NHEC Feed: News Items

The Supreme Court: Connections Between Past and Present

leeannghajar — Tue, 26 May 2009 08:52:29 -0400

News Brief

May 26 2009

The Supreme Court: Connections Between Past and Present

On May 26, 2009, President Obama nominated Judge Sonia Sotomayor to replace retiring Justice David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

The Senate Judiciary Committee is likely to hold hearings on her nomination in July and to seek a confirmation vote in Congress before the August 8 summer recess. If confirmed, Sotomayor would be the third woman on the Supreme Court and the first Hispanic justice, but how important are gender and ethnicity to the selection and approval process?

In The New Republic, columnist Tom Goldstein sketches the likely arguments for and against her confirmation. "Overall, the White House's biggest task is simply demonstrating that Judge Sotomayor is the most qualified candidate, not a choice based on her gender and ethnicity. The public wants to know that her greatness as a Justice is informed by her personal history and her diversity, not that it is defined by those characteristics," he points out.

At the top of her class at Princeton University and editor of the Law Journal at Yale University, Judge Sotomayor has been a prosecutor, private litigator, trial judge, and appellate judge. For more than a decade, she has served on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit which incorporates Connecticut, New York, and Vermont. As an appellate judge, she reviews decisions of District Courts for errors of law. Read sample cases she has adjudicated during her tenure as a member of the court's three-judge panel.

The complexity of the cases the Court chooses to hear and decide cannot easily be explained to lay people.

Teaching about the Supreme Court

The judicial system is perhaps the least understood and most complicated among the three branches of U.S. government to explain and to teach.

To place Sotomayer's appellate experience in the context of the judicial system, visit U.S. Courts for an explanation of the structure of the American court system and the responsibilities of each kind of court. The Wikipedia entry, United States Courts of Appeals, also gives a helpful overview of the role of the functions of these courts and of how to find further documented information.

In a review of books about the Supreme Court at History News Network (HNN), historian Peter Hoffer explains why we need to understand the history of the Supreme Court. (Search HNN for other current and historical analyses of the role of the Supreme Court and specific decisions.) Hoffer writes,

. . . a history of the Court is essential because its operation is often obscure. The complexity of the cases the Court chooses to hear and decide cannot easily be explained to lay people. The deliberations of the Court are kept secret and cloak its operation and thinking from our inspection. The arcane language of the law in its opinions adds another layer of incomprehensibility to the Court's operation.

And at Annenberg Media, the course Democracy in America includes the unit The Courts: Our Rule of Law, stressing how "we depend on our courts and the rule of law to resolve conflicts between citizens and the government and between and among citizens." Lesson plans, primary source documents, critical thinking activities, and readings explore the importance of the American legal system and of the role of courts in defining law.

A teacher-authored history of the Supreme Court, produced in conjunction with PBS station Thirteen/WNET New York, offers educators and advanced learners a series of essays giving a comprehensive overview of the Court, of major decisions, and of their context. Lesson plans link to online resources and incorporate primary source documents requisite to implement each lesson plan.

The Thirteen/PBS website evolving from the PBS series on the Supreme Court also includes multimedia presentations on court justices and major events in the Supreme Court's history. Lesson plans, games, interviews, and discussion guides provide a variety of materials for classroom use.

Other useful resources include

The Supreme Court Historical Society explains how the Supreme Court works and its history.

Landmark Supreme Court Cases provides teachers with a full range of resources and activities to explore the key issues of major court decisions and presents the Constitutional concepts around which they evolve.

The Supreme Court's website includes current as well as historic information and materials.

Bookmark This! Beneath the Surface of Wikipedia

leeannghajar — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 13:19:32 -0400

News Brief

Apr 29 2009

Bookmark This! Beneath the Surface of Wikipedia

Wikipedia, the online, open-source encyclopedia, is no longer a new kid on the research web, but questions about its merits and use in the classroom continue to recycle.

Wikipedia is perhaps the most extensive example of democratic scholarship on the web. Tens of thousands of volunteer contributors have collectively written, revised, and edited nearly 3 million encyclopedia entries in English and other languages. Almost any Google search on topics relevant to teaching and learning history (among other subjects) elicits a Wikipedia entry among the top five search results—and frequently it occupies the number-one slot.

How should teachers respond to the ubiquity and accessibility of Wikipedia?

Students regularly and unquestioningly rely on Wikipedia as a resource for assignments. How, then, should educators respond to its ubiquity and accessibility? Many teachers simply banish it from the classroom. Banished or not, the encyclopedia is unlikely to disappear, and students will continue to be among the millions of inquiring minds who use it daily as a first stop for information-gathering. Teaching students how to evaluate Wikipedia may be a better solution, then, than ignoring its influence.

In fact, a hard look at the value and limitations of Wikipedia offers practical experience to students in critical thinking and analysis of primary and secondary sources in any subject area.

Bookmarks!

Start with this video from North Carolina State University Libraries: Wikipedia: Beneath the Surface (in under 6 minutes). The video gives an overview of Wikipedia and how it works—pros and cons—and situates its use as a tool promoting critical thinking.

In Can History be Open Source? Wikipedia and the Future of the Past, author Roy Rosenzweig, founder of George Mason University's Center for History and New Media, answers "some basic questions about history on Wikipedia. How did it develop? How does it work? How good is the historical writing? What are the potential implications for our practice as scholars, teachers, and purveyors of the past to the general public?" (This article was originally published in The Journal of American History Volume 93, Number 1 [June, 2006]: 117-46)

Carleton College Gould Library offers a faculty guide, Using Wikipedia. The article offers guidelines for using Wikipedia, suggestions about its role in the curriculum, and links to further analytical articles. Guidelines include a caution from Wikipedia founder, Jimmy Wales, that the encyclopedia is not a definitive source. "It's pretty good, but you have to be careful with it." He advises students to use Wikipedia for an overview of a topic, but then, to hit the history books.

Jeremy Boggs, digital historian and creative lead at the Center for History and New Media, authored a detailed lesson plan for undergraduate history classes, Assigning Wikipedia in a US History Survey. Boggs describes the assignment and the process of implementation, but also explains the rationale and benefits of this curriculum module, which he considers one of his most successful assignments. "Most of my students have a difficult time understanding how to make an argument, how to differentiate between fact-based 'reporting' and analysis. By actually being forced to write a 'just the facts' report, they have been able to see the difference between the two." The module is adaptable to high school coursework.

Resources: Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

leeannghajar — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 11:51:52 -0400

News Brief

Apr 23 2009

Resources: Asian Pacific American Heritage Month

Asian Pacific Heritage Month, a celebration of Asian and Pacific islanders living in the United States, began as a 10-day observance in 1977. Congress passed Pub. L. 95-419 which requested the President to issue a proclamation designating the seven-day period beginning on May 4, 1979 as Asian/Pacific American Heritage Week. In 1978, President Carter spoke of the significant role Asian-Americans have played in the creation of a dynamic and pluralistic American society and made the observation an annual event. Then, in 1990, President George H.W. Bush proclaimed the entire month of May to be Asian Pacific American Heritage Month.

