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Past/Present - Experience History From the Inside Out - Center for New American Media and Muzzy Lane Software
Grades
5 to 11In the Classroom
Prepare to use this activity in your classroom by thoroughly exploring the documentation and videos before you plan to use it. Introduce this interactive to students on a projector or whiteboard using the demo videos and videos about Anna and Walter. Next, have students pair up and sign up for an account. One must be Walter, and one must be Anna. The characters both meet the same townspeople and participate in the same global events, but the roles and social positions are different, so they will have different tasks. Pairing students will allow for maximum participation in post-activity discussions.You must be registered and logged in to add items to your favorites.
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Imperial War Museums - IWM
Grades
7 to 12In the Classroom
Discover the many ready-to-go, free resources on this site as you teach about wars and conflict. Use this information to compare and contrast British involvement in conflicts vs. those in your country. Have students create an annotated image including text boxes and related links using a tool such as Image Annotator, reviewed here, to describe images taken during wartime. Using Twiki, reviewed here, create a class wiki about the conflict you are studying. Not comfortable with wikis? Check out the TeachersFirst Wiki Walk-Through.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Webcomics Web Archive - Library of Congress
Grades
8 to 12In the Classroom
Include this collection in art classes during the study of comic book art. Share comics with students in history classes along with newspaper comics to demonstrate the use of comics to depict historic events or share political beliefs and satire. In literature classes, include this site along with others to share comics depicting characters in novels. Have students create their own comics or cartoons to summarize story events or depict characters and events from history using a comic creation tool like ToonyTool, reviewed here, to create single frame cartoons. Find more uses for using comics in the classroom by viewing the archive of our OK2Ask session Engage & Inspire: Comics in the Classroom, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Transportation Systems - Past, Present, and Future - Educator DigiKit - The Henry Ford Museum
Grades
8 to 12In the Classroom
Save some time with these ready-to-use free materials for use as an entire unit or as a supplement to current teaching materials. Include information from this site during lessons on the 1800 or 1900's or the Industrial Revolution. Have students transform their learning by creating timelines (with music, photos, videos, and more) to demonstrate changes in transportation using Timeline JS, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Beyond The Bubble - Stanford History Education Group
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
Bookmark and save this excellent site as a resource for Common Core social studies literacy assessments. Many of these activities (and videos) are ideal for your interactive whiteboard or projector. Share the interactive rubric BEFORE the lesson, so students are aware of exactly what is expected. Use activities and materials provided on the site to teach lessons in character education, bias, and racism. Create your own similiar activities. Explore this site during professional development sessions for ideas for rubrics and lesson planning. Click on tags for "same assessment type" to find additional assessments not in the main list.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Barat Primary Source Nexus - Barat Education Foundation
Grades
2 to 12In the Classroom
Take a look at the free professional development for using primary sources for teachers. Search for Connecting to the Common Core, where there are writing prompts for K-5 plus a link to the triangle activity. Download and use the PDF for the Thinking Triangle. Have older students research an interest and report to the class using a tool like Slides, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Zoom In! - Education Development Center
Grades
5 to 12In the Classroom
Take advantage of these free lesson plans for use in teaching social studies aligned to Common Core Standards. Even if you cannot use whole lessons, browse through to find resources to add to your current lessons. Create classes and assign different lessons to different groups of students based on ability and interest. After completing a unit, have students make a multimedia presentation using one of the many TeachersFirst Edge tools, reviewed here.Edge Features:
Includes an education-only area for teachers and students
Parent permission advised before posting student work created using this tool
Requires registration/log-in (WITH email)
Includes teacher tools for registering and/or monitoring students
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The Wright Brothers - Who Were Wilbur & Orville? - Smithsonian National Air & Space Museum
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
What a perfect addition to a lesson about the Wright brothers or a science unit about aviation (physics and more)! Have students work in cooperative learning groups and research a specific topic found at this site. Enhance learning by having students use Fakebook, reviewed here, to create a "fake" page similar in style to Facebook about one of the Wright brothers or as a spectator viewing one of the first flying machines. Be sure to take advantage of the free experiments and activities available on the site.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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History and Politics Out Loud - WyzAnt Tutoring
Grades
6 to 12This site includes advertising.
In the Classroom
Share speeches from this site on your class webpage or blog for students to view at home. Share them with your class using your projector or interactive whiteboard. Have students use Fakebook, reviewed here, to create a "fake" page similar in style to Facebook about a president, famous scientist, or nearly any other real or fictitious person after viewing and listening to speeches on this site. Use the text of speeches to create a word cloud; try WordClouds, reviewed here, to analyze a leader's priorities and emphasis. Use these examples as students prepare their own persuasive (or propaganda) speeches in English or civics classes. Teachers or ELL students can offer speeches with accompanying texts to help build vocabulary and listening skills.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Vistas - Dr. Dana Leibsohn and Dr. Barbara Mundy
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
You could share this site with your students on your interactive whiteboard or projector and at the same time create a timeline for the Spanish Americas using a tool such as Timeline Infographic Template, reviewed here. What a wonderful resource for higher level students during Hispanic Heritage Month!There are several themes listed on the site and each theme starts with a video that is less than five minutes. You might want to put small groups of students in charge of a theme, and have them explore the site for what their theme is all about (be sure to go over the titles in the Library with them). Enhance learning by having the small groups use a tool such as Mindmeister, reviewed here, to create and share concept maps of the important ideas about their theme. They may want to use the images from the site, too, so be sure to remind your students that they must cite their source, and give credit to the people who created this site when they create a project on line.
