I have a huge passion for local history. It started with hearing stories about my grandfather, who was the first African-American police officer on the Eastern Shore of Maryland. It continued to grow through college, graduate school and through one of my first archival positions where I helped preserve and provide access to several local history collections for the District of Columbia Public Library’s Washingtoniana Division.

Group of school children in front of statue of George Washington, Washington, D.C.

Usually teachers in history and social studies classes focus on national or international events. But what about the history of the neighborhood where the students live? When teachers encourage students to learn about where they live and perhaps link their community to a larger event, they can see they are part of a larger story. Students can understand that they are a part of history and that they make history every day.

Start a local history lesson by finding a primary source from the Library of Congress that connects to a local event. Chronicling America and the Prints and Photograph Online Catalog are two great places to search. Use the primary source analysis tool for students to describe what they see from a picture or in a newspaper article, note anything that they recognize or other connections they make, and ask any questions they may have. Students can brainstorm where they can go to locate additional information that can answer their questions.

The Library of Congress has many other resources to help your students learn more about the history of their community.

Students from 6th Division public schools, Washington, D.C., looking at an exhibit of fine prints in the Library of Congress

• Local History: Mapping My Spot uses panoramic maps from the Library’s collections to help students begin to learn about their neighborhood and to find the important structures near their home. This lesson is especially suitable for younger grades.
• Creating a Primary Source Archive: All History is Local encourages students to develop an exhibit that documents their community’s history.
• Consider using the lesson Oral History and Social History for students interested in collecting oral histories within their communities. After students analyze oral histories created during the Great Depression, this lesson provides guidance on creating their own oral histories.

What strategies and other Library resources have you used to encourage students to explore local history?

The Birth of Old Glory

What is Flag Day?  It’s a great opportunity for students to explore Library of Congress primary sources and discover the history and meaning of an important national symbol: the flag of the United States. You may have some surprises in store for you.

On June 14, 1777, the Continental Congress approved the design of a national flag:

Resolved, That the flag of the ∥thirteen∥ United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white: that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new constellation.

By 1916, when President Woodrow Wilson designated Flag Day a national holiday, the U.S. had expanded to 48 states.  Try one or more of the following activities to help your students discover the history and symbolism of the Stars and Stripes as they learn how the flag changed over time.

Great Flag Day Puzzle

Have your students:

• Speculate about how artists were selected to redesign the flag when new states joined the nation and list desirable skills or qualities.  Read a story about the person who designed the current flag, and then review the list. Ask them how their thinking has changed.
• Analyze the Great Flag Day Puzzle that appeared in a 1916 Chicago newspaper.  Why do they think this article was created and published?  What more do they want to know?
• Imagine if Washington, D.C., were to obtain statehood.  Design a flag that would include this new state.
• Count the stars and stripes in the 1777 flag in The Birth of Old Glory and discuss what they symbolize.  Speculate about what the flag looked like after the 14^th and 15^th states, Vermont and Kentucky, were added. Were there more stars?  More stripes?  Something else?  Check out Grand Old Flag to find out what happened, and compare with their speculations.  How would the flag look today if each star represented one of the original colonies, and each stripe represented a state?

Additional Resources:

• Historical background for younger students:  Flag Day Celebrated
• Historical background for secondary students:  Flag Day
• Primary Source Set:  Symbols of the United States
• Elementary learning activity:  Stars, Stripes and Symbols of America: Comparing Our Flag, Past and Present

You can extend any of the above activities by using the Primary Source Analysis Tool and Teacher’s Guides to examine these primary sources further.

We’d love to hear if you or your students’ thinking about the U.S. flag changes after exploring these resources.  Did anything surprise you?

“Rules of Civility & Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation” transcribed by a youthful George Washington.

Some of these “Rules of Civility” address basic etiquette, which may be recognizable to students in spite of the wording: “Shift not yourself in the Sight of others nor Gnaw your nails.” Other rules may be more difficult for students to understand but familiar once their meaning is interpreted: “Speak not Evil of the absent for it is unjust.” Still others may seem nonsensical in light of modern social norms: “Eat not in the Streets, nor in the House, out of Season.”