Why choose May?

May was chosen to commemorate the immigration of the first Japanese to the United States on May 7, 1843, and to mark the anniversary of the completion of the transcontinental railroad on May 10, 1869. The majority of the workers who laid the tracks were Chinese immigrants.

The term Asian Pacific American covers millions of people, thousands of cultures, and dozens of countries. Where to begin?

The U.S. Census Bureau lists over 25 Asian and Pacific Islander groups. This includes Vietnamese, Chinese, Filipinos, Indian, Pakistani, Korean, Japanese, Cambodian, Laotian, Indonesian, Thai, Burmese, Malaysian, Taiwanese, Sri Lanka, Bangladeshi, and a variety of Pacific Islanders from the Hawaiian Islands, Polynesian Islands, and New Zealand. While it's always important to recognize individual differences, sometimes looking at broad categories emphasizes the impact of particular people and events. Look at these general statistics for the Asian and Pacific Island population in America drawn from the U.S. Census.

What online resources do you recommend?

The 2008 website on Asian Pacific Heritage Month from the Library of Congress offers a gateway to collections and exhibitions that emphasize the individual cultures of Asian Pacific Americans such as this collection of art from ancient Cambodia at the National Gallery of Art or this presentation on The Chinese in California which includes essays, images, and primary source materials.

The Veterans History Project highlights the contributions of Asian Pacific Americans to America's wartime efforts. The presentation highlights eight stories from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq, with special emphasis on the 442nd Regimental Combat Team, the "Go for Broke" outfit of Japanese Americans who fought valiantly in Europe during World War II. Many of these men put their lives on the line for their country while their families were confined to internment camps back in the States.

What about lesson plans?

AskAsia.org is an educational website for students and teachers. This presentation looks at 30 countries that comprise Asia today and offers dozens of educational activities, from short skill builders to project-based curriculum units. Master teachers created the units; scholars edited them. Maps, images, and an annotated national directory of Asia-related resources are also available.

The special For Students section looks at global issues, politics, and daily lives through student-created essays and documentaries. This dense multimedia resource emphasizes current issues, people, and points of view.

Does the Clearinghouse have any materials related to Asian Pacific Americans?

Here at the Clearinghouse, you'll find dozens of websites, lectures, lesson plans, and much, much more through utilizing various search options. Use search words for individual nationalities such as Japanese or Chinese, or the generic Asian-American term. Here are just a few:

The Vietnam Center Archive furnishes several large collections. The Oral History Project presents full transcriptions of more than 475 audio oral histories conducted with U.S. men and women who served in Vietnam. The Virtual Vietnam Archive offers more than 408,000 pages from over 270,000 documents regarding the Vietnam War in addition to a number of video interviews.

The website Chinese in California, 1850-1925 features 8,000 items documenting the immigrant experience of Chinese who settled in California during the 19th and early 20th centuries. Materials include photographs, letters, diaries, speeches, business records, legal documents, pamphlets, sheet music, cartoons, and artwork.

The public history venue The Japanese American National Museum in California incorporates online collections and resources.

The Lesson Plan Review Civil Rights and Incarceration discusses the evacuation and relocation of Japanese Americans from western states during World War II.

Interactive Exhibit from the American Art Museum

leeannghajar — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 08:33:13 -0400

News Brief

Apr 16 2009

Interactive Exhibit from the American Art Museum

Earlier in April, we highlighted a few resources for teaching about the New Deal, but here's one addition well worth checking out.

An exhibition, 1934: A New Deal for Artists, is on view at the Smithsonian American Art Museum and the Renwick Gallery until January 2010, and a multifaceted, online educational website complements this display.

It was the first time the United States government provided direct support to artists.

Curator Elizabeth Broun explains The Public Works of Art Project of the New Deal. "Artists were encouraged to portray 'the American Scene.' With this minimal guidance, they turned to local and regional subjects and created a picture of the country striving to survive through hard work and true grit. They were inspired by the idea that their art would be displayed in public spaces for broad audiences." It was the first time the United States government provided direct support to artists.

The website encourages visitor immersion in the works of art—regional, recognizable subjects—ranging from portraits to cityscapes and images of city life to landscapes and depictions of rural life. The 1934 artists reminded the public of quintessential American values such as hard work, community, and optimism.

An Exhibition Slide Show is open to public comments and shared stories.

A flash presentation takes visitors into a virtual movie theater where virtual curators talk about picturing the 1930s, provide historical context, explanations of individual paintings, and the chance to create movies with personal collections. Movies are created using Digital Storyteller created by primaryaccess.org. (Be forewarned: navigation is a little complex in this component, but well-worth the exploratory effort. It's a good idea to visit How is This Site Organized.)

Mapping 1934 lets visitors see where the exhibition's artworks were painted.

The museum has also created a 1934 Flickr group to share the nearly 400 related artworks and objects from its collection. New images are added each week both by the museum and members of the public who choose to join the group. Comments, stories, and new images are invited and welcome.

New Visitor's Center Opens at Monticello

leeannghajar — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 08:18:34 -0400

News Brief

Apr 14 2009

New Visitor's Center Opens at Monticello

Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson, officially opens a new visitor center on April 15. The Visitor Center billed as the 21st-century gateway to Thomas Jefferson's Monticello, offers hands-on, thought-provoking, interactive views and experiences of the artifacts and ideas that help define Jefferson and his times.

A New York Times museum review, Jefferson's Blind Spots and Ideals, in Brick and Mortar, emphasizes that the overwhelming sweep of the new exhibits serves, in part, to highlight the diversity, tension, and contradictions of Jefferson's genius and the effect of that genius on his personal life and his vision for the nation.

As Washington Post columnist Anne Applebaum points out, the exhibitions and a discovery room reflect changes in how we talk about and present history. "Nowadays, hagiography is Out. Historical reconstruction is In. Silent contemplation of the great man's possessions is also Out. Recent scholarship about those possessions is firmly In. Interactive games and objects are In, too."

Monticello pioneered the movement to increase online, public access to historical resources.

And if you live too far away to visit? Monticello has pioneered the movement to increase online, public access to historic collections, archives, and resources. The superb Monticello website offers The Monticello Classroom with sections for kids and for teachers, access to Resource Packets (K–12), and a wealth of essays, podcasts, and research resources. The online Press Room offers video clips and images of the new center as well.

And at Jefferson Today, scholars, public figures, and the general public can debate and interpret Thomas Jefferson's ideas and present-day events. Read, for example, how Jefferson dealt with pirates off the coast of Africa, see an image and transcription of Jefferson's 1801 address to Congress addressing the problem, and link to commentary from the Library of Congress.

Monticello has also joined other public history venues on Facebook where an active membership shares events, comments, photos, and all things Jeffersonian.

On YouTube, the Monticello Channel includes a nine-and-a-half-minute video narrated by historian David McCullough and a series of clips of a lecture by Annette Gordon-Reed discussing the process of researching and writing The Hemingses of Monticello: An American Family.

