Math, Science, History, and Search Lessons Based on Baseball
Baseball is my favorite professional sport to watch. The Red Sox have been my favorite team for as long as I can remember which is why I still occasionally look through the baseball cards I collected as a kid. And going to last year’s Hall of Fame induction ceremony for David Ortiz was one of […]
A Free Smithsonian Webinar Tomorrow
Some of my high school history students often took a while to understand the idea that just because a document is an old primary source it doesn’t automatically mean that source is infallible or even an accurate representation of events. They still needed to account for context and the potential for an author’s bias among […]
A New Primary Source Crowd-sourcing Project from the Library of Congress
By the People is a crowd-sourcing project that enlists the help of the public to transcribe thousands of primary source documents that are housed by and have been scanned by the Library of Congress. Over the years there have been collections of documents from the American Civil War, papers from the American Revolution, presidential papers, documents […]
The WWII Rumor Project – An Activity in Learning Through Primary Sources
A handful of years ago the Library of Congress launched a crowd sourcing project called By the People. The purpose of the project is to enlist the help of the public to transcribe thousands of primary source documents that are housed by and have been scanned by the Library of Congress. Over the years there have […]
The Essays and Madness of King George III
I recently started reading The Last King of America by Andrew Roberts. It is an extensively detailed biography of King George III. I’m about fifty pages into as I write this blog post. So far it has been an enjoyable read although not one that I would deem a “quick read” or “light reading.” I […]
The Homestead Act and a Research Prompt
Last Friday the document of the day on the Today’s Document from the National Archives blog was a copy of the Homestead Act passed on May 20, 1862. Seeing the document reminded me of a prompt that I used in a workshop about teaching search strategies that I hosted last summer. If you teach U.S. […]
Understanding Perspectives in Primary Sources – A New National Archives Resource
Once they understood the difference between a primary and secondary source, helping students understand the context, meaning, and purpose of primary source documents was one of the things that I enjoyed the most when I taught U.S. History. To that end, I often used resources from the National Archives Daily Document RSS feed to spark […]
A Good Source of U.S. History Lesson Starters
When I taught U.S. History one of my go-to methods for starting classroom conversations about a new topic or unit was to give my students an interesting image or a short primary source document to review and ask questions about. A great place to find those conversation starters is the National Archive’s Today’s Document website. […]
MHDL Lantern – Media History and Lesson Plans
The Media History Digital Library is a huge archive of books and magazines about the history film, television, and radio. The Lantern is the name of the search engine that lets you search through more than 2,000,000 pages of scanned copies of the books and magazines in the MHDL. In those books and magazines you will find reviews […]
New Lesson Plans from DocsTeach
DocsTeach is one of my favorite resources for U.S. History teachers and students. The platform makes it easy to find curated collections of primary source documents and offers great templates for creating online lessons based on those documents. And if you don’t have time to make a new activity, DocsTeach offers hundreds of premade primary […]
Artifacts of U.S. History for Teaching and Learning
Earlier this week I was catching up on some RSS feeds in Feedly when I came across this drawing from the patent application for the board game that became Monopoly. That drawing was the featured artifact of the day on the Today’s Document website published by the U.S. National Archives. It’s a resource that I […]
About Primary Sources
As a U.S. History teacher one my primary goals was to help students understand the past to understand where we (Americans) came from to understand how we got here and to, hopefully, avoid mistakes of the past. To that end, I frequently had students read excerpts from primary source documents. Sometimes that meant confronting language […]
Use Formative to Build Questions Into Primary Source Documents
Formative is a great tool for creating all kinds of online activities from simple multiple choice quizzes to in-depth examinations for documents. One of the ways that I like to use it is to upload a document and then build questions into the document for students to answer while reading. In this new video I […]
Transcribing Early Copyright Applications
By the People is the Library of Congress project that was formerly known as the Crowd project. The name changed at some point in the last year, but the purpose of the project remains the same. That purpose is to enlist the help of the public to transcribe historical documents housed the by the Library […]
Influenza Archives – A History Lesson
Monday’s featured artifact on Today’s Document from the National Archives was “Nurse wearing a mask as protection against influenza. September 13, 1918.” As is often the case with items in the daily feed there was a link to additional information about the image. In this case the additional information was a National Archives collection of […]
Five Google Docs Activities Besides Just Writing Essays
Over the last fourteen years I’ve used Google Docs and had students use Google Docs for lots of activities besides just writing essays. I’ve used Google Documents to facilitate analysis of primary sources, to create charts and diagrams, to facilitate group note-taking, to publish simple webpages, and to make collaborative task lists. All of those […]
15 New Primary Source Activities from DocsTeach
DocsTeach has been one of my go-to places for U.S. History lessons since the day that I first discovered it years ago. Not only does DocsTeach host a large, curated collection of primary source documents it also offers templates for developing online activities about those documents. Additionally, DocsTeach offers hundreds of premade primary source lesson […]
