As educators across the U.S. return to—or continue to settle back into—their classrooms and libraries, we’d like to welcome you all to another year of the Teaching with the Library of Congress blog!
This blog is part of the Library’s program for K-12 educators, and supports teachers across the curriculum and at all grade levels as they use primary sources from the Library’s online collections in their classrooms. Primary sources are powerful teaching tools, and their authentic classroom use can help students engage with complex topics, build their critical thinking skills, and create new knowledge.
The Library of Congress is a treasure trove of primary sources, with millions of photographs, maps, films, audio recordings, manuscripts, books, and more available for free to everyone at LOC.gov. We’re excited to point out that the Library adds to its online collections throughout the year, so watch this blog for updates on some of our most teacher-appealing additions.
The Library’s portal for educators, LOC.gov/teachers, offers free teaching tools and professional development opportunities that can help any teacher bring the power of Library of Congress primary sources into their classroom. Longtime users of the Teachers page may notice a few changes in the coming months as we work to make our online resources even easier to use.
Please join us this school year as we spotlight rich Library of Congress primary sources, share teaching ideas, introduce the Library’s visiting teachers for this year, and explore topics ranging from women’s suffrage to statistics to folk music. And please let us know in the comments what topics you’re interested in, and how we might better support your work!