Tonight's the Night: PBS Broadcasts We Shall Remain

leeannghajar — Mon, 13 Apr 2009 09:31:49 -0400

News Brief

Apr 13 2009

Tonight's the Night: PBS Broadcasts We Shall Remain

The five-episode PBS series We Shall Remain begins tonight. Check local listings for broadcast times of this American Experience documentary.

Teaching Guides and Lesson Plans are now available on the rich, interactive, and immersive series website. Teaching Guides are defined by episode, and each includes discussion questions, student activities, additional resources, and lists of relevant themes corresponding to those developed by the National Council for the Social Studies Curriculum Standards and common state social studies standards.

But don't stop there. Explore supplementary video resources including discussions of language, sovereignty, and enterprise included under the Native Now section.

Elsewhere, on PBS Teachers, guest author, educator Eric Langhorst discusses the program and tackles the question, How do you teach Native American history and culture in the context of an American history class?

Bookmark These! History Sites on YouTube

leeannghajar — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 14:40:35 -0400

News Brief

Apr 8 2009

Bookmark These! History Sites on YouTube

Numerous museums have launched channels on YouTube. The result? Videos of lectures, oral histories, exhibits, and digital archives with accompanying commentary and analysis are available with the click of a mouse. One avenue to find them is simply to use the search term museum and select the Channels option.

Art repositories—always amazing sources for visual and material cultures for the history classroom—outnumber history museums, but you'll find the following:

The Newseum, located in Washington, DC, has posted 69 videos, including a series of brief clips (30 seconds to two minutes) on how journalists reported the assassination of Abraham Lincoln.

The Computer History Museum channel focuses on the communications revolution and the role of the computer. Videos include talks by legal historian Lawrence Lessig and other prominent scholars; videos from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences March 2009 Symposium on the Impact of Information Technology on Society: Technology and the Future of the Book; and historic views of computers through time.

The Library of Congress channel includes historic films, lectures, and public talks. The channel includes historic film clips, some only a few seconds long, demonstrating early filmography—others, such as a 14-minute mini-documentary on Rosie the Riveter, highlight collections with commentary from curators and archivists. Bibliographic and explanatory materials accompany each item. According to the Library Blog, playlists will continue to grow, just as the Library has continued to expand its Flickr pilot project during the past several months in order to make resources and collections increasingly accessible to the public.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum channel broadcasts oral histories of Holocaust survivors and numerous historic and documentary films with commentary.

Recession, Depression, Hard Times, New Deal: Classroom Resources (updated April 7)

leeannghajar — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 16:03:28 -0500

News Brief

Mar 31 2009

Recession, Depression, Hard Times, New Deal: Classroom Resources (updated April 7)

What makes the New Deal and Franklin Roosevelt's presidency particularly exciting to teach in history classrooms today? In part, apparent parallels between current events and history. The downward spiral of the Dow Jones, continued news about job layoffs, failures of financial institutions, economic stimulus plans, and executive and legislative initiatives evoke the specter of the 1930s.

The internet is full of classroom resources for teaching about the New Deal—arguably, perhaps more than for any other era. We've highlighted a few below that serve as gateways to this internet wealth and a few that address specific subjects and content.

The Overview

During his first 100 days in office, President Roosevelt set an unprecedented legislative pace, sending 15 requests to Congress for action—all of which Congress passed. How FDR Made the Presidency Matter (The New York Times, January 16, 2009) summarizes Roosevelt's record-breaking legislative achievements. (This article is an entry in The Times 100 Days Blog that offers a historical perspective of the first 100 days in office of five 20th century presidents: Franklin Roosevelt, John Kennedy, Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan. Blog entries compare their experiences with those of President Obama.)

Don't miss this! The March edition of History Now, a quarterly journal from the The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History, focuses on multi-faceted approaches to learning about and to teaching the Great Depression. In this issue: The Great Depression: An Overview, historian David Kennedy roots the causes of the economic crisis in World War I and discusses the state of the nation during the 1920s, and the New Deal and its effects. Other content areas include Lesson plans for elementary through high school including women, the Dust Bowl, migrant farmworkers, popular culture; an exhibit from New York's Lower East Side Tenement Museum; and a variety of additional resources from historians, archivists, and educators.

Annenberg Media's series, America's History in the Making, the film, Film 18, By the People, For the People looks at how a new relationship between individuals and the government arose in the face of plummeting agricultural exports, the stock market crash, and environmental disaster all led to an unprecedented economic depression. Sign up for Video on Demand, a free service of Annenberg Media, in order to access series films.

Teaching with Visual Culture

According to A New Deal for the Arts, an exhibit from the National Archives, during the depths of the Great Depression of the 1930s and into the early years of World War II, the Federal government supported the arts in unprecedented ways. For 11 years, between 1933 and 1943, federal tax dollars employed artists, musicians, actors, writers, photographers, and dancers. Never before or since has our government so extensively sponsored the arts. These archival materials explore categories of art—visual artists, writers, filmmakers, for example—and discuss examples and their creators.

Picturing U.S. History: an interactive resource for teaching with visual evidence, is a digital project from City University of New York and funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities. Developed on the premise that visual materials are vital to understanding the American past, Lessons in Looking, a guide to Web resources, forums, essays, reviews, and classroom activities, helps teachers incorporate this visual evidence into their classrooms. In March 2009, George Mason University professor, Barbara Melosh focuses on teaching the Great Depression through photographs, political cartoons, comics, graphics, prints, and posters. A series of thoughtful essays and comments describes, annotates, and contextualizes selected visual works from the 1930s.

Websites

Best History Websites: US History Great Depression may be the gateway motherlode. This briefly annotated list is divided into three sections: Great Depression in the News; General Information; and Lesson Plans, Teacher Guides, Activities and More. Among the helpful resources: Teaching K-12 Economics and Taking Stock in the Past for the Future: Examining the Causes and Effects of the 1929 Stock Market Crash Through News Coverage in The New York Times, a 1999 lesson plan from New York Times Learning Pages.

New Deal Network is an educational guide to the Great Depression of the 1930, sponsored by the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute and the Institute for Learning Technologies at Teachers College/Columbia University and funded in part through a grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Document Library. The site is both a gateway and a resource center to just about any imaginable resource on The Great Depression, and includes Lesson Plans, K-12. (NHEC's Lesson Plan Reviews evaluates the approach of one of the Network's lesson plans for elementary school, Children's Letter's to Mrs. Roosevelt).

At Edsitement, the lesson plan, Worth a Thousand Words: Depression-Era Photographs, gives guidelines for working with the image library of the New Deal Network.

America in the 1930s, a project, developed by the American Studies Program at the University of Virginia, allows visitors to view the 1930s through films, radio programs, literature, journalism, museums, exhibitions, architecture, art, and other forms of cultural expression. The site itself is best for students in high school and above; however, it contains excellent resources, such as audio of 1930s radio programs, that teachers can use with students of any age. Materials are most easily accessed through the organized Site Index.