Did Washington live his adult life according to these rules? Students might investigate this question by analyzing Washington’s correspondence for evidence of how he responded to difficult circumstances. One intriguing example—although certainly Washington must not have thought so at the time—is a letter dated December 2, 1791, addressed to Pierre Charles L’Enfant. In this two-page document, President Washington addresses an incident that took place on November 20 of that same year. Major L’Enfant, selected as planner of the new capital city at Washington’s recommendation, had ordered the demolition of a partially-constructed house that stood in the way of one of his planned avenues. He acted under his own authority and without the owner’s consent. Complicating matters, the homeowner, Daniel Carroll, was a prominent citizen who was related to one of the Commissioners in charge of the District of Columbia.

Washington admonished L’Enfant in his letter, writing, “Having the beauty and regularity of your plan only in view, you pursue it as if every person, and thing, was obliged to yield to it.” Such elegant prose (and handwriting) communicates Washington’s disapproval politely, yet in no uncertain terms. In this instance, at least, the evidence points to Washington behaving in a very civil manner, indeed.

• (Elementary grades) Have students compose their own “Rules of Civility” based on those from Washington’s time. How might some of these new rules influence students’ responses to challenges in their own lives? [Note: While a transcription of the document is not available from the Library of Congress Web site, an online search using its full title will produce results.]

• (Secondary grades) Use the Teacher’s Guide to Analyzing Manuscripts to help students analyze Washington’s December 2, 1791, letter and complete the Primary Source Analysis Tool. Have students read the letter’s transcription before challenging them to compare its tone to related entries in Washington’s letter copybook. How does Washington address this same controversy in a December 2, 1791, letter to Daniel Carroll; a December 1, 1791, letter to the Washington, D.C., Commissioners; and a November 30, 1791, letter to Thomas Jefferson? [Note: Links to transcriptions are available at the top of each page.]

Which of these “Rules of Civility” do your students think apply to our society today?

The Library’s online collections are not encyclopedic, so knowing their strengths will save time and help you to find primary sources.  Most of the digitized items were created prior to 1923 or were created by someone working for the federal government as part of the job, and most of them document American history and culture.

Primary Sources by State

Here are some shortcuts to locating primary sources from the Library of Congress quickly.  Start at LOC.gov/teachers.   Look at the list of Classroom Materials and select the classroom-ready sets of primary sources already assembled by the expert staff at the Library of Congress to save teachers time.

Primary source sets feature selected primary sources related to specific topics.  Don’t miss Primary Sources by State for local resources related to all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and U.S. territories.

Presentations look across the American Memory collections to investigate curricular themes, including historical background. These are some favorites:

Fill up the Canvas: Exploring with Lewis and Clark

• Lyrical Legacy helps teachers explore American songs and poems from the online collections of the Library of Congress. For a closer look at this presentation, including teaching ideas, see A Historical Tour of Poetry and Song.
• For historical context and selected primary sources across eras, check out the American Memory Timeline. The blog post The American Memory Timeline: Finding Primary Sources from throughout U.S. History explores the main features of the timeline and ways to use it in the classroom.
• Fill up the Canvas explores the route of the Lewis and Clark expedition, using primary sources to develop the narrative of their experiences at specific points during the exploration.

The next post in this series, coming in a few weeks, will look at how to search in the collections. In the comments, tell us your favorite shortcuts to finding primary sources from LOC.gov.

Though the National Archives of the United States oversees the presidential libraries that hold the papers and memorabilia of the most recent presidents, the Library of Congress holds the papers of 23 presidents including George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, and Theodore Roosevelt.

Roosevelt Diary 2/14/1884

Roosevelt’s papers include some wonderful items that help readers understand Roosevelt as a person. One 1880 entry from his diary documents his love for his first wife Alice. In an entry dated Valentine’s Day 1884, Roosevelt expresses in a single sentence the pain of losing his mother and, only a few hours later, losing Alice after childbirth. He describes this tragic sequence of events in the diary’s next entry, dated February 16-17.

Two years later, Roosevelt married Edith Kermit Carow and they had five children. While in Washington, D.C. serving as a member of the United States Civil Service Commission, Roosevelt sent a letter to his then three-year-old son Theodore, Jr. This letter shows the devoted father who draws pictures to illustrate a fable for his son who is not yet able to read.

Letter from Theodore Roosevelt to his son

The collection Words and Deeds provides links to a number of personal letters from the Library’s collections of presidential papers.

