Teaching American History Grant at the Old Courthouse

Our Teaching American History grant crew had the distinct pleasure of having their second colloquium at the old Citrus County Courthouse, which was built in 1912 and is a National Historic Preservation Site.

The 35 members of the TAH grant spent February 4 & 5 learning teaching strategies specific to the social studies, and excellent in-depth historical presentations on the American Revolution and it's European connections, as well as the influence of the Revolution on France and England.

The group, along with Kathy Thompson, our Old Courthouse resource officer and our three presenters - Robby Brown, Anthony Fitzpatrick, and Dr. Patricia Behre - enlighened, educated, and motivated our teachers on this era of history, expanding their horizons, and encouraging them to carry the knowledge and strategies back to the classroom.

This Federal grant provides funding to provide in-depth knowledge on American history and additional instructional strategies to K-12 teachers throughout the nation.

Happy 96th Birthday to the Crossword Puzzle

It was on this date (12/21) in 1913 that the first crossword puzzle was published - an 'invention' of fifty-one year old Arthur Wynne, and appearing in the New York World newspaper in a Sunday edition.

Wynne was an Englishman who had emigrated to the United States, and was employed by the World. His creation was the result of his editor asking for something new to add to the Fun section of the Sunday edition. Wynne modified a game he had played as a child called Magic Squares and created the crossword puzzle.

What we today call a crossword puzzle was originally called a word-cross, then cross-word, and finally crossword. It would become a fad in America during the "Roaring Twenties", and is still a popular newspaper feature throughout the world today. Simon and Schuster would publish the first crossword puzzle book in 1924.

The first crossword puzzle was diamond shaped, with none of today's blacked-out spaces. It was created entirely by hand - compared to the computer generated puzzles that dominate the market today. A fun exercise is to have students try to find the answers to the original crossword puzzle. While their great grandparents would have had to use their heads, or perhaps a dictionary, they can search the Internet to find the answers.

It's not as easy to solve as one might think - a great challenge for the kids.

Wynne eventually retired, and passed away in Clearwater, FL, in 1945.

For those of you NOT able to solve the puzzle above on your own, the answer is here.

PHOTO RESOURCES:

Arthur Wynne, Findtarget

Crossword puzzle, A Brief History of Crossword Puzzles
Wynne obituary, Findtarget

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American Treasures Exhibit

Wow - the 100th blog entry! What better topic than one concerning our nation's history and heritage.

I was privileged to attend the Teaching American History Project Directors conference in Washington DC last week. The conference was enlightening, as was the opportunity (evenings and an afternoon) to visit various spots in our nation’s capital on our own.

Knowing the emphasis our teachers are placing on the use of primary resources, I visited the Library of Congress, Jefferson Building – which is the oldest of the three LOC sites in the capital. It was an absolutely splendid experience – one even more impressive as I realized that the LOC was working on digitizing many of its items for display on its internet website.

It was fascinating to see a selection of Jefferson’s books, which helped restart the Library after its destruction when the British burned many of the official buildings in Washington during the War of 1812 – and to be told that he actually collected (but had not read) many of those books.

I also was able to spend an inordinate amount of my time at the American Treasures exhibit titled “Creating the United States” - which chronicled the steps to American Independence and the writing of the Constitution over a decade later. The exhibit housed maps, letters, and documents – all primary resources that could be used to teach this concept in the classroom without resorting to the textbook. It would be an engaging and innovative method of instruction with our young people, showing them the very documents and thinking that led to the foundation of our nation. The Creating the United States link. That link also has a tab that leads to interactive activities for the students.

Many of the items in the exhibit are available online at the Library of Congress. A link from the aforementioned site takes you to the Top Treasures Gallery where digitized primary resources on the Declaration of Independence, Mason’s Declaration of Rights, Washington’s Commission as Commander-in-Chief, the Constitution, and more are available.

Of course, the first item I saw was a huge map of colonial America that would look really nice hanging in my office…..
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The 29th Anniversary of 24/7 Cable News

CNN. Those initials have become the by-word representing an innovative concept – now imitated by other agencies around the world – of making the news available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

CNN (Cable Network News) was launched on June 1, 1980. The brainchild of Ted Turner, CNN has revolutionized the world of news, affected American policy, and influenced the way Americans – and the world - think. Can students today even conceive of the 15-minute (later expanded to half-an-hour) news brought to us by ABC, CBS, and NBC back in the 1950s and 1960s? The news with Walter Cronkite was ‘family television time’ in our household when I was growing up. Now that half hour has expanded into twenty-four hours – and no longer ‘family discussion’ time.

CNN – and other 24/7 news stations – have backed a number of causes and politicians – although very subtly – and has had an influence on what we think and believe, hence continuing the traditional role of the press in America. It is also causing the decline – along with the spread of the Internet – of the printed newspaper, which has always provided a chance for the reader to study and reflect on the news.

Talk about the power of the press – or electrons!

What a discussion point for our students as the school year nears an end: perhaps a question such as ‘what is the effect of CNN on our perception of the President’?

And some people thought the idea of news being available 24/7 was silly and would never work It is admittedly fascinating the see images from around the world beamed into our living room whenever we want to turn to the news channel.

Essential Question: What long-range effects does the 24/7 news concept have on our perceptions of the world and our lifestyles?

PHOTO RESOURCES:

Allfreelogo

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The Government on YouTube

This past week was a busy week at work and home, and I didn’t have the opportunity to do my usual ‘perusal of the blogs’ routine until Saturday night. There are some advantages to a once-a-week review of my favorite blog sites, as well as some disadvantages.