The H-net discussion group, H-US1918-45: the New Deal Era and Its Origins offers an extensive cafeteria of Resources for Teaching. It's a gateway to a variety of materials spanning World War I through World War II. Resources include course syllabi for college and university classes (including that of noted 20th century historian, Alan Brinkley) which, in turn, lead to further web-based resources; categorized links to primary source websites, photographs and images, posters, maps, audio files and video from American Memory and History Matters, The Crash, FDR Archives, and more.

The online interactive exhibit, A New Deal for Texas Parks demonstrates local impact of New Deal Programs—in this case, the Civilian Conservation Corps, who constructed the first state parks in Texas. Visitors are invited to flip through the pages of the scrapbook to explore how individuals, communities and landscapes in Texas were impacted by the New Deal Era, to explore primary source materials (including music, oral history videos, and newsreels) and to create a personal scrapbook of materials. The exhibit is thematically organized, and at the beginning of each thematic chapter, a PDF file with questions guides content exploration.

Bookmark These! Resources for Movie Friday

leeannghajar — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 10:50:00 -0400

News Brief

Mar 27 2009

Bookmark These! Resources for Movie Friday

Looking for online film resources?

Visit American History in Video. More than 1,200 titles and 420 viewing hours comprise the online searchable collection—including documentaries, newsreels, and archival footage. Browse materials by type or by historical era, download the transcript, link to the video or embed footage on another website. The site includes tools for creating your own film clips, annotating those clips, and choosing who has access: only you, your institution, or everyone. American History in Video is a joint project between A&E Television Networks and Alexander Street Press. American History in Video is available for one-time purchase of perpetual access, or as an annual subscription. Contact sales@alexanderstreet.com if you wish to begin a subscription or to request a free 30-day trial.

American Experience Films from PBS allows the visitor to browse the entire American Experience series—over 200 films. Watch them online, go behind the scenes, download teacher's guides. Browse films alphabetically, by season, theme, or historical era.

FedFlix advertises that it features the best movies of the United States government (not necessarily an oxymoron in the context of history education). It's an eclectic collection of topics and speakers, browsable by subject, author, keyword, or creator. Definitely informative, the films clarify the institutional voice and provide insight into our government and national identity. All films are in the public domain. FedFlix is a joint venture between the National Technical Information Service Library of Commerce and Public.Resource.org

John Hope Franklin, 1915-2009

leeannghajar — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 13:54:00 -0400

News Brief

Mar 26 2009

John Hope Franklin, 1915-2009

John Hope Franklin, African American historian, professor, and civil rights activist, passed away on March 25. His life work changed the way we explore, analyze, construct, and teach American history. "He not only studied history; he made it," explains an editorial in The Washington Post.

Franklin lived and acted with a conviction that historians have a voice and an obligation to the present and to the determination of public policy. "Using one's skills to influence public policy seemed to be a satisfactory middle ground between an ivory tower posture of isolation and disengagement and a posture of passionate advocacy that too often deserted the canons of scholarship," he said.

The specter of color is apparent even when it goes unmentioned, and it is all too often the unseen force that influences public policy as well as private relationships. (John Hope Franklin)

As an historian, he is credited as the first to contextualize African Americans in the historiography of American history with the 1947 publication of From Slavery to Freedom: A History of African Americans, a book he continuously revised and whose sales have exceeded 3 million copies throughout the world. As his obituary from Duke University states, "At the time From Slavery to Freedom was published, there were few scholars working in African-American history and the books that had been published were not highly regarded by academics. To write it, he first had to give himself a course in African-American history, then spend months struggling to complete the research in segregated libraries and archives—including Duke's, where he could not use the bathroom."

He published his last book, Mirror to America: The Autobiography of John Hope Franklin, in 2005.

In the almost-60 intervening years, John Hope Franklin wrote history, taught history, and made history. The articles and multimedia links below highlight his life and hint at the depth of his influence.

News from the American Historical Association includes links to Franklin's work and online interviews.

One might argue that the historian is the conscience of the nation. (John Hope Franklin)

Duke University Remembers John Hope Franklin is a website dedicated to accomplishments, quotes, statements, and images. The site (including the detailed obituary cited earlier) offers the opportunity to share condolences and memories. The Gallery includes filmed interviews with Franklin, courtesy of University of North Carolina TV.

Franklin was the James B. Duke Professor Emeritus of History at Duke University where he founded the John Hope Franklin Center for Interdisciplinary and International Studies and whose Rare Book, Manuscript, and Special Collections Library houses the John Hope Franklin Collection of African and African American Documentation.

The John Hope Franklin Humanities Institute, a part of the Center for Interdisciplinary and International Studies, has also posted biographical interviews with Franklin on his work as a historian, including Dr. Franklin on the Role of the Historian in the World.

Franklin is memorialized in a comprehensive biography in The New York Times.

He spoke with journalist Gwen Ifill about his autobiography and the state of race in America in 2005 during a PBS interview.

Under Historians in the News, the History News Network encourages readers to post their memories of John Hope Franklin, links to news articles and videos, and offers articles from the HNN archives by and about Franklin.

Join the Clearinghouse on Facebook and Twitter!

leeannghajar — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 08:23:03 -0400

News Brief

Mar 20 2009

Join the Clearinghouse on Facebook and Twitter!

Join the National History Education Clearinghouse (NHEC) on Facebook and Twitter! On Facebook, bookmark our page at http://tinyurl.com/historyclearinghouse. And on Twitter you can follow the latest postings online at http://twitter.com/teachinghistory or text to twitter@teachinghistory.

New to Twitter? Check out our Twitter how-to posting in Tools for Teachers to learn more. Not yet on Facebook? Sign up for an account.

We will post updates on new additions to the NHEC. We will also let you know about upcoming conferences where you can meet NHEC staff, learn more about the website, and let us know how we are doing.

American Experience: We Shall Remain

leeannghajar — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 12:56:32 -0400

News Brief

Mar 17 2009

American Experience: We Shall Remain

In April 2009, the award-winning PBS series, American Experience launches an immersive look at the Native American experience with the five-episode series We Shall Remain.

Watch the series trailer and film clips to get an idea of content and concept. Actor Benjamin Bratt narrates this documentary that explores how Native peoples valiantly resisted expulsion from their lands and fought the extinction of their culture. The chronological range is impressive—from the Wampanoags of New England in the 1600s who used their alliance with the English to weaken rival tribes, to the bold new leaders of the 1970s who harnessed the momentum of the Civil Rights Movement to forge a pan-Indian identity. We Shall Remain represents a collaboration between Native and non-Native filmmakers and involves Native advisers and scholars at all levels of the project.

A teacher's guide is forthcoming in April and promises to offer techniques to integrate Native American history into the school curricula—including film-specific questions for analysis and comprehension, discussion questions, and classroom activities.

The film website includes additional resources and a bibliography of books and digital resources tied to each episode.

Local PBS stations, libraries, and educational institutions also plan events related to We Shall Remain, and an Event Calendar lists what, when, and where.

Omnibus Spending Bill, FY '09 Passes: Good News for History

leeannghajar — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 12:41:23 -0400

News Brief

Mar 13 2009

Omnibus Spending Bill, FY '09 Passes: Good News for History

Oh March 11, 2009, President Obama signed into law the the omnibus fiscal year (FY) 2009 budget. The bill provides funding for federal agencies left unfunded by the previous Congress, and it's good news for history, history education, and historians.