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Critical Past Stock Footage Archive - Jim and Andy Erickson
Grades
6 to 12This site includes advertising.
In the Classroom
Use photos or videos on Critical Past to help illustrate what students are learning in history. Ask students to be "eyewitnesses" of history and watch a video before they have context for it. Students can write or blog about what they think they are witnessing. Afterward they can research the event in more depth and write a follow-up reflection on what was actually happening in the clip. Challenge your students to use a site such as Sutori, reviewed here, to create timelines of topics researched on the site. Use images from public domain sites, such as the collections, reviewed here, to illustrate the events.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Women with Altitude - NetFlights
Grades
6 to 12In the Classroom
Share this timeline when studying pioneers in different fields or include in Women's History Month lessons. Each entry provides a short introduction to the featured woman. Challenge students to use the entry as a starting point to research the aviator more fully. Have students save their resources using a bookmarking tool like Papaly, reviewed here, and include a link to their resources with the final project. Papaly allows you to collaborate and add notes to bookmarks making this a useful tool for use with group projects. Replace paper and pen timelines by asking students to create their own timelines exploring the life of a famous pioneer using Turbo Timeline Generator, reviewed here.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Native Knowledge 360 Education Initiative - Smithsonian Institute
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Replace some (or all) of your current written Native America resources with the genuine artifacts and stories available for viewing on this site. Use Padlet, reviewed here, to organize important information and resources found on this site to share with students. As students learn about Native Americans, instead of written or oral presentations, ask student groups to create quizzes for their classmates using a quiz-creation tool like Baamboozle, reviewed here. Baamboozle is a quick and easy resource for creating and sharing quizzes for teams of two. As a final project, transform and extend student technology and learning by using Book Creator, reviewed here, to create class books sharing information about Native Americans. Book Creator is a digital book creation site offering the ability to add images, text, video, and more. Be sure to share student-created books on your class website or blog after publication.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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The Center on Representative Government - Indiana University
Grades
7 to 12In the Classroom
Clearly, this is a great resource for those teaching civics or US government. These activities will also be useful to US History teachers, as the issues covered span important political eras. For example, there are activities related to women's suffrage, the child labor movement, the GI Bill and the development of the Interstate Highway system. Lesson plans range from those designed to cover several days, to short "Congressional moments" videos perfect for introducing a concept or sparking class discussion. A number of the lesson plans and activities are designed specifically for iPads. Of note also is the fact that the video clips on the site are not links to YouTube, so will not pose an access problem for school districts that block the site.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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America Goes to War: an Infographic - New England College
Grades
8 to 12In the Classroom
Was the U.S. at war? What powers does the U.S. President have to declare war, and how have Presidents used those powers historically? A powerful, but simple infographic delineates the legal and Constitutional differences among U.S. wars historically. Share the infographic on an interactive whiteboard, or embed on your classroom website for reference.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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TPS Teachers Network - Metropolitan State University of Denver
Grades
K to 12In the Classroom
Bookmark and save TPS Teachers Network as an excellent professional development and social networking site. Share with your colleagues to create your own professional learning network on the site. Create albums with primary sources for use throughout the year in one easy to find location.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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The International Civil Rights Center & Museum - The International Civil Rights Center & Museum
Grades
5 to 12In the Classroom
Have your students use the information about the people of the sit-in movement to write a biography. Add drama to your classroom and have students pretend to be one of the protesters. Have them write a monologue and present it to the class. Have students create public service announcement posters using Piclits (reviewed here). Use the announcements that can be found in the image gallery for examples.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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The Election Collection - PBS Learning Media
Grades
3 to 12In the Classroom
Include The Election Collection as part of any election unit. Have students research candidate information and compare and contrast points of view. Use an online tool such as the Interactive Two Circle Venn Diagram, reviewed here, or the Interactive Three Circle Venn Diagram, reviewed here. Pose a controversial question about an election issue and have students answer as one of the candidates. Use a tool such as Dotstorming, reviewed here, for that exercise. Or, challenge students to use Fakebook, reviewed here, to create a "fake" page similar in style to Facebook about a candidate's journey through the election process. Or, using Fakebook, have two candidates debate an issue. Be sure to take advantage of the free lesson plans offered on this site correlated to National History Standards.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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Trails to Utah and the Pacific
Grades
1 to 12In the Classroom
Search this site, or have students search this site, to find primary sources that accurately display what the experience of traveling west was like.Add your comments below (available only to members) | Become a Member
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'The Press and the Civil Rights Movement' Video Lesson - NewseumED
Grades
8 to 12In the Classroom
Using the Activity lesson plan/viewing guide, have the before viewing discussion with your class. Consider giving all students a chance to voice their opinions (even the shyest and quiet ones) by using a backchannel tool like YoTeach!, reviewed here. Then, show the video to the whole class, or "flip" the class and have them watch it at home. Either way, the viewing guide questions could be inserted into the video using a tool such as Acclaim, reviewed here. After the video, use the discussion questions and Vibby again. Next, have students (or small groups) choose one of the extension activities to complete and share with classmates.The reviewers at TeachersFirst have some suggestions for tools to use for those final projects: For items 1-4 make a chart using a tool such as Canva, reviewed here, or Draw.io, reviewed here. For managing a project like item 5 use Google Keep, reviewed here, Workflowy, reviewed here, or Todoist, reviewed here. For items 6 & 7, biography type projects, use Fakebook, reviewed here, and for item 8, make a collage, use Fotojet, reviewed here.
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