Primary vs. Secondary Sources
A couple of times this week I have written about using primary sources in history lessons and or research lessons. That has reminded me of a couple of good videos that can help students understand the differences between primary and secondary sources. The Minnesota Historical Society offers a fantastic video on the topic of primary v. […]
World History Commons – Annotated Primary Sources for Students
World History Commons offers a free collection of more than 1700 primary sources covering a wide array of themes and events in world history. The best part is that all of the primary sources in the collection are annotated with helpful notes for students. World History Commons also offers a collection of free teaching guides […]
Read and Transcribe Walt Whitman’s Notebooks and Diaries
A few years ago the Library of Congress launched a crowd sourcing project called Crowd. The purpose of the project is to enlist the help of the public to transcribe thousands of primary source documents that are housed by and have been scanned by the Library of Congress. Over the years there have been collections […]
Five Activities for Teaching and Learning With Primary Sources
As a history teacher one of my favorite yet challenging things to do was introduce my students to primary sources. It’s great because it reveals to them a whole new world of research opportunities. There’s nothing better than a student saying, “wow! Mr. Byrne, look at this!” At the same time learning to read, evaluate, […]
New Map-based History Lessons from DocsTeach
DocsTeach is one of my go-to resources for history teachers. I like it so much that I feature it in my Teaching History With Technology course. DocsTeach provides thousands of primary sources that teachers can use to build online and in-person history lessons for middle school and high school students. Additionally, DocsTeach hosts hundreds of pre-made […]
Three Good Resources for Teaching With Primary Sources
I’m currently developing a new version of my popular online course, Teaching History With Technology (you can see a preview last year’s course here). Part of that process has been revisiting collections of primary sources and some of the tools that I recommend for teaching lessons based on primary sources. Here are three of the many […]
Daily Artifacts of U.S. History
Earlier this week I was catching up on some RSS feeds in Feedly when I came across this drawing from the patent application for the board game that became Monopoly. That drawing was the featured artifact of the day on the Today’s Document website published by the U.S. National Archives. It’s a resource that I […]
Good Sets of Primary Source Documents About the American Revolution and More
The Massachusetts Historical Society has a great website that hosts collections of primary sources related to the American Revolution, founding families of the United States, abolition, and the Civil War. Additionally, on the MHS site you’ll find recordings of webinars about many of the topics related to the collections of primary sources. Music of the […]
Finding Primary Sources in the World Digital Library
The World Digital Library is a resource that I started using back in 2009. At that time it was just a small collection of about 1,200 digitized primary source artifacts from libraries around the world. Today, the World Digital Library hosts more than 19,000 digitized primary source artifacts to view and download. As you’ll see […]
Return to Sender – Interactive Map of Postcards from WWI
Return to Sender provides an interesting way for students to find and read postcards sent to and from soldiers during World War I. Return to Sender is an interactive map on which students can see where postcards were sent in Europe during World War I. The postcards displayed through the map are part of the […]
Great Sets of Primary Source Documents for U.S. History Lessons
The Digital Public Library of America is a great place to find all kinds of neat digitized historical artifacts. I recently went down a rabbit hole looking at photographs in the baseball collection and the DPLA’s Boston Sports Temples exhibit. That happened because I was revisiting the DPLA’s Primary Source Sets for teachers and students. […]
Explore the Library of Congress on Your iPad
The Library of Congress Collections app is a free iPad app that offers a nice way for students and teachers to explore collections of artifacts housed by the Library of Congress. The collections available through the app are also available directly on the LOC website. The benefit of viewing them in the app is ability to […]
How to Find and Create Primary Source Lessons With DocsTeach
DocsTeach has been one of my go-to tools for social studies teachers for many years. Despite that recommendation I’ve never made a video on how it works, until now. DocsTeach is a free service offered by the National Archives through which you can find primary source lesson activities and create your own activities by using […]
Camera and Locomotive – A Mapped Story About the Transcontinental Railroad
Camera and Locomotive is the title of a fantastic mapped story published by the Library of Congress. Camera and Locomotive tells the story of the building of the Transcontinental Railroad and the development of photography in the United States. As you scroll through the story you will find interactive maps that are loaded with photographs […]
A New Crowdsourcing Project from the Library of Congress
Last year the Library of Congress introduced a new online project called Crowd. The project invites teachers, students, and anyone interested in history to contribute to the transcription of primary source documents. The documents are arranged in thematic collections that the LOC calls “campaigns.” This week the Library of Congress added a new campaign to […]
Lee’s Map of Gettysburg – And Tools for Making It Interactive
Today’s featured document featured by the National Archives is a copy of General Robert E. Lee’s map of the Battle of Gettysburg. If you download a copy of the map (which you can do as it is in the public domain) and then zoom-in on it, you will be able to see the notations about […]