Teachers may want to have students:

• Brainstorm a list of words they think of when they think about the President of the United States. Then have students read one of the letters or diary entries and list the words that come to mind to describe the person they learned about in the document. Ask how reading the document affects their opinion of the person and have students and compare the two lists.
• Explore the diaries of George Washington. How are Washington’s entries similar and different from other diaries they may have read or created? What clues do the entries provide about Washington as an individual rather than as a public figure?
• Review the entry when Washington’s stepdaughter Patsy Custis died. Compare Roosevelt’s entry about the loss of his wife and mother and Washington’s entry about the loss of his stepdaughter. How do these entries compare, both in terms of writing style and content? How do students feel after reading Washington’s entry and why?

What are the benefits to students of learning about the private person behind the public title?

Library's main search box

If you’ve recently searched online for primary sources from the Library of Congress, you may have noticed an exciting change: the search from the Library’s home page now offers the option to narrow the results by format.  Try it out with a sample search on Bull Run, using the drop-down box to select “Map.”

Once you select one of the maps listed, you’ll see another change:  there is a new display page, or object page, being used for these maps.

Detail from Plan Of Bull Run

It includes a new functionality that lets you zoom in on very fine details, drag the image to focus on different sections, and click a toggle button for a full screen view.  To check it out, click on “Enlarge” or click on the thumbnail of the map, and be sure to try rotating your mouse wheel.

In addition to the zoom functionality, there are handy new lists of related materials which will make it even easier to use primary sources in your teaching setting:

• “Part of…” tells you what collections the item is in.
• “More maps like this” is a selection of related primary sources in the same format – in this case, maps.
• “You might also like” is a selection of related items in other formats.

By selecting the “Rights & Access” tab, you’ll find a link that goes directly to guidance for teachers and students on citing primary sources.

Initially, around 9,500 maps are being displayed in the new object page format, but additional collections of primary sources will be switched over in coming months.  For more information, see the Library’s recent blog post New and Improved.

Keep an eye out for future improvements to search functionality and results display.  Finding the resources you need will continue to get faster and easier.

We’d love to hear what you think of these changes, and how they can help you in the classroom.

• Alphabet books include Kate Greenaway’s A Apple Pie and Baseball ABC by Peter Newell. Not only can they be used to teach the alphabet, but they also offer a peek at images and attitudes from the past. Students past the age of reading alphabet books may compare these to more recent favorites that they read in the primary grades.
• The Twelve Magic Changelings and Mother Goose Finger Plays present puppets and games related to familiar stories. These are great for engaging young children, but some of the stories, such as Robinson Crusoe, also will appeal to older readers.
  

  The Rocket Book

• Not all of the books are in English, though. Vieilles Chansons pour les Petits Enfants, Le Corbeau (The Raven), and My Very First Little German Book provide opportunities to practice reading in French and German.
• Gobolinks presents a series of short poems inspired by inkblots or “shadow pictures,” but also describes the “Game of Gobolink.” Kids and adults can browse the pictures and poems and then try their hand at creating a few of their own. (Some might even make a math connection and notice the line of symmetry in the pictures.)
• Another book in verse, The Rocket Book, narrates the passage of a rocket, lit by the janitor’s son, from the basement up through 20 floors of apartments. Even reluctant readers might get drawn in by the richly illustrated hilarity that ensues.
• Favorite chapter books include The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Arabian Nights, A Christmas Carol and The Secret Garden. Students may already know some of the stories from film or other adaptations, but they might find surprises in these rare editions.

The choices are a few of my favorites, the list admittedly a bit random, and I hope you’ll browse the complete list and let us know your favorites – or your students’ favorites! – in the comments below.

Maps can help students make meaningful interdisciplinary connections with major themes, concepts and ideas.  My colleagues and I developed an integrated unit of study on the New York City Draft Riots of 1863 for fourth grade. We selected maps of our hometown, New York City, from the Library of Congress.  We realized analyzing maps could help students develop skills relating to social studies as well as literacy, math, and art.

Projecting the Map of the City of New York from 1865 on an interactive white board, I asked students to make interactive observations and comparisons with a recent map.  As their comparative investigation began, I was thrilled to hear questions like, “Ms. Sweeting, how did they move the roads?” and “Why did they change the street names?”

