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This is the front page of the Smithsonian American Art Museum. This website is a lot more than just the site for an art museum. Inside, you can find information about current exhibits, collections, upcoming events, teacher resources, and much more. Over the next few months there are also some special events for high school teachers, including one on October 16th titled "Teaching History through Art." I think it is easy, in most high schools, to forget the importance of art in our society and how it can give a glimpse of our cultural history.

How might teachers use this site?

Art can define elements of our history. I would probably be better able to answer this question if I could attend the seminar on October 16th. Taking a look at a few of the featured exhibitions on the main page of the site, we can already make some history connections. Consider the current Norman Rockwell exhibition. Rockwell provides excellent visualizations of idealized, traditional American society in a broad period, roughly 1913 to shortly before his death in 1978. Rockwell paintings could be used in any kind of lesson plan dealing with either of the World Wars, the Boy Scouts, or the rise of middle-class America in the 1950s. Another lead exhibit on the page is titled The Pond, by an artist whose name currently escapes me. Taking a look at the photos of a pond somewhere in Maryland in the 1980s, the pictures tell a story of forgotten parts of the American wild that are surrounded by urbanization and industry.

Great lesson plans! "EDSITEment is a partnership among the National Endowment for the Humanities, Verizon Foundation, and the National Trust for the Humanities. EDSITEment offers a treasure trove for teachers, students, and parents searching for high-quality material on the Internet in the subject areas of literature and language arts, foreign languages, art and culture, and history and social studies. All websites linked to EDSITEment have been reviewed for content, design, and educational impact in the classroom. They cover a wide range of humanities subjects, from American history to literature, world history and culture, language, art, and archaeology, and have been judged by humanities specialists to be of high intellectual quality. EDSITEment is not intended to represent a complete curriculum in the humanities, nor does it prescribe any specific course of study."

The AP section was very helpful. Thanks for keeping me in mind. :)

FREE is a website pool of teaching and learning resources from various branches of the federal government. From the website: "More than 1,500 federally supported teaching and learning resources are included from dozens of federal agencies. New sites are added regularly. . . . FREE is maintained by Peter Kickbush and Kirk Winters, Office of Communications and Outreach, with support from the Development Services Team in the Office of the Chief Information Officer, U.S. Department of Education."

This site is amazing, I was just playing around with it and I am definitely using some of the resources for my unit. :)

"Upcoming Professional Development Opportunities Teaching History Through Art Date: Saturday, October 16, 2010 Time: 10:00a.m.-1:00p.m. Cost: $10 (more information) Learn how to use artworks as primary sources to teach American history and critical thinking. This workshop brings together the highlights of the collection used in American Art's history tours, including Young America, Lure of the West, and A House Divided. Come and get activity ideas to use in preparation for a tour or as stand-alone classroom lessons. This workshop will be offered again on February 12, 2011 and is available, by request, for groups of fifteen or more teachers. E-mail AmericanArtEducation@si.edu for more information."

I can't make this event, but it could be really interesting!

The National Postal Museum provides several curriculum guides for teachers to use to teach about the history of the postal service, stamps, letter writing, and other historical events relating to the history of communication.

This article examines how the State of Texas went about designing new standards for history government and social studies. Also, there are comments that people have made for and against the new standards.

I just came across this article in the most recent issue of the Smithsonian Magazine. While it describes law enforcement officials being taught the skills of describing in great detail what they see, I thought it provided an interesting example of how helpful looking at works of art can be. While many students might at first not feel confident in describing works of art in the classroom, I think this shows how applicable the skills can be.... not only to use them as a starting point for a history discussion but for other things as well.

This is sort of a basic review of how and why we as teachers might use film in the classroom. This is my first post on this issue; I am searching for some more in-depth sites that might have models for lesson plans. Many sites have lesson plans based around a specific film; a site that provides lesson plan templates that are applicable across a wide variety of films would be more applicable/useful. However, the comments made here by Paris provide a good base from which to start thinking about the idea.

"Collections of primary resources compatible with the Common Core State Standards - historical documents, literary texts, and works of art - thematically organized with notes and discussion questions."

Site provides activities on history and culture, straight from the Smithsonian Institute. Primarily geared toward elementary students, the Institute provides lesson plans from art to war to language.

What makes the resources "excellent"?

The Metropolitan Museum of Art in NY, NY, has scans of a large amount of their collection online. This can be really useful to help students visualize a period of history and make connections between the history they are learning and the people, places, and events involved.

Specific ideas about how the material might be used?

I first thought I would combine my love of art and history by someday working on projects like this.... creating teaching kits or sets of images that can be used in classroom education. This one provides images for classrooms or libraries based on American-inspired themes.

Slavery and African Americans in Antebellum America  |  Causes of the War  |  Abraham Lincoln and the Course of the War  |  The Art and Literature of the Civil War  |  Reconstruction and After in Art and Culture  |  Related EDSITEment Websites

Lesson plans and activities about art.

Michelle Lee, a middle school teacher in Michigan, wrote this interdisciplinary lesson plan for teaching the American Revolution. There are some great ideas for incorporating geography, math, sociology, language arts, phys ed, and music into the social studies/history classroom. -----------Once you click the link, hit the full text button on the right hand side.-----------