DocsTeach Adds Good Artifacts for Teaching About the Transcontinental Railroad
DocsTeach has long been one of my go-to recommendations for teachers of U.S. History. DocsTeach provides a wealth of digitized primary source artifacts that can be incorporated into lessons for elementary school, middle school, and high school students. You can search for those artifacts according to era in U.S. History, according to artifact type (text, […]
LOC Crowd – Crowdsourcing the Transcription of Primary Sources
The Library of Congress has launched a new crowdsourcing initiative to transcribe primary source documents. The new initiative simply called Crowd has contains collections of documents that the Library of Congress wants the public to help transcribe. Anyone can participate in the LOC’s Crowd project. To get started simply go to the site and click […]
A New LOC Online Collection – Theodore Roosevelt’s Papers
I have always found Theodore Roosevelt to be one of the most fascinating characters in U.S. History. That is why I was excited this morning when I saw an email from the Library of Congress announcing the online publication of Theodore Roosevelt’s papers. The LOC’s collection of Theodore Roosevelt’s papers is divided into sixteen sections. […]
Case Maker – Civics Lessons Built on Primary Sources
Case Maker is a free service designed for middle school social studies teachers and their students. Case Maker uses primary sources from the Library of Congress as the basis of activities in which students have to build a case in response to real civics scenarios. For example, the first cast that I tried was about […]
Chronicling America – An Archive of 2,600+ Digitized Newspapers
Chronicling America is a great resource provided by the Library of Congress. On Chronicling America you can find more than 2,600 digitized copies of newspapers printed in the United States between 1789 and 1963. You can search through the collection according to date, state in which the newspaper was published, and keyword. All of the […]
New Artifact Collections Added to DocsTeach
DocsTeach is one of my go-to recommendations for anyone who teaches U.S. History at a middle school or high school level. The site offers a dozen tools that you can use to create interactive history lessons based on primary and secondary sources. To help you build those lessons DocsTeach provides thousands of primary and secondary […]
Docs Teach Adds New Primary Sources About WWI
Docs Teach is a fantastic resource for US History teachers that I have shared many times over the years. I like it so much that I include it in my Teaching History With Technology course. Docs Teach provides teachers with access tools for creating online lessons based on collections of primary source documents. Docs Teach […]
Library of Congress: Papers of Ulysses S. Grant Now Online
The Library of Congress has just put the papers of Ulysses S. Grant online for the first time in their original format. The collection of over 50,000 items that date back to 1819, was digitized from microfilm scans. The papers from the 18th president of the United States, include family correspondence, reports, military records, scrapbooks, […]
The Library of Congress Puts Hamilton’s Papers Online
The Library of Congress has put their collection of Alexander Hamilton’s papers online for the public. The collection of papers includes some of Hamilton’s letters to family and friends, a draft of Washington’s farewell address, and documents from Hamilton’s law practice. Additionally, the Library of Congress has put together a simple timeline of Hamilton’s life. […]
DocsTeach Adds New Analysis Activities for Students
DocsTeach is a great resource for teachers of U.S. History. DocsTeach, produced by the National Archives Foundation, provides teachers with a free platform on which they can create online history lessons based on images, documents, audio recording, video recordings, and maps. The lessons that teachers create can be shared with their students through a free […]
More Than 100 Sets of Primary Source Documents for Students – Best of 2016
As I usually do during this week, I’m taking some time off to relax, ski, and work on some long-term projects for the next year. This week I will be re-publishing the most popular posts of 2016. A few years ago I wrote a post about searching through the Digital Public Library of America to […]
Online Activities for Teaching With Primary Sources
As a history teacher I have a natural attraction to old maps, dusty documents, and all manner of primary source media. While it is a passion for me, I fully recognize that learning to read, evaluate, and utilize primary sources can be long process for some students. The following are some of the online activities […]
A Great Journal for History Teachers
The Library of Congress has quite a number of great resources for teachers and students. The Student Discovery Sets are favorite amongst my favorite resources that I’ve featured in the past. That collection of resources was recently updated by the LOC. The recent additions to the Student Discovery Sets include iBooks about the New Deal, scientific […]
More Than 100 Sets of Primary Source Documents for Students
A few years ago I wrote a post about searching through the Digital Public Library of America to locate primary source documents to use with students. At that point the DPLA had relatively few, loosely organized collections. Yesterday, I received an email from DPLA informing me that they now have more than 100 primary source […]
A Great Explanation of Primary Sources vs. Secondary Sources
On Monday evening I hosted the first meeting of the spring section of Teaching History With Technology. One of the topics that I covered was using technology to support students as the read and work with primary sources. Before a student can search for, read, or cite a primary source he or she needs to […]
5 Online Activities for Teaching With Primary Sources
As a history teacher one of my favorite yet challenging things to do was introduce my students to primary sources. It’s great because it reveals to them a whole new world of research opportunities. There’s nothing better than a student saying, “wow! Mr. Byrne, look at this!” At the same time learning to read, evaluate, […]