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Barat Primary Source Nexus - Barat Education Foundation
Grades
2 to 12tag(s): advertising (24), black history (125), cross cultural understanding (157), history day (40), immigration (64), journalism (72), Juneteenth (22), lincoln (60), martin luther king (43), poetry (189), presidents (121), primary sources (117), professional development (396), roosevelt (12), slavery (75), writing prompts (58)
In the Classroom
Take a look at the free professional development for using primary sources for teachers. Search for Connecting to the Common Core, where there are writing prompts for K-5 plus a link to the triangle activity. Download and use the PDF for the Thinking Triangle. Have older students research an interest and report to the class using a tool like Slides, reviewed here.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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Classic Books - Library of Congress
Grades
K to 12tag(s): book lists (161), independent reading (85), literature (217)
In the Classroom
Share the classics on your interactive whiteboard or projector. Read the stories together as a class and consider converting an excerpt into an interactive text using Active Textbook, reviewed here. You could add to it yearly, with each class taking a chapter or section to "liven up" with media. Or challenge your tech-savvy or gifted students to bring a classic to life with such a project. Share this public domain collection on your class website, blog, or wiki as a good place to find classics (FREE). Create a learning station on your classroom computers using these books.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Chronicling America - National Endowment for the Humanities and Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): 1800s (72), 1900s (73), journalism (72), news (229), newspapers (91), primary sources (117)
In the Classroom
Make history come alive in your classroom using newspapers, the perfect primary source. Enter dates from history and different locations to find local news stories and information. When studying events over an extended period of time, find resources from the beginning, middle, and end of that period to compare and contrast information from the local newspapers. Read the evolution of American popular opinion before and after Pearl Harbor, for example. Have students create "annotated pictures" to illustrate or report events using Phrase.it, reviewed here. Challenge your students to use a site such as Timeline JS, reviewed here, to create an interactive timeline of events as reported in various news sources. Timeline JS offers the option to upload and add photos, videos, audio, Tweets, and Google Maps making it interactive.Comments
Fabulous resource for American History/Social Studies. Primary sources you can search. Wasn't able to get phrases to work, but individual words do.Frances, CT, Grades: 6 - 8
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National Jukebox - Library of Congress
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): composers (16), listening (68), lyrics (15), sound (74)
In the Classroom
Introduce a class novel, a unit in the 20th century, the Great Depression, or WWII by having the class listen to music from that time period. You can also couple this site with the Old Radio World site, reviewed here, to help students get an overview of what life and entertainment was like.Challenge students to create an interactive timeline of artists during a specific musical era. First, show them how to embed media transforming their findings and then challenge them to use a site such as Timeline JS, reviewed here. Timeline JS offers the option to upload and add photos, videos, audio, Tweets, and Google Maps making it interactive.
Have your students create an online "scrapbook" of a specific composer using Smilebox, (reviewed here.) Throw out the tests and have students demonstrate what they have learned by creating a scrapbook full of information!
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Everyday Mysteries - Library of Congress
Grades
3 to 12tag(s): agriculture (49), animals (281), climate (80), energy (130), planets (112), plants (145), questioning (32), resources (88), seasons (36)
In the Classroom
Use as a reference to answer questions that students have. Use this site to also apply information learned in the classroom. For example, when discussing light energy and wavelengths, use the explanation of why it is hot in the summer and cold in the winter to apply the information about energy and wavelength. Follow the use of this site with related labs and other activities. Follow up also with more research. For example, after learning about how an hour glass works, research, report, or create other timepieces used throughout history focusing on the advantages and disadvantages as well as the limitations and changes in technology over time.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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A Teacher's Guide to Folklife Resources for K-12 Classrooms - Library of Congress
Grades
1 to 12tag(s): communities (36)
In the Classroom
