I’m working with a lot of primary sources, sometimes it's hard to figure out how to break down that language so that English learners are still accessing the same content but not losing the academic vocabulary.

Primary Sources 136

Primary Sources Lesson Plan Professional Development EdTech 136

Teaching American History

AUGUST 6, 2024

Background readings, a pre-webinar discussion board, and links to webinar recordings and relevant primary sources will be made available to registrants. Teaching American History’s exhibit, The Election of 1912 , recounts the history of this three-way election with data, maps, images, historical essays and primary sources.

Primary Sources 72

Primary Sources American History Professional Development History 72

Dangerously Irrelevant

MAY 31, 2017

Like many teachers, I would tap into the the Library of Congress, which would give me tips for teaching with primary sources , including quarterly journal articles on topics such as integrating historical and geographic thinking.

Social Studies 76

Social Studies Teaching Archiving Geography 76

Thrive in Grade Five

MARCH 9, 2019

We must rely on primary sources to learn about this historical period. Early American Government Journal Prompts The Articles of Confederation failed because the central government was too weak. Why might a colonist have chosen to remain neutral while people around him/her were choosing the Loyalist or Patriot point of view?

Social Studies 130

Social Studies Government American History Primary Sources 130

ACRE

SEPTEMBER 16, 2022

In the classroom, educators can explore a variety of Constitutional resources with learners by reading primary sources, reviewing changes to the Constitution throughout American History, and analyzing historical arguments relating to the founding of the United States and the Constitution today. Government: PP.2.USG.2 Constitution SC.3.USG.5

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources Civics Archiving Government 52

Teaching American History

JANUARY 16, 2024

Edited by Jeremy Bailey and intended as a secondary and post-secondary document reader, American Presidency contains 39 introduced and edited primary sources, discussion questions, and a thematic table of contents. Article Two states, “The executive power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.”

Teaching 52

Teaching Primary Sources American History History 52

History Tech

MAY 24, 2023

Recent news articles are highlighting a request to ban access by Florida elementary students to Amanda Gorman’s poem A Hill We Climb. The reason for the request? “it is not educational and have indirectly hate messages.” ” The specific passage that “have indirectly hate messages”?

Primary Sources 100

Primary Sources Education History 100

The Hechinger Report

DECEMBER 27, 2023

Outside of local government and a prison, the primary source of jobs are the farms that have existed since before the Civil War. A 1988 newspaper article notes Issaquena’s 13 public schools closed, too. Do we want the kids to stay? What they gonna stay here for?” Unless his grandchildren want to work on a farm, it’s hard to say.

Primary Sources 105

Primary Sources Public School Economics Tradition 105

Studies Weekly

JULY 9, 2024

One school in Connecticut reported that many of their teachers had to start the 2022 school year with the basics — showing students how to hold a book, or reviewing the ABCs and letter sounds, according to a 2022 New York Times article by Dana Goldstein. Hogan in the New York Times article.

Heritage 52

Heritage Social Studies Primary Sources Lesson Plan 52

Studies Weekly

SEPTEMBER 6, 2024

They love playing the game after reading an article online or in the magazine. So the kids were really into that project that we came up with. And it was just again, very easy to use, very engaging. The kids enjoyed it. So everybody’s engaged and we give the thumbs up, thumbs down.

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources Social Studies Lesson Plan Professional Development 52

ED Surge

JULY 7, 2022

So when one student says she plans to study the Bermuda Triangle, the professor recommends that she ask a librarian—maybe the one who talked to the class earlier in the semester—to help her curate a reading list of secondary sources. You don’t want to read 30 articles,” the professor says, “you want to read seven.”

Library 114

Library Psychology Primary Sources Humanities 114

Students of History

JANUARY 3, 2023

For example, I will have students read an online article and complete an interactive notebook graphic organizer based on what they read. One way to do this is to incorporate a variety of primary sources into lessons, including documents and speeches from underrepresented groups.

Social Studies 52

Social Studies Teaching Historic Sites Primary Sources 52

Studies Weekly

FEBRUARY 5, 2024

An Interactive Notebook allows students to organize and connect their learning by writing notes, drawing pictures, and pasting in articles and printable worksheets. I love using these companion printables with my lessons with the option of students using them into their interactive notebooks. What is an Interactive Notebook?

Artifacts 52

Artifacts Primary Sources Lesson Plan Social Studies 52

Studies Weekly

MAY 28, 2024

Texas Superintendent Quintin Shepherd told the New York Times in a 2023 article, “If kids are not here, they are not forming relationships,” he said. Absent classmates negatively impact all students, regardless of performance level. Student absenteeism is even tied to the rise in emotional and behavioral problems.

Heritage 52

Heritage Primary Sources K-12 Social Studies 52

Teaching American History

JUNE 18, 2024

One of the benefits to learning through primary sources is developing an ability to understand others as they would understand themselves, so set aside time to make sure you reveal this ability in your responses. For what purpose was it written? Who was its intended audience? What effect did it have?

American History 52

American History Primary Sources Government History 52

Teaching American History

NOVEMBER 20, 2023

For a few hours, teachers can dive into the content of primary source documents through a discussion with colleagues facilitated by a scholar. These are free to attend for all social studies teachers and can be in historical locations, school districts, and educational service centers.

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources American History Social Studies History 52

Teaching American History

NOVEMBER 14, 2023

A Teacher’s Influence “Because of MAHG, I’ve begun using way more primary sources,” Livingston says. She decorates her classroom with red, white and blue crepe paper and hands out pocket Constitutions, telling her government students that “this will be your textbook for the rest of the year.”