As I was reviewing the new entries on the Library of Congress blog site I found a blog entry titled “Uncle Sam 2.0: U.S. Government Goes YouTube”. After spending a little time there reviewing the content, I felt it was a site worth sharing with our Social Studies folks.

The home page for the site is the U.S. Government Channel. To access it, you will have to use a home or public library computer, as our District filters block YouTube. More on that later.

Some of the entries were a little disappointing – such as the FDIC Channel’s collection of short PSA’s (Public Service Announcements) – while other entries have quite a bit of potential for judicious use in the classroom. However, some gems were found in the History, Arts, and Culture channel as well as The White House channel – which has weekly broadcasts from the President concerning policies, directions we are heading, as well as current issues the United States is facing.

These could be very valuable as instructional tools when appropriately used. They could be wonderful class discussion starters; for analysis of politics, propaganda, and viewpoints; as well further resources for each of the fields of Social Studies.

While our District filters out live YouTube viewing, the selections can be downloaded and played from a classroom computer. Thumb drives are great for moving the file from home to work.

I would encourage you to take a peek at the site, explore, and determine if there is any entries at the site that you feel would be appropriate in the classroom. I know that I did not take the time to look at all of the channels, but the site is on my 'go back and visit often' list.

I wonder if our Florida government will be doing the same thing?

Essential Question: Do you view the YouTube U.S. Government Channel as a valuable resource for education or a powerful tool of salesmanship and influence?

Picture Resource:
U.S. Capitol Building, about.com

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60th Anniversary of the Berlin Airlift

Occasionally anniversaries of events occur that can - and probably should be - utilized in a classroom experience for the students even if it is not the 'topic of the day'.

May 12th marked the 60th anniversary of the end of the Berlin Airlift, a monumental effort by the American, British, French, and other allied forces to resupply Berlin, Germany, after the Soviets made a power-play to gain the divided city by cutting off all access to supplies. Stalin miscalculated, as President Truman and America's allies came up with an alternative, heroic method of resuppling the city with food, coal, clothing, and the necessities of life.

For a 10 minute BBC documentary on the Berlin Airlift, click here.

For an excellent lesson plan, with primary resources (both print and visual), click here.

Our county library system has several books concerning the Berlin Airlift, including The Candy Bombers : The Untold Story of the Berlin Airlift and America's Finest Hour by Andrei Cherny.

Essential Question: How effective are the tools above in teaching students about the Berlin Airlift.

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Teacher Tube in the Classroom

Imagine you are teaching about Abraham Lincoln and the Gettysburg Address. What an advantage to show a short video clip which has a historical reenactment of this momentous event. Try here to see an example. Or you are teaching geography and reviewing for a test on the United States. What about a cartoon video naming all of the states and their capitals as part of that review? Or you are teaching world history, and want an overview of themes found in world history to lead off the unit.

Knowing that our kids are very visually and/or auditory oriented, the use of short, pertinent video clips that are readily available both in the classroom and for the child at home could provide a very positive learning experience for that child.

Teacher Tube provides that material. There is a huge amount of videos available - of varying quality - for the teacher to use in the classroom, to get ideas from by seeing what slant someone else has on how material is presented. When a teacher finds one that is appropriate, the video site can either be bookmarked, or copied onto a lesson plan for reference, or the video can be downloaded. Membership in Teacher Tube is free... just be sure to write down someplace your username, password, and Teacher Tube website address.

Teachers and students can even get motivated and challenged to produce their own material, either for in-class consumption or Web display - as a hands on project. Research does show that teaching something is the best way to learn it.

Teacher Tube in an innovative, creative, and applicable way to teach in the classroom in a manner that students can relate to, learn from, and retain.

I would encourage each of our Social Studies teacher to look at Teacher Tube, evaluate and reflect on the material there and its potential use in your classroom, and determine if this approach is one that would provide an appropriate learning activity for the students in your classroom.

There is just something about having Thomas Jefferson pop in to talk to your class over the Web and discuss the responsibility of vigilance. It can blow you - and your students - away.

Essential question: How effective is the use of a tool like Teacher Tube in our classrooms?

Resources for teaching from the State Archives

I just received my quarterly newsletter from the State Library and Archives of Florida, and found several items to share with our Social Studies teachers that they might want to check out.

1. The State Library and Archives of Florida has joined the Commons Project at Flickr. From the site:

“In 2008, Flickr partnered with the Library of Congress to launch the site as a pilot project. The program's main goals are to feature hidden treasures in the world's public photography archives, and to demonstrate how user input and knowledge can help to enrich these collections. Viewers are invited to help describe the photographs, either by adding descriptive terms known as tags, or by leaving comments. Today, contributors to The Commons include the Smithsonian, the National Galleries of Scotland, the Bibliothèque de Toulouse, the George Eastman House, and other noteworthy repositories.”

This is an excellent source of photos and images for use in your classroom.

2. WPA Stories, published for use in schools.

The Federal Writers Project (part of the WPA – Works Progress Administration) was started in 1935 as an attempt to put our researchers and writers to work during the Great Depression. From the site:

“The Federal Writers’ Project became the most expansive piece of collective research ever conducted by any nation on itself. Writers visited every rural corner, small town, and crossroads in the country, leaving future generations a massive documentation of their own nation unlike any the world has ever seen, before or since.”

It’s worthwhile to browse through the selections available by clicking the links on the left side of the web page to the title of the article. To see the page, go here.

3. A new photo exhibit was established online at the State Archives to provide a celebration and history of NASA’s first 50 years. To see the exhibit, go here.

Essential question: How can we effectively train our students to use resources provided by the various state departments?