Group items tagged

This is the Simithsonian website. A person can search past, present and future exhibition displays. You can also search their encyclopedia as well as search their collections.

The Smithsonian Institution offers access to primary sources and other resources on a wide variety of topics, including military and political history. http://www.si.edu/

This website focuses on the 1930s and the New Deal which was passed under the F.D.R.'s administration. Using a collection of letters, newspaper articles, photos, and documents, it has autobiographical stories and interviews about living during that time period. For grades 7-12, lesson plans and discussion panels are included in this resource, making it great for an American History class.

The New Deal Network is a website that focuses on the history of The Great Depression. Documents, photos, speeches, and articles can be found for teachers and students to use when researching this era of American History.

Through audio files, this website is a collection of speeches in United States History from various political figures and activists . These sources give a glimpse into events and viewpoints in our history such as the Civil Rights Movement or the Challenger's disastrous flight. Middle School students will be able to listen to what was really said by that individual and what it meant for that time period.

American Rhetoric allows students to take a step into the past and feel as though they are living in a particular time period. I can imagine a class closing their eyes and listening to the powerful words of JFK in his "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech, or the determination in Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech. Transcripts of each speech are also available on the site, as well as photos that help the students visualize the speaker and the time period. Extremely motivating!

This site is a collection of songs from early American History, including the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, and westward expansion after the war. This would be useful for a unit on any of those eras, especially for a music teacher, however it could be used by a classroom teacher or school librarian as well. I think listening to music from the past really helps students get a better feel for what it was like then. They may be able to picture that time and place in their mind a little clearer while listening to music they would have heard then.

The Nebraska Partnership for American History Education provides a variety of primary source resources by theme, time period, photos (1850-1938), and bibliographic collections. This site is useful for Nebraska history, United States history, women's history, Native & African American histories. It would definitely be appropriate for intermediate elementary students through high school students and all educators (lesson plans can be found here).