Who benefits? The current Congress rejected massive cuts proposed under President Bush—cuts that would have eliminated the national Historic Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) and decreased funding for the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), Teaching American History Grants (TAH), and various historic preservation efforts.

Instead, NHPRC will receive its highest level of funding in five years, and the NEH and TAH budgets are among those receiving increased funding. For TAH—the Bush administration had proposed cutting more than 50 percent of the program budget; new allocations raise the funding level from $117.9 million to $118.9 million.

And, among exciting allocation news: for the first time, National History Day is receiving federal support to the tune of $500,000.

National Coalition for History Washington Update for March 12, 2009, gives a comprehensive summary of which history and humanities focused agencies get what.

Remember the Ladies—But Not Just in March

leeannghajar — Fri, 13 Feb 2009 11:54:23 -0500

News Brief

Feb 27 2009

Remember the Ladies—But Not Just in March

Shirley Chisolm, the first African American woman elected to Congress and the first woman to run for president of the United States in 1972, once stated, "Of my two 'handicaps,' being female put more obstacles in my path than being black."

It's perhaps a surprising point of view—but in light of the recent presidential election, perhaps not. The election brought both race and gender to the forefront, often on waves of euphoria pushed by hope that the nation has moved a long way beyond a culture of discrimination. But how far have we actually come, and how much farther do we need to go? Women's History Month in March, following on the heels of Black History Month, is a chance to examine the trajectory and distance of that progress. One question for teachers is how integrate this narrative into the curriculum.

Educators and historians question the value of isolating women's history—and African American history—by focusing on "firsts" or on prominent individuals—and by limiting this focus to one month a year. "Women's history exists always within the context of universal history," wrote historian Gilda Lerner. "[It] takes place within the context of the political and social life shared by men and women."

The resources below, while focusing on women, demonstrate that integration into the greater narrative of American and global history. They represent only a sample of available materials.

Solid preparation in women's history is now critical for history teachers . . . to enable them to present an accurate and inclusive version of American history.

A new book, Clio in the Classroom: A Guide to Teaching U.S. Women's History, edited by Carol Berkin, Margaret S. Crocco, and Barbara Winslow, (Oxford University Press, 2009) is central to the discussion of the place of women's history in the curriculum. Their goal, the editors explain, is to consider how to integrate women's history "into the traditional American history narrative." Clio in the Classroom approaches their goal in three categories: up-to-date overviews of American women's history divided into eras from colonial to the present; conceptualization of the issues in women's history; and approaches and materials for incorporating women's voices into the curriculum. An essay on applying the historical thinking process to women's history and a rich compendium of resources are part of the volume.

Women's History: a Quick Cyberguide, by Arnold Pulda on AP Central on the College Board website, addresses how to include women's history in the AP U.S. history course. "We may not have, say, two weeks to focus exclusively on women's history," Pulda writes, "but we do have 40 weeks to make sure that students take notice of the threads that make up the entire strand as we progress along its length, and to pay attention when that thread is more or less prominent in the whole, and why."

Websites

Links below lead to a few of the reviews and websites on women's history included in the Clearinghouse database of website reviews.

Women and Social Movements in the United States, 1600-2000
Jewish Women's Archives
Emma Goldman Papers
Kate and Sue McBeth: Missionary Teachers to the Nez Perce
Do History: Martha Ballard's Diary Online
Votes for Women: Selections from the National American Woman Suffrage Association Collection, 1848–1921
Urban Experience in Chicago: Hull-House and Its Neighborhoods, 1889–1963

Museums and Historic Sites

Teaching with images? The National Portrait Gallery of the Smithsonian hosts an online Flash exhibit, Women Of Our Time. The exhibit includes three sections: Gallery, Biographical Moments, and Styles Gallery summarizes women's advances and looks at notable women of achievement in business, politics, social movements, and entertainment. Biographical Moments includes a curator's explanation of the role of portraiture in documenting a life, providing insights into interpreting portrait photographs. Styles explores the work of individual photographers, including Edward Steichen and Louise Dahl Wolfe and places their work within the photographic conventions of their times.

The Organization of American Historians hosts the National Collaborative for Women's History Sites, and the National Park Service itemizes lesson plans related to teaching women's history through historic sites through models diversified by race, geography, and time period.

Women's History Teaching Resources from the Smithsonian categorizes resources on women's history by race and ethnicity, professions, and events.

Multimedia

A YouTube series, Facts on Congress, includes a one-minute quick quiz on Women in Congress.

A search on the History Channel under video using the search term women yields audio and video files lasting 30 seconds to four minutes. Some are commentary: Maya Angelou tackles gender and race through comments about the Women's Movement and her memories of Eleanor Roosevelt and Rosa Parks. Some are historic footage: a newsclip from 1943 celebrates the first birthday of the Women's Auxiliary Army Corps, the predecessor of the Women's Army Corps. This video is both a primary and secondary source—it reveals multiple perspectives on contemporary attitudes toward women. (Brief commercial messages accompany many History Channel videos.)

A search through the P.O.V Blog (Point of View) on PBS provides lists of documentaries, including Chisholm '72: Unbought and Unbossed. The film is available through Netflix. The PBS site includes lesson plans and additional resources.

Also on PBS, the American Experience series offers a film on Woodrow Wilson. A full transcript of the program is available online, and the accompanying teachers guide offers a lesson on Women's Suffrage for grades 7–12. The lesson begins by pointing out that Wilson's first wife did not have the right to vote for her husband and branches from there into a look at phases of the women's suffrage movement, obstacles, and the Wilson administration's stance on women's suffrage.

Libraries and Archives

American Women's History: A Research Guide, a resource from the Middle Tennessee State University Library, is an extensive gateway to collections of women's history resources—print, media, and digitized primary sources—grouped under 75 alphabetized topics ranging from abolitionists to writers to Hispanic Americans, philanthropists, sports, and work.

The Library of Congress window on materials about women's history, Women's History Month, leads to a wealth of materials recognizing "the creativity, imagination, and vitality of women throughout U.S. history." Materials still available from 2008 emphasized the theme Women's Art, Women's Vision.

At the Library of Congress, see also "Votes for Women" Suffrage Pictures, 1850–1920

Pathfinder for Women's History at the National Archives systematizes the hunt for resources through defined categories of Primary Documents, Monographs and Anthologies, and Reference Works.

For primary source documents, see Teaching With Documents: Woman Suffrage and the Nineteenth Amendment on the National Archives site.

Miscellany

A 12th-grade curriculum module from Annenberg Media, titled Gender-based Distinctions, analyzes the question, "When does the government have the right to treat men and women differently?" Students debate gender discrimination laws. Title IX, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the 1972 Amendments, and court cases are among examined materials. A video demonstrates classroom implementation of the lesson plan. Annenberg requires a login; online materials are free of charge.

Also from Annenberg: The Lowell System: Women in a New Industrial Society, Workshop Three of Primary Sources: Workshops in American History, illustrates through primary source documents just how much industrialization changed the lives of women. Documents, activities, videos, and lecture transcripts are available on the website.

