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This site has almost anything one would want having to do with the United States government. It is one of the most extensive sites relating to the U.S. government. It has information for students as low as kindergarten and as high as seniors. It seems rare to find a site that truely covers this range of ages as well as this one does. For the elementary teacher and the high school history teacher this will be a helpful site to use.

This site is part of the Eisenhower Presidential Library. It would be extremely useful for civil rights units. This is a nice collection of some of Eisenhower's most important correspondence during the Little Rock High School integration crisis. It is also neat to read them because they are scans of the actual typed documents and not just transcriptions. It seems more authentic when students can see the real thing. His notes, diaries, telegrams, letters and press releases really help to show how Eisenhower handled the situation. (Note: There is even an exchange of letters between Jackie Robinson and the president in which they discuss how blacks need to be patient for civil rights)

This site is a large collection of primary documents related to the Cold War.  There are presidential letters, decrees, memorandums, and meeting notes.  There are also documents pertaining to Hiroshima. This site would be great for a high school history or government class to use when studying the Cold War. 

This is a great site for upper elementary through high school. There are numerous learning experiences from exploring a town which has been cleaned up, to learning to help the city budget enough to follow through with their plans of cleaning up the environment. There are activity areas as well as teacher information sections. I will be sharing this with the middle school science teachers I know.

This site is filled with information about the environment. Although it appears to be geared for younger children there is a link for middle school and high school students, too. This site can be used by science and art teachers alike. There is something for everyone here.

An incredible number of primary sources can be found on this site regarding our first president. I was impressed with the "Educational Resources" that take some primary sources and scaffold teachers' use of them with students in grades 3-5 and middle/high school.

The Harry S. Truman Library website has a plethora of primary sources in audio, video and government documents. The videos alone contain 500 films from 1934 to 1984, Many feature Truman in some way. Their online documents are organized by important topics. For instance, there is a collection of primary source/govt docs relating to the atomic bombings in Japan. One is even a letter from Einstein to Truman. These documents would be very useful in connection with the 8th grade Nebraska social studies curriculum, where they discuss WWII. The collection on Japanese Americans in WWII would also be great for the high school American History courses.

A project of Emory University, this website contains database information for slave ship voyages across the Atlantic. It has tables, timelines, essays, maps and images related to the slave trade plus an African names database. There is a section with lesson plans for middle/high school level students and additional web resources. This website humanizes the transportation history of slavery in the Americas.

On a note of local interest for all OPS teachers, the Media Technology Center Library and the Joslyn Art Museum have worked together to provide classroom access to these historical, informational traveling exhibits. From Douglas County History to Native American History, call 557-2500 and have the trunks delivered to your classrooms to use for two full weeks. I work in this department one day a week -- and was totally thrilled to be introduced to these marvelous sets of get-your-hands-on primary sources. They can be used in primary grades through high school.

This interesting site provides photographs, letters, newspaper articles, quotes, and famous speeches all related to the life of Gandhi. While the text is probably best suited to middle and high school students, younger students could use other parts of the site to learn about Gandhi for biography projects or studies of passive resistance.

This site is great for K-12 students. It contains current event articles on a large scale of topics to keep high school students engaged in the world around them. There is a special "Kids" page with interactive games and lessons for teachers. This is a phenomenal site for educators.

The MedlinePlus website would be very valuable for students in middle and high school grades doing research about diseases and health related topics. MedlinePlus provides health information and documents from the world's largest medical library, the National Library of Medicine. MedlinePlus is updated daily and has current reliable information on over 800 diseases and conditions. I especially found interesting the video footage of numerous actual surgeries narrated by doctors to treat major medical conditions.

NOAA has primary resource collections on the Gulf oil spill, hurricanes, El Nino, tides and sea turtles. I really like the way they feature current topics of importance in the news right now. This would be a great way to teach media literacy to our students. They also have a feature activity section called "Data in the Classroom" where students can make real world connections with real data related to El Nino, sea level, and water quality.

This site is an excellent weather website with resource collections divided into the following areas: ocean and coasts, climate, weather and atmosphere, marine life (sea turtles), freshwater (water cycle), and special topics. There data visualizations for weather events, lots of maps and charts for middle/high school students to analyze weather events, water cycle lessons, and a section with activities for teachers to bring real world data into the classroom.

A huge collection of resources for career exploration geared toward K-8, but with the changes happening in the world of work, adults and high school students could benefit from this resource as well. This site also has resources for educators to help children explore careers.

This patent drawing by Eli Whitney for his cotton gin could be used at the elementary level when taking about the impact of Whitney's invention, or at the senior high level when discussing patent applications.

This website is another portal with many links that are organized very well. This website has 2 links that I would use most often and they are the Ben's Guide to the Government link, which is a very kid-friendly website that talks about the U.S. government, and it has a link to primary early government documents like the Constitution and Bill of Rights, etc. This site may not be as useful in the elementary grades as it would in high school, but the links I mentioned above would be good for 5th and 6th grade students.

An excellent resource for students researching the Holocaust. Probably more useful for the high school student who wants transcripts/interviews/actual documents from world leaders who were involved in policy decisions during this time. PBS, a reliable trusted resource.

The Nobel home web site offers a generous supply of first hand information not only on the prize itself, but of the many men and women who have earned the prestigious prize. The entry here is of Herman Hesse, his autobiography sketch in his own words. The home page offers links to all winners in all areas, the sciences, literature, etc. A great resource for librarians as well as students, mostly appealing to high school and up, wanting more specific information on Nobel Laureates as well as the origination of the prize.

This drawing submitted by Eli Whitney for his cotton gin patent application could be used at the elementary level when discussing Whitney's invention and its impact. Students will be able to see what a cotton gin looks like and how it operates. This document could also be used at the senior high level when discussing patent applications.

Wow, who knew. Dr. Seuss was the chief editorial cartoonist for the New York paper for two years. This is an archive of the political cartoons he drew. This would be a really good site for middle school and high school students. It would put a different twist on Dr. Seuss Week for them.