Group items tagged

War rations is a concept that is difficult for students to understand. This site uses a painting of people shopping at a grocery store during WWII and makes it interactive. Visitors to the site can examine the picture and click on details to learn more about what is happening in the photo. For instance, it shows pictures and explainations of actual ration booklets, propaganda, posters, grocery prices, etc. There are also nice "Did you know" buttons to learn more and all the primary sources can be downloaded and printed as PDF's.

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 is a primary source document . . . in Spanish! It is purported to be (as I'm no hispanohablante) a letter from 1570 that "describes the settlement at Ajacàn and requests that Juan de Hinistrosa, the Royal Treasurer of Cuba, send a ship of grain to sustain the settlement." This would be great for Spanish class, obviously, and then maybe for world history after the other students translate it. :-)

This website is a great source to go to find information about Nebraska. It is the Nebraska Historical Society website. The site has many links that will lead to a wealth of information on the state of Nebraska

This internet site provides a variety of resources for learning about the state history of Nebraska. Searching through the wide historical collections online, I discovered a wealth of photographs, maps and even information about individuals and families. The society does provide a specific "Teacher Materials" link. For fourth grade Nebraska social studies standards!

The American Memory collection is such a treasure trove, including this old photograph of Sioux City (as well as many other Iowa towns). This would be really useful in a unit about local history or even for younger students, talking about communities and maps. Students would find it interesting to match up today's view of the city with this one.

This is a wonderful source when studying our 16th president, Abraham Lincoln. It tells about his life and has over 20,000 documents in it.

This is a great source when studying southern history, literature or culture. In this source you will find slave and other first-person narratives of the South, as well as a collection of southern literature. It could be used when studying the Civil War to get more of a southern point of view.

Site includes maps, pictures, thematic packets for teachers and more. Teachers are able to navagate throughout the site to access all aspects of history. Site also provides sources for professional training and outside resources. Site provides training on how to use primary sources.

Library of Congress Teachers Page, with links to using primary sources, etc. The LOC has created "Themed Resources" that include specific, common topics into easy to use sets. The combined resources include grouped primary source sets, lessson plans, exhibitions, etc. Love IT! Also provides user with pre-made LOC professional development sessions called "Teaching with Primary Sources."

This site is full of information that can be used to teach about the Constitution on Constitution Day, or any day when referring to the U.S. Constitution. There are lesson plans that can be used and other valuable ideas to help students learn about this important document.

This is a fabulous site filled with tons of information that could be used when studying history from colonization to the Revolutionary War. There are timelines, maps and documents put into the appropriate category you are looking for during this period of American History. Great site!

The map lover in me is enthralled with this website. The site contains detailed historical maps organized by themes like "Environmental History" and "The Historical Geography of Transportation". Each map then has links to lesson plans organized by K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12 with links to additional, applicable primary sources. The site also includes helpful tips for teachers and a useful glossary.

Site's front page uses timeline to break history of US into 7 eras; ie 1700-1815, 1815-1860 and so on. You can search by era, or by topic. Topics include Civil War, Holocaust, Vietnam Memorial and more. Documents can be zoomed in on enough to read legible writing.

Easy to navigate. Primary sources include court cases, historic newspapers, landmark document, and social history. Uses drop down for topic selection. Also includes lesson plans, multimedia, science and technology.

This appealing site offers an interactive online art zone for projects in painting, photography and collage. Exploration games guide observations of masterpieces in painting and sculpture. Link to NGA exhibitions.

This site is a small collection within the American Memory Project website created by the Library of Congress. What makes it nice, is that it easily brings together many important documents that help provide insights into the African American experience from the slave trade to the Civil Rights era. Sometimes the larger American Memory site can be hard to navigate. This smaller sub-collection has nicely collected the highlights of the African American collection.

I heard about this site when I saw Pam Berger at the Heartland School Library Conference this summer. This sites lets you design your own interactive primary source activity. You can create digital movies, comic strips and rebus stories. Teachers can create and manage activities for a class. The site is simple enough that students (or student groups) could even create their own activities to present to their class. The site also operates completely online and requires no downloads.

This site is presented by the Virginia Center for Digital History and the University of Virginia Library. It showcases two communities during the Civil War. One count was in the north, and one was in the south. It provides an interesting case study of life on both sides of the war. Students and teachers can use this site to compare maps, letters, diaries, newspaper articles, speeches and records in both communities. It also organizes the war into three eras: the eve of war, the war years, and the aftermath.

Here's an interesting little tidbit, a personal letter and then newspaper column (fully transcribed) about fighting the Spanish Flu of 1918. Could be useful in health class?

This site has a lot of primary source documents about Wisconsin history, but which certainly pertain to the rest of the Midwest, too. The one linked to is of an 1838 newspaper article about the first careful investigation of effigy mounds undertaken in Wisconsin. Certainly this could be useful when studying Native American history, state history, or geography.

Next time you are in Chicago, go to the Oriental Museum at the University of Chicago - incredible! But until then, check out their website for images of artifacts, maps, video interviews with archaeologists, and lesson plans.