And Annenberg recommends Remember the Ladies, correspondence between Abigail Adams and her husband, John Adams, in 1776, and speeches by Sojourner Truth, on the website for America's History in the Making. Also see the program Industrializing America to trace the developments leading to women's entry into the workforce en masse.

The Women In World History website includes a resource page, Teaching Women's Rights from Past to Present. Resources include lesson plans, links to primary source documents and analysis, and an emphasis on law and policy demonstrating a formal extension of women's rights.

In 2007, Scholastic Magazine asked filmmaker Anne Aghion about Women's History Month. Her response: it made her sad that Women's History Month was even needed, but, "The truth is, women still have to work harder than men do to succeed in certain professions." Scholastic's activities for students grades 5–8 include Women's Suffrage, a unit including interactive maps and quizzes and the stories of one woman who remembered casting her first vote in 1920.

PBS Kids offers a contextualized essay on Alice Paul and the National Women's Party.

Women In Congress a rich website of the Office of the Clerk, U.S. Capitol, includes historical essays, artifacts, fast facts, and educational resources—including seven lesson plans.

IF . . . the Omnibus Spending Bill

leeannghajar — Fri, 27 Feb 2009 14:27:01 -0500

News Brief

Feb 27 2009

IF . . . the Omnibus Spending Bill

The National Coalition for History Washington Update for February 27, 2009 offers a comprehensive summary of the financial implications of the FY '09 Omnibus Funding Bill to the field of history and historians.

Who benefits? While figures are not final until the bill is signed into law, funding increases above 2008 allocations would be in store for the National Archives (NARA), National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC), Teaching American History Grants (TAH), National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH), and the Smithsonian (SI).

The Coalition's newsletter update provides detailed summaries on an organization-by-organization basis. Particularly worth a cheer: funding for NHPRC has been an ongoing battle and President Bush had proposed zero funding for this critical agency in 2009. The current budget proposal brings NHPRC closer than ever before to its full authorization of $10 million per year.

The Coalition newsletter explains, "If enacted, the omnibus package will finalize spending levels for the current fiscal year that began on October 1, 2008. Most federal programs have been operating at the previous year's levels under a continuing resolution that will end on March 6, 2009."

Another Kind of American Idol

leeannghajar — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 17:13:56 -0500

News Brief

Feb 19 2009

Another Kind of American Idol

The impressive Star-Spangled Banner, America's almost 200-year old, 34-by-34-foot flag that inspired Francis Scott Key to pen the national anthem, is a highlight exhibit at the Smithsonian Museum of American History.

But as important as the flag and the anthem are to our national identity, it's no secret that singing the anthem is not for the faint-of-voice or for the monotone, although it's publicly sung in every imaginable venue by choirs, opera singers, pop and rap performers, and many, many, many more. Now, the Smithsonian offers visitors to the online Star-Spangled Banner exhibit a chance to show the world how it ought to be sung on YouTube.

The Smithsonian invites you to

Sing the national anthem your way! Upload your video to our YouTube group and enter to win the Star-Spangled Banner singing contest sponsored by the National Museum of American History and USA WEEKEND. The Grand Prize winner will be invited to perform the national anthem at the Museum in Washington, DC and at the Baltimore Orioles vs. Atlanta Braves game, both on Flag Day (June 14, 2009). The prize includes a trip for two to Washington, DC, including airfare and two nights hotel accommodations; tickets and transportation to a Baltimore Orioles baseball game; and $400 in spending money.

Sample entries are posted; just hit the Go button and start singing!

The exhibit explores the Star-Spangled Banner as history, as artifact, and as symbol.

But first, tour other elements of this online exhibit. The Star-Spangled Banner site looks at the flag as history, as artifact, and as symbol. It weaves narratives of the past with present-day meaning. The exhibit tells the story of the flag and invites viewers to explore the physical features and dimensions of this carefully-preserved remnant. Close-up zooms focus on the fabric, weave, and color and explain history and conservation efforts over the years.

Mini-essays and quizzes give context to the War of 1812 and explain why the Star-Spangled Banner and subsequent versions of the flag came to hold such meaning for Americans. Read the history of the American flag, and investigate rules and rituals surrounding its display and use.

The interactive feature, Share Your Story, encourages individuals to talk about the meaning of the flag in their own lives and to upload photographs illustrating that meaning.

The Electronic Schoolhouse/LaEscuela Electronica: A Bilingual History Education Resource

leeannghajar — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 11:08:41 -0500

News Brief

Feb 16 2009

The Electronic Schoolhouse/LaEscuela Electronica: A Bilingual History Education Resource

The Electronic Schoolhouse/LaEscuela Electronica developed by the New York State Archives represents a major educational outreach to Spanish-language speakers.

The site focuses on using historical records—primary sources—as learning tools in elementary, middle, and secondary education. There's an English site and a Spanish site; and lesson plans, worksheets, and instructional videos are mirrored in both languages.

Primary source materials remain in their original language, organized by categories. The site enables the teacher to build a worksheet and then to edit and adapt that worksheet, selecting what information is needed to accompany the primary source material. Among seven worksheet options, the teacher might select captions, historical background of the primary source, questions, and resources.

Classroom teachers developed the content to correlate with the New York State Learning Standards with the goal of promoting critical thinking skills, reading and writing skills, and understanding historical content and context.

Lincoln Bicentennial: A Teachable Moment (updated February 24)

leeannghajar — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 10:43:34 -0500

News Brief

Feb 16 2009

Lincoln Bicentennial: A Teachable Moment (updated February 24)

The calendar date of President Abraham Lincoln's 200th birthday on February 12, 2009, by no means circumscribes the exhibits, events, lectures, reenactments, ceremonies, and other tributes commemorating the significance of his life and his presidency. They continue throughout the year in libraries, schools, museums, towns, and cities.

The Clearinghouse will continue to highlight resources on Lincoln that are helpful in the K–12 classroom: lesson plans, projects, and professional development opportunities of particular interest to educators. Please visit the Clearinghouse Professional Development section for information on events and online programs. The Clearinghouse Project Spotlight will also highlight Teaching American History (TAH) grants with modules related to teaching about Abraham Lincoln.

Lincoln Bicentennial Commission

The most complete centralized information center is the Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, website of the Library of Congress, offering a comprehensive compendium of events, materials, information, and resources surrounding this event the Commission has labeled "a teachable moment." We particularly invite your attention to Resources for Teachers. The Learning About Lincoln section includes lesson plans and other classroom resources, reading lists, podcasts, ideas for community projects, and a calendar of professional development opportunities.

Recent Discoveries

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History (added February 24)

The Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History announced two podcasts by Lincoln historians Catherine Clinton and Andrew Delbanco. Clinton looks at how early tragedy helped prepare Lincoln for crises later in life; Delbanco examines how Americans have perceived Lincoln throughout history.

A partnership between NBC News and Gilder Lehrman focuses on teaching American history through archival news footage and primary documents. Use Lincoln as the search term at iCue and uncover a wealth of primary source materials, sources, and commentary. Other resources from Gilder Lehrman are available on the Institute's Lincoln page.