Map of the City of New York

As I circulated from group to group, I overheard “accountable talk,” the participation in instructional conversations that builds on each others’ responses. “My daddy’s job is right by the seaport,” one fourth grader recalled as he examined lower Manhattan’s South Street Seaport.  Maps became a tool to help build my students’ literacy and oral language skills.

Their initial success helped motivate my students, increasing their readiness to learn and giving them confidence to apply information in other subject areas.  After their comparative analysis, it was a smooth transition then to calculate distances using a map scale to address requirements in math.

Little did my students know that they were being groomed to assume the role of map-makers.  The next activity to help students internalize and practice their understanding of scale was to create a map of lower Manhattan.

Your students will be excited to make connections with local area maps.  You can search for maps of your area directly from the Library’s main page; use the drop-down box to select the “map” format. For more map activity ideas, visit Getting Started with Maps.  Look for an upcoming blog about the new and improved features for finding and using many of the Library’s digitized maps.

How have you used maps to help your students build connections and apply skills in other subject areas?

Primary Source Analysis Tool

At the bottom of the Primary Source Analysis Tool is a section labeled, “Further Investigation.” As the Teacher’s Guides explain, this is the section where you “help students identify questions appropriate for further investigation, and develop a research strategy for finding answers.”  In addition to asking your students, “What more do you want to know, and how can you find out?” what can you do to guide them forward after analyzing a primary source?

One strategy from Earnestine is to have students revisit the questions they previously generated in the Question column. In her classroom, Earnestine will immediately collect students’ completed Analysis Tools for evaluation, then hand them back at a later date for the review.  She then asks, “What questions intrigue you the most?” This discussion helps identify which questions interest students enough to engage them throughout the upcoming investigation.  Students then talk about where they can find out more, using both primary and secondary sources.

Earnestine says that sharing essential questions with students ahead of time is critical, to help guide students’ thinking so that they can explicitly link information from the analysis of the primary source to a topic or learning goal.

Other strategies include:

• Provide additional primary sources from different points of view, for students to analyze and investigate for perspectives and bias.
• Provide contemporary primary sources so that students can find out what has changed over time.
• Have students generate a list of terms they don’t understand – perhaps using a word wall – to help them expand their vocabulary and develop richer questions.

Earnestine and I both agree on this: encouraging student choice in what to investigate gives them ownership in the learning process.  Planning ahead – through your selection of primary sources and framing of instructional goals – helps ensure that the questions students investigate further are related to your desired learning outcomes.

Additional Resources:

• To see a unit plan that highlights investigation, check out Investigating the Building Blocks of Our Community’s Past, Present and Future.
• For help in guiding students through the investigative process, see Thinking Like a Historian and Teaching Inquiry with Primary Sources.
• You can find additional guidance from the three “follow-up activity ideas” at the bottom of each Teacher’s Guide.

Do you have a tip for helping make the connection between primary source analysis and further investigation?  We’d love to hear your ideas.

READ.gov

Check out these highlights:

• Webcasts allow you to “… see and hear your favorite authors discuss their work and how they have used the Library of Congress’s extraordinary resources in their work.”
• Contests include Letters about Literature, which invites students in grades 4-12 to “write a letter to a favorite author on how his or her book affected you.” Letters from past winners are available.
• Booklists suggesting books related to particular collections of digitized primary sources make it easier to construct lessons to deepen student engagement and develop content knowledge.
• If you didn’t make it to Washington, D.C. for the National Book Festival, you can still hear most of the authors online!
• Local and community resources, including book festivals and One Book programs, are searchable by state.
• “The National Library Service for the Blind and Physically Handicapped makes it possible for Americans living with visual impairment to enjoy a good book, magazine and even music scores.”
• If you’re planning a visit to Washington, D.C., consider stopping by the Young Readers Center, a space dedicated to young readers and their families.

A separate post, next week, will explore the digitized rare books, but feel free to leaf through them on your own before then.

Teaching ideas:

• Bring a favorite author into your classroom or library via webcasts from the National Book Festival. Show the entire presentation, or move the track slider to a pre-selected portion.
• Join a nearby One Book program, or start your own.
• Encourage students to write letters and submit them to the Letters about Literature contest.

How do you motivate your students to read?