Use this site as a resource in a research project, or a webquest. Be sure help your weaker readers and ESL students by sharing the vocabulary words prior to reading, either on a handout or by projecting on an interactive whiteboard and highlighting them in the text as you come to them.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Baseball and Jackie Robinson - The Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): baseball (33), civil rights (195)
In the Classroom
Use this lesson plan with your secondary students to combine history, research using primary sources, and baseball. Then have students use a tool like Zotero, reviewed here, to organize, cite, and share the resources they find. With Zotero, students can form and work in groups.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Image Detective - Library of Congress
Grades
5 to 12tag(s): logic (164), photography (126), scientific method (47), world war 1 (72)
In the Classroom
Share the photos on your interactive whiteboard or projector. Use the series of steps on this activity to teach students the skills of observation, deduction, and drawing intelligent conclusions. Have students do this activity in pairs in a computer lab. The steps are available to use on paper or printable in pdf format, so students can select their own mystery photos and create a similar activity away from the computer. ESL/ELL students can benefit from using the steps in this process. Images will help them understand material better, and they can also create their own presentations. Have students bring and exchange mystery photos; see if the conclusions they draw match the family stories the photo owners have. Science teachers can use this photo activity to teach about scientific method and, in particular, making observations. Start with the offerings on this site, then try it with more "scientific" images.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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The Wilbur and Orville Wright Papers - Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): aviation (38), flight (31), inventors and inventions (71), wright brothers (15)
In the Classroom
Students doing research on the Wright brothers will find this site invaluable. Have students work in cooperative learning groups and research a specific topic found at this site. Exchange paper and pen notes by having students to take notes with an online tool like Simplenote, reviewed here. Have them share the info they learned with their small group. Tell students to be sure to save the URL to share their notes and questions. Simplenote allows you to access and update across all devices. Enhance learning by challenging students to modify their technology use and create a multimedia presentation using a tool such as Zeemaps, reviewed here. Zeemaps allows students to create audio recordings AND choose a location (on a map) where the story takes place. Alternatively, students could use Adobe Creative Cloud Express for Education, reviewed here, to enhance their learning and transform technology use by creating an interactive poster for their presentation.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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American Labor Studies Center - ALSC and Share My Lesson
Grades
5 to 12tag(s): history day (40), labor day (5)
In the Classroom
Offer a lesson from this site when planning student projects for National History Day or in conjunction with Labor Day. Use this site to have students compare labor issues in several states. Show students a timeline of labor history from one area and have them create a similar one for their own state or region using a site such as Sutori, reviewed here, that can include images, text, and collaboration. Show selected videos (on your interactive whiteboard or projector). Share authentic photographs from this site when discussing employment topics or the history of unions. This site can also provide context when reading literature based in the Great Depression or industrialization era.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Poet at Work: Walt Whitman Notebooks 1850s-1860s - Library of Congress
Grades
8 to 12tag(s): civil war (134), lincoln (60), literature (217)
In the Classroom
Use this online exhibit for an in-depth study of Walt Whitman. Have cooperative learning groups investigate one of the notebooks available at this site and create a multimedia presentation to share their findings. Have students create podcasts using a site such as PodOmatic (reviewed here). Or create a class wiki dedicated to the poetry of Walt Whitman. Not comfortable with wikis? Have no wiki worries - check out the TeachersFirst's Wiki Walk-Through .Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Library of Congress Read.gov - Library of Congress
Grades
K to 12A special feature of the site is an exclusive story, called "The Exquisite Corpse Adventure." The Exquisite Corpse was a game in which someone would start a story, fold over their part, and the next person would add to the story and on it would go until the last person ended the story. For this Exquisite Corpse, Jon Scieszka started the story and passed it on to Katherine Patterson, who passed it on . . . and so it goes for 18 episodes. The entire story took a year to write to the finish.