21st Century Abe (added February 16)

On February 12, the Rosenbach Museum and Library in Philadelphia launched 21st Century Abe. This interactive website is an exploration of history, memory, and popular culture and invites visitors to find their own version of Abraham Lincoln, asking why we in the 21st century "are still obsessed with this 19th-century man?"

The project points out that Abraham Lincoln is prevalent in popular culture and asks what this popular culture has to do with the historical Abraham Lincoln. It's a collaborative venture. Visitors may upload their own images of the "found Abe." There's a portrait in cupcakes, videos, and contemporary artists' paintings and illustrations. You can add your own creation and design a poster to show what Abe means in the modern world. The site blog shares other representations of the "found Lincoln."

Lincoln at 200

Lincoln at 200, a collaborative project from Chicago—the city where Lincoln was nominated for president—combines resources from the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission, the Chicago History Museum, and the Newberry Library.

The thoughtfully analytical site includes two web exhibits and a databased archive of 270 prints, images, and artifacts.

Abraham Lincoln and the West, 1809–1860 is a web-only exhibition that takes its organizing structure from Lincoln's 1860 autobiography, written to introduce him to voters. The exhibit looks at America between 1809 and 1860, focusing on changes in transportation, commerce, political alliances, and growing divisions on the question of slavery.

The Fiery Trial: Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War is a digital version of a temporary exhibition at Chicago History Museum (October 10, 2009 to April 4, 2010). This exhibit examines the course of Lincoln's ideological and political transformations as president from a moderate Republican opposed to slavery yet willing to accept it to maintain the Union to becoming the author of the Emancipation Proclamation—a document that changed the course of American citizenship and democracy. The exhibit also looks at how time and memory alter the historic perception of Lincoln.

Gilder Lehrman Institute

The Gilder Lehrman Institute publishes a Lincoln page offering highlights of current events about Abraham Lincoln, bibliographies of prize-winning books, links to online exhibitions on Lincoln and the Civil War, and audio podcasts and videos of prominent historians focusing on themes and events in the life of Abraham Lincoln.

Happy Presidents Day

leeannghajar — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 11:54:49 -0500

News Brief

Feb 11 2009

Happy Presidents Day

February 16 is Presidents Day—but what exactly does that mean? Even though it's a federal holiday, Presidents Day actually doesn't exist. It's officially still named George Washington's Birthday. The observance of Washington's birthday on February 22 began in 1880 (or 1885, depending on where you lived), but in 1971 the celebration changed to the third Monday in February. The chronological proximity of Abraham Lincoln's birthday on February 12 (never an official federal holiday), state mandates to combine the observance with recognition of other presidents,—even a push from commercial interests to call the day Presidents Day in order to have retail sales promotions—all led to the unofficial name, Presidents Day.

An unquantifiable number of excellent web resources exist for teaching about individual presidents and the presidency in general from presidential libraries to historic sites, to the National Archives and Library of Congress—to highlight perhaps the most familiar—however, several are listed below as supplemental "quick fixes."

White House 101: Facts and Fun for All Ages offers a comprehensive look at the presidency, from biographical slide shows and essays, to a briefing room with a blog of current events and commentary to a look at the categorized agenda of the Obama administration—and of course, a look at the White House and its history.

Constitutional Rights Foundation considers Presidents Day in 2009 as a time for reflection. The site looks at 13 presidents and key decisions and events from each administration from Washington to Lyndon Johnson. The initial article on George Washington, What Made George Washington a Great Leader, also lists the 10 best and 10 worst presidents, voted by 846 historians in 1983. Compare that with a recent C-span survey.

2009 Horizon Report: Emerging Technologies in Higher Education

leeannghajar — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 15:32:55 -0500

News Brief

Feb 4 2009

2009 Horizon Report: Emerging Technologies in Higher Education

The New Media Consortium (NMC) and the Educause Learning Initiative (ELI) recently released the sixth annual Horizon Report. The Horizon Report examines six emerging technologies, their potential impact on "teaching, learning, research, or creative expression within learning-focused organizations," and places them within the likely timeframe for their absorption into the user mainstream. Each technology profile provides specific examples of applications and supplemental resources.

This year's focus: mobiles, cloud computing, geo-everything, the personal web, semantic-aware applications, and smart objects.

While mobiles and cloud computing fall within the first adoption horizon (one to two years), the Report points out that these technologies are already in place on many campuses and that geo-everything and the personal web (placed within the three-to-four-year horizon) are already in common use outside the educational establishment.

The Horizon Report discusses the challenges of developing technologies on instruction and on educators. The critical challenges categorized in the Report include updating how students are taught; updating learning models and educational materials; adjusting assessment criteria; and assessing how emerging forms of scholarly practice impact evaluating faculty tenure and promotion. These critical challenges are "...more than merely an expectation to provide content; this is an opportunity for higher education to reach its constituents in new and compelling ways."

The decision-making processes behind the selections are transparent; The Horizon Project Wiki served as the workspace for the project. It is now open to public comment and augmentation—including discussion of technologies such as collaborative environments and paperless publishing that did not make the final cut for the 2009 report.

Smithsonian 2.0

leeannghajar — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:24:36 -0500

News Brief

Jan 27 2009

Smithsonian 2.0

What happens when America's largest museum complex gets on board perhaps the greatest communications revolution? During a two-day interactive gathering, January 23–24, 2009, 30 activists in the digital world joined Smithsonian curators and other museum specialists to explore the intersection of Web 2.0 technologies and the Smithsonian's 19 museums and National Zoo.

The event, Smithsonian 2.0: A Gathering to Re-Imagine the Smithsonian in the Digital Age, addressed a primary question—how to make the vast resources of the Smithsonian more digitally accessible. Concurrently, experts discussed how Web 2.0 technologies influence the dissemination and interpretation of museum collections and how this dissemination affects the functions of historians and curators.

As the description of the gathering asks,

How does the Smithsonian effectively serve its growing virtual visitors? How does it deliver to those visitors the 137 million artifacts, works of art, and scientific specimens in its collections along with the expertise that goes with them? How does it do so in an engaging, educational manner that evokes the power and inspiration of its finest exhibitions and presentations?

The Smithsonian's target audience in the digital age is the teenage through college demographic, most of whom will largely experience and use the collections and educational resources online.

Michael Edson, Director, Web and New Media Strategy, at the Smithsonian, encourages a vision of a Smithsonian Commons, a concept rooted in the "democratization of knowledge and innovation" and broadly defined as a "set of resources maintained in the public sphere for the use and benefit of everyone." And what are the benefits to a museum? Edson points out that ideas don't stand alone, but are built on the ideas of others. A commons, perhaps much like the collaborative classroom, provides access to the raw materials of innovation and encourages networking and creativity in their use. (Edson's PowerPoint presentation is online on Slideshare with an accompanying full-text version).