Teaching 52

Teaching Geography Ancestry Primary Sources 52

Teaching American History

JULY 9, 2024

On Independence Day, we watched a “ bipartisan reading of the Declaration of Independence ” organized by legislator and educator Sean Brennan , representative to Ohio’s House of Representatives for District 14.

American History 52

American History Civics History Government 52

Teaching American History

APRIL 16, 2024

He began looking for primary sources to flesh out the story of history, which led him to TAH.org and to its Master’s program centered around reading and discussing documents. All of those sources show Jefferson viewing slavery as immoral and destructive to both races.” That’s what teaching through primary sources makes possible.”

Primary Sources 98

Primary Sources American History History Government 98

Studies Weekly

MARCH 3, 2025

According to an article by Youki Terada called Understanding a Teachers Long-Term Impact, teachers have the greatest impact on student achievement compared to any other aspect of schooling. You know the heartbreak of seeing your students struggle with things that can’t be fixed inside the classroom. But, still, you try.

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources Lesson Plan Social Studies Professional Development 52

The Hechinger Report

APRIL 18, 2017

Another online resource that has seen a spike in use since the 2016 campaign is Newsela , which compiles both primary sources, such as presidential speeches, and topical articles from publications such as the Washington Post , Scientific American and the Associated Press, and then adjusts the reading level of the texts to grades two through 12.

Civics 86

Civics Education K-12 Primary Sources 86

Zinn Education Project

JANUARY 8, 2024

History class I teach a lesson about the African American experience in WWII using primary sources. Students are shocked to read the quotes from articles written by the African American newspapers that show a completely different perspective of the war (abroad and domestically) than that described in textbooks.

History Education 52

History Education History Education Social Studies 52

Anthropology News

JUNE 27, 2024

I suggested students start playing with ChatGPT and provided a set of articles about how LLMs work, including how to prompt them to generate comparisons or lists and how to cite AI tools. This particular tool allows users to upload their own documents—course readings, research articles, archives, etc.—so respectively. respectively.

Anthropology 105

Anthropology Archaeology Pedagogy Archiving 105

Teaching American History

FEBRUARY 6, 2024

In October, Czarnecki’s article “Migrant Music” was published in The Chronicles of Oklahoma. Probing the Historical Portrait of Migrant Farmworkers Czarnecki’s article examines the popular portrait of midwestern farmworkers who migrated to California in the 1930s, a portrait drawn by historians, folklore collectors, and Steinbeck’s novel.

Social Studies 98

Social Studies Research Archiving American History 98

The Hechinger Report

AUGUST 7, 2023

You can’t skip the slavery unit, or you can’t think to skip Harriet Jacobs’ primary source of her narratives of a slave girl, where she’s talking about being sexually harassed by slaveholder,” she said. “I don’t know how you really cherry-pick what you’d like to cover in an AP class.

History 98

History American History Teaching K-12 98

The Hechinger Report

DECEMBER 20, 2016

Can middle-school students spot “native advertising” (ads masquerading as articles) on a crowded news website? Will students investigate the sources of controversial claims? Can high-school kids check the authenticity of an alarming image posted on Facebook?

K-12 99

K-12 Primary Sources Civics Social Studies 99

Leah Cleary

JANUARY 28, 2024

For more on this, check out this article in Slate. Our prompt was: “Please summarize the key points of this primary source for me.” I’m no Pollyanna, and I’m painfully aware of the destructive potential of AI, but I do see a silver lining to this storm cloud.

Tutoring 52

Tutoring Primary Sources History World History 52

Zinn Education Project

SEPTEMBER 30, 2024

I started by reading the article and lesson aloud to my students. After reading the article we did a number of activities to help students learn more about climate change and environmental activism. I was really impressed with the way my students responded to this article and lesson.

History 52

History Teaching Social Studies High School 52

Teaching American History

FEBRUARY 11, 2025

This document is excerpted from our CDC volume Race and Civil Rights , which contains classroom-ready primary sources, introductory essays and discussion questions. Supreme Court ruling that invalidated state-mandated segregation on interstate buses. Download or purchase your copy today from our bookstore !

Primary Sources 64

Primary Sources American History Library History 64

Teaching American History

MAY 14, 2024

Thus, many of the primary sources after the ratification of the Constitution concern various rules governing debate, which bills can be sent to the floor, what powers the committees will have, and so forth. But the manner in which the rules are set up determines who wields the power in Congress.

Primary Sources 52

Primary Sources Government Library American History 52

Students of History

JANUARY 25, 2022

6th insurrection at the Capitol (I have a lesson for this here ), I came across an article about the only "successful" coup or insurrection in US History. After reviewing the sources, they will need to decide if this event is best defined as a riot, uprising, coup d’état, or insurrection. Following the Jan.

Lesson Plan 52

Lesson Plan History Primary Sources Government 52

Zinn Education Project

MARCH 7, 2024

It’s pretty fascinating, and there’s an article that we can share with you all later where you can see Du Bois taking on Hoffman. You are often limited in your ability to teach certain topics by the dependence upon primary sources rather than secondary sources. This interview was lightly edited for length and clarity.

Primary Sources 98

Primary Sources History Economics K-12 98

ASHP CML

MARCH 3, 2025

This week, administrator and multimedia producer David Scheckel shares a primary source. Stay tuned for more documents in the coming weeks both on our website and on our primary source database, Social History for Every Classroom.

Primary Sources 40

Primary Sources Archiving American History Government 40