tag(s): authors (103), digital storytelling (142), writing (315)
In the Classroom
Check out "The Exquisite Corpse Adventure" and have students listen to the stories. As a challenge ask students to look at the differences in writing style for each of the authors. Project a chart about the plot and the writing style on your interactive whiteboard or projector, and have students list the differences and similarities in writing style. Another idea for an activity is to have the students read the poem "If" by Rudyard Kipling (not found on this site) and then have them read the very touching national contest winner letter to the author about his poem found here. Students could then write their own letters to an author of a favorite book or poem. Extend student learning and have students create podcasts to read their letters to the authors using a site such as podOmatic, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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StoryCorps - Dave Isay
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): questioning (32), writing (315)
In the Classroom
Grandparent's day is in September. What better gift to a grandparent than to be able to spend time with their grandchild and tell them a story about an important time in their lives? Of course, you'll want to prepare students with some interviewing skills and questions before they interview their grandparents, and show them how to record the interview with some type of recorder (tape recorder, cell phone, video camera, etc). This recording can then be submitted to StoryCorps and it will then reside at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress. Students can also interview parents about their first memories of school, and what they remember about the grade that the student is currently in. Share these interviews during the first week or month of the school year. Not only can these interviews be submitted to StoryCorp, but students could then do a write up of their interviews and publish them in a classroom book of memories. Have students create online books to share with the class about their interview. Use a tool such as Bookemon, reviewed here. Or have students narrate a photo of the person they interviewed using a site such as ThingLink, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Great Debates in American History - Peter Pappas
Grades
9 to 12tag(s): bill of rights (28), constitution (87), foreign policy (12), immigration (64), migration (44)
In the Classroom
Teachers do not need to start from scratch to develop the themes, nor do they need to be using Boorstin's book to use these activities. Use these handouts and themes to prompt traditional debates or challenge student teams to prepare position videos or multimedia presentations using resource images and texts both from these files and from public domain files and other resources from the Library of Congress. Invite your students to choose from the many multimedia tools on the web to present their position. See the TeachersFirst Edge for reviewed suggestions including Image Annotator, SchoolTube. or TeacherTube for videos, or podomatic for audio-only arguments. Embed the products on your class blog or wiki and let classes vote on the debate "winners."Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Baseball Cards 1887-1914 - Library of Congress
Grades
3 to 10tag(s): baseball (33)
In the Classroom
Share this link on your class website for your baseball card collectors! Use the site to teach about the early days of baseball. Have younger students create a Venn Diagram comparing baseball today with baseball of the 1880s. Have older students create a blog entry from a famous baseball player of the past.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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By Popular Demand: Jackie and other Baseball Highlights 1860s-1960s - Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): 1800s (72), 1900s (73), africa (137), african american (111), baseball (33), black history (125)
In the Classroom
Provide your students with this website and a good 20-minutes of exploration time. Then, enhance learning by having your class write journal entries through the eyes of the African-American baseball stars. If you are beginning the process of integrating technology, replace paper journals and have students create blogs (digital journals) sharing their learning and understanding using Telegra.ph, reviewed here. This blog creator requires no registration. With Telegra.ph have students click on an icon to upload related images, add YouTube or Vimeo, or Twitter links. Or divide the class into cooperative learning groups. Extend learning by having each group research a specific time period and share their findings with the class using an infographic tool created with Canva Infographic Maker, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Baseball and Jackie Robinson: Early Baseball Pictures - Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): africa (137), african american (111), baseball (33)
In the Classroom
Share these authentic pictures with your students! Use this site to teach about baseball history, African-American history, and more.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Veterans History Project - Library of Congress
Grades
9 to 12To fully experience this site, you need Adobe Acrobat and Real Player. You can get both from the TeachersFirst Toolbox page.
tag(s): afghanistan (8), iraq (27), korea (19), resources (88), veterans (20), vietnam (35), world war 1 (72), world war 2 (149)
In the Classroom
Primary documents are a vital link between the students of today and the experiences of real people from the past. Students can access these interviews and accounts through searching by time period (WWI through the present), branch of service, gender, or POW status. As your class studies a particular conflict, assign students different accounts to research and then have them "portray" that person in a panel discussion about the war. Compare the experiences of persons filling similar roles across conflicts. Examine gender differences or the differences between those serving in the Navy and the Army. For a powerful long-term project, download the site's "field kit" and consider gathering new accounts for the project in your community.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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I Do Solemnly Swear...Presidential Inaugurations - The Library of Congress
Grades
4 to 12tag(s): inauguration (6), presidents (121), washington (25)
In the Classroom
Why not feature an "inauguration a day" during the week prior to the current inauguration? Use the many images to create a Lino, reviewed here, of inauguration information for students to dig though. With older students, have cooperative learning groups create their own Lino. All of the Library of Congress resources are in the public domain, so students can USE these images to create new products, such as a photomontage of an inauguration topic: bands, dress, buzzwords, etc.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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African-American Soldiers in the Civil War - Library of Congress
Grades
6 to 12tag(s): africa (137), african american (111), civil war (134), lincoln (60)
In the Classroom
The site could be the basis for dozens of lesson ideas, as well as an ideal starting point for a research paper. Have students view authentic letters from Abraham Lincoln on your interactive whiteboard or projector. Challenge students to write a letter (or a blog) in response to Lincoln's letter.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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