Catch up and contribute to the discussion which continues on the Smithsonian 2.0 blog and, among others, currently includes ideas from Lee Rainie, Director, Pew Internet & American Life Project, Bruce Wyman, Director of Technology, Denver Art Museum, and other responses and referrals to papers and resources from public historians in the Smithsonian and other museum venues.

Photos from the conference reside on Flickr, and discussion also continues on the Facebook group, Smithsonian 2.0. The Washington Post reported the event.

(Smithsonian resources for educators link from the conference website as well.)

Register for Your Virtual Seat: Smithsonian Education Online Lincoln Conference

leeannghajar — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 12:54:15 -0500

News Brief

Jan 23 2009

Register for Your Virtual Seat: Smithsonian Education Online Lincoln Conference

Register now for the free Abraham Lincoln: a Smithsonian Education Online Conference, airing February 4–5, 2009. The conference takes place completely over the internet, so tune in from wherever you are. The Smithsonian promises opportunities to meet peers, share information, expand professional networks, and learn from talented colleagues.

Topics include One Life: The Mask of Lincoln conducted by Historian Dave Ward of the National Portrait Gallery; Public and Private Photography During the Civil War with Shannon Perch, Associate Curator at the National Museum of American History; and The Enduring Emancipation: From President Lincoln to President Obama led by Lonnie Bunch, Founding Director of the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

The five 50-minute sessions scheduled for each day will be recorded to accommodate all participant time zones, and schedules will be available online after the conference as well. Each day concludes with a session exploring classroom application of workshop content.

The conference program and speaker biographies are available online to enable you to plan your schedule. Technical information necessary for participation arrives after registration.

Save the Date! National Teach-In on Lincoln!

leeannghajar — Mon, 05 Jan 2009 15:09:11 -0500

News Brief

Jan 5 2009

Save the Date! National Teach-In on Lincoln!

The History Channel and the Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission are offering a National Teach-In on the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln on Thursday, February 12, 2009, at 1:30EST. (The History Channel also publishes a minisite including videos and essays on Lincoln.)

Registration is now open at www.history.com/lincoln. The first 500 registrants receive a National History Day sourcebook on Lincoln and a Lincoln coinbox.

The Teach-In features two Lincoln Scholars: Matthew Pinsker and Harold Holzer. They will share their expertise and answer student questions from throughout the country. Content recommended for middle through high school, with an emphasis on eighth grade.

Questions? Please email lincoln@aetn.com.

Please consult A New Look at Abraham Lincoln and Lincoln Bicentennial for previous articles on classroom resources for the bicentennial.

Classroom Resources: Presidential Inaugurals

leeannghajar — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 18:42:13 -0500

News Brief

Jan 2 2009

Classroom Resources: Presidential Inaugurals

Inaugural parades and balls are as integral to the nation's history as the solemnity of the presidential oath of office and the inaugural address. A few of the many online resources ranging from primary source documents to quick quizzes are listed below.

Renewing America's Promise, the theme for the inauguration of Barack Obama as the 44th U.S. President on January 20, links the event to the 200th anniversary of the birth of Abraham Lincoln. The concept of "a new birth of freedom," words taken from Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, November 1863, underpin inaugural ceremonies.

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), chairman of the Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies (JCCIC), explained the Committee's choice of theme. "It is especially fitting to celebrate the words of Lincoln as we prepare to inaugurate the first African-American president of the United States."

President-elect Barack Obama will take the oath of office on the same Bible upon which Abraham Lincoln swore March 4, 1861, to uphold the Constitution. Part of the collection of the Library of Congress the Lincoln Bible will go on display at the Library between February 12 and May 9, 2009, in an exhibit, With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition.

When Barack Obama takes the oath of office at the U.S. Capitol, the first African American to become president will be standing amid stonework laid by slaves more than two centuries ago.

Despite many historic parallels suggested between Obama, Lincoln, and other previous presidents, Boston Globe article "At Capitol, Slavery's Story Turns Full Circle" posits that many people are unaware that "When Barack Obama takes the oath of office at the U.S. Capitol, the first African American to become president will be standing amid stonework laid by slaves more than two centuries ago." (Michael Kranish, Boston Globe, December 28)

The New York Times emphasizes the opportunity of this election to examine the progress of African Americans in the electoral system. Take the quiz developed by two college professors, Paving the Way to the Inaugural Ball, and get instant answers and contextual information. Did you know, for example, that the first African American welcomed at the White House for an inaugural celebration was Frederick Douglass? The detailed answer explains that Douglas, like many white celebrants, tried to enter the white house without an invitation, and was denied entrance. "Lincoln heard and demanded Douglass be admitted and greeted him warmly."

The JCCIC provides historical perspectives on activities such as the inaugural parade, Facts and Firsts, and the history of inaugural balls.

Libraries, Lesson Plans, and Exhibits

The Library of Congress offers a collection of approximately 400 items or 2,000 digital files relating to inaugurations from George Washington's in 1789 to George W. Bush's inauguration of 2001. The presentation, I Do Solemnly Swear, includes diaries and letters of presidents and of those who witnessed inaugurations, handwritten drafts of inaugural addresses, broadsides, inaugural tickets and programs, prints, photographs, and sheet music. Materials are compiled from an array of divisions within the Library, and from the White House, the United States Senate, and the Architect of the Capitol Office of the Sergeant at Arms.

The National Archives has digitized over 3,000 documents relating to presidential inaugural addresses. George Washington's First Inaugural Address is among those available for online reading. For those visiting the Washington, DC area, the Archives downtown at Constitution Avenue and 7th Street also offers special programs and exhibits on inaugural history.

The History News Network highlights 35 hot topics associated with inaugurals in articles such as The Best and Worst of Inaugural Addresses and The Controversy Over Prayer at the Inauguration.

The University of North Carolina School of Education's Learn.org has compiled comprehensive annotated resources under the title, Presidential inaugurations in historical perspective. Topics include inaugural addresses and oaths of office, collections and online exhibits, teaching about presidential inaugurations, general presidential references, and a look at Inauguration 2009.

Further lesson plans for grades K–12 appear at Education World and Edsitement.

The White House Historical Association offers A Brief History of Presidential Inaugurations through essays, images, trivia, and tidbits.

Department of Education Publishes 2009 Teaching American History Grant Notice

leeannghajar — Fri, 19 Dec 2008 11:41:26 -0500

News Brief

Dec 19 2008

Department of Education Publishes 2009 Teaching American History Grant Notice

On December 23, 2009, the U.S. Department of Education published a Notice Inviting Applications for New Awards for FY 2009 for Teaching American History (TAH) grants. Complete details are in the notice.

January 22 is the deadline for Notice of Intent to Apply; application deadlines are March 9; and May 7 is the deadline for intergovernmental review.

Two pre-application workshops are scheduled. The first will occur in New York City in the Grand Ballroom of the New York Hilton Hotel, 1355 Avenue of the Americas, New York City, 10019 on Thursday, January 8, 1–4pm.

The second takes place in Washington, DC, in the U.S. Department of Education Auditorium, 400 Maryland Avenue, SW, on Monday, January 12, 10am–12pm and again, 2–4pm.

Please check the Teaching American History website for further information.