Iowa

Iowa Council for the Social Studies

Primarily Teaching: Using Primary Sources to Promote Effective Instruction and Improve Student Learning

In this project by the Iowa Council for the Social Studies, social studies teachers participated in a professional development workshop on using primary sources from the Library of Congress. In addition to modeling the use of resources available from the Library, workshop leaders also modeled best practices in social studies instruction and connected teachers with the ELA (English Language Arts) Literacy Standards, the Iowa Core Standards, and the newly released C3 Framework. The project provided teachers with concrete ways to address these standards through the use of primary sources and historical thinking skills.

Contact: Stefanie Rosenberg Wager

Mid-Iowa School Improvement Consortium

Primary Steps in the Core: Workshop for Secondary American History and Government Educators on Using Historical Documents from the Library of Congress to Meet Iowa Core Content Standards

This project by the Mid-Iowa School Improvement Consortiumcreated and conducted a workshop for teachers. This provided a varied program of lectures, demonstrations, analyses of documents, independent research, and group work which introduced teachers to the holdings and organization available online at the Library of Congress. Participants learned how to research the Library's website. They also created supplemental classroom materials from records aligned to the national literacy core (text complexity, close reading) and Iowa Core Social Studies (content and historical thinking), and also presented documents in ways that sharpened students' skills and enthusiasm for history and government. Each participant selected a specific topic in a unit typically taught in Iowa secondary American history or government courses, searched the topic at the Library online, and developed a lesson plan that supplemented instruction in their classroom.

Contact: Dave Christensen

University of Northern Iowa

Pathways: Using Historical Documents to Chart the Past

An entire website was created to support the project, Pathways: Using Historical Documents to Chart the Past. Pathwaysis an online library of lesson modules developed by teacher education students at the University of Northern Iowa. Based on digitized resources from the Library of Congress, the lesson modules included learning objectives, materials, primary sources, lesson plans, and assessment strategies. They were designed primarily for classrooms at the elementary and middle school levels and are available for teachers to use anytime.

Pathways Adventures: Using Historical Documents to Develop Early Literacy

This project, awarded to the University of Northern Iowa, created Pathways Adventures. This website led to the development of an online historical matrix and the availability of Book Backdrops, which link primary sources from the Library of Congress to children's literature. This library of Book Backdrops was based on high-quality children’s literature that has been recently published. This same resource also made primary source materials from the Library of Congress highly visible in the university’s social studies methods courses.

Contact: Dr. Sarah Montgomery and the late Dr. Lynn E. Nielsen

Herbert Hoover Presidential Library Association

Primarily Teaching

For two years in a row, a professional development program consisting of lectures, demonstrations, analyses of documents, independent research, and group work introduced teachers to the holdings and organization of the Library of Congress and the Herbert Hoover Presidential Library Association. Participants researched historical records, created classroom materials from records, and presented documents in ways that sharpened students' skills and enthusiasm for history, social studies, and the humanities. Each participant created a lesson plan that was shared online.

Contact: Mary Evans