Photos As Primary Sources

On Tuesday we joined the fifth graders in our building on a fieldtrip. Our school's art teacher, Paul Elo, designed a architectural fieldtrip to Northeast Kansas City. Using a scavenger hunt, we looked closely at 20 homes built at the turn of the century. Students wrote short paragraphs and took 400 photos. We developed a website to share all of our information. You can see the website here.

You can also find the original scavenger hunt and the tour map on the website.

Wonderful Images of Old Classrooms

When I was designing the header for my students' blog I wanted to use images of old classrooms so I searched for hours until I came up with some good ones. I'm going to share them with you in this entry, then I'm going to look for the citations. So, if you don't see the citations check back.

I love the images on the left. Shows how much classrooms have
change in the last 100 years, these young women are doing
calisthenics at their desks. Wasn't there a movement several years
ago to have kids exercise at their desks?

Below is a list of images from the Library of Congress that you might enjoy. This is a portion of 100s of images they have archived at the LOC.

Classroom of students at the State Normal School, Kearney, Nebraska Nebraska State Historical Society, [Digital ID, e.g., nbhips 12036]

1st grade art work at Central, 1941
Western History/Genealogy Department, Denver Public Library


2nd grade at Central, 1941, Miss Monroe
Western History/Genealogy Department, Denver Public Library

Aspen School Room
Western History/Genealogy Department, Denver Public Library

Boys sitting at tables and reading books at the Chicago Telephone Company School for Boys
Chicago Daily News negatives collection, DN-0003451. Courtesy of the Chicago Historical Society.

Small Children Studying Geometry in the Classroom Johnston, Frances Benjamin,1864-1952. Washington, D.C., school survey Library of Congress Prints and Photographs Division Washington, D.C. 20540 USA

Novels with a Historical Connection

Blue Balliett wrote several novels that we used in our classroom with great success. Her first book was Chasing Vermeer, a mystery developed around a missing painting by Johannes Vermeer. The second book, The Wright 3, had the Frank Lloyd Wright Robie House as its main focus. I really liked the historical connection in the novels and the kids immediately warmed to the main characters. I liked the connections with primary sources; the paintings, the blueprints, the original photos.

I wrote curriculum for each book with a heavy emphasis on technology and the Internet. We did our first classroom wiki as a culminating project for our reading of The Wright 3. I discussed the wiki in a previous post Wikis in the Classroom.

I've read several other novels with a historical connection. I have not used Endymoin Spring by Matthew Skelton in the classroom, but there is a lot of potential in it---it's all about the power of the book. We might read it this Spring. The other book, which our students loved, was The Invention of Hugo Cabret by Brian Selznick. It is a marvel---I didn't write a curriculum but there are so many connections to old movies and movie makers--definately a must read but students really need their own copy since 1/2 of the 300+ pages are illustrations. Let me know if you run across any other novels with a historical connection. These Da'Vinci Code like books for kids makes great gifted curriculum.

Titanic in the Classroom

Be on the lookout for something new. Titanic in the Classroom was originally developed by the Department of Education & Children Services, Southern Australia http://www.decs.sa.gov.au/. I contacted them in June 2007 to ask if I could use some of their activities in a Titanic curriculum I was writing to use in the fall. I looked for Wayne Starick, the original webmaster, he was no where it be found. Eventually I found Henry Legedza, Corporate Web Administrator and he informed me that they were getting ready to disassemble the site. The Titanic in the Classroom site seemed to be the only site with a "searchable" Titanic database so I asked if I could re-construct the site. Luckily, Mr. Legedza said "yes".

So I have reconstructed the original site and am adding much more including the curriculum we will use. Please check out the new site Titanic in the Classroom now and again and see how things are progressing. As of today the database is the only weak link. Hopefully in the next few months I will find someone to get it up and running.

CSI--Finally Finished!!

We finally finished the CSI:Cemetery Scene Investigation website mentioned in an earlier post. Check it out!

Martha Ballard's Diary

I ran across this site, Martha Ballard's Diary, seven years ago and was amazed by it. I included it in all my primary source workshops. There is a PBS documentary about the same topic. I was reminded of the site by a listing on Blue Web'n listserv-- be sure to check out the diary site as well as the documentary.

American Experience: A Midwife's Tale (PBS)http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/mwt/index.html

Description: In 1785 Martha Ballard began the diary that she would keep for the next 27 years, until her death. At a time when fewer than half the women in America were literate, Ballard faithfully recorded the weather, her daily household tasks, her midwifery duties, and countless incidents that reveal the turmoil of a new nation. Historian Laurel Thatcher Ulrich discusses the importance of Martha Ballard's diary and what it reveals about 17th century America and women's roles at that time. Based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book of the same name by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, "A Midwife's Tale," Teaching Activities may be adapted in the absence of the for-fee film.

What Do You See?

I've done several NECC workshops on The Library of Congress and was "wowed" at the time as I looked deeper into what they have available for teachers and students. I want to share one of those "wow" activities with you. I was researching visual learners when I ran into this activity and I said to myself, "I can see where kids would really like this". The activity is called What Do You See?

"In this lesson students analyze a single photograph from the American Memory collection Selected Civil War Photographs, 1861-1865. Using the skills developed, students then find and analyze other images. Conclusions reached will allow students develop links between the Civil War and American industrialization."

Students divide into teams and look at a section of a bigger picture, they then come up with answers to questions about the photograph. They return to to the larger group and discuss the "Big Picture". When, in the late 1990's, I first saw this photograph and the "technology" used to cut it up I thought, "this is so cool". It seems rinky dink by today's standard but utilizing the technique is a good way to enhance visual literacy. Check it out and see how you could use this technique in your classroom.

Image From Selected Civil War Photographs, 1861-1865, Library of Congress