This Day in History

Connecting Classrooms Kickoff workshop with teachers using nifty little computers to access a Library of Congress Webinar

I wanted to share a few things on this post. Wednesday was our Connecting with Classrooms Kickoff and we had ten teachers join us for a day of History Day and Primary Source goodies from the LOC.
My New Favorite is the Today in History Archive

It allows you to put in any topic from history and it will pull up a variety of primary sources from The American Memory Collection.

So when I do my search and put in "Brooklyn Bridge," I get a fantastic Image and great information :

On June 12, 1806, John A. Roebling, civil engineer and designer of the Brooklyn Bridge, was born in Muehlhausen, Prussia. The Brooklyn Bridge, Roebling's greatest achievement, spans the East River to connect Manhattan with Brooklyn. For nearly a decade after its completion, the bridge, with a main span of 1595 feet, was the longest suspension bridge in the world. Steel wire cable, invented and manufactured by Roebling, made the structure possible.

So this is a great resource and a great topic for this year's theme!
Judy Graves from LOC led us through the wealth of resources on a great low cost webinar software called OPAL which allowed us to hear and chat with her as we were taken for a real time tour of the sites and let to play. You can see a copy of the text chat that has lots of valuable links NYhistassn_text.dochere.
Beyond the great resources from LOC we shared new curriculum materials from New York State History Day and shared primary sources from the New York State Historical Association's Research Library.




Tobi Voigt shares an exercise with primary source documents from the NYSHA Library

The entire day was a great experience. If you are intrested in coming to our workshops or scheduling one in your area please email us and we will happy to see if we can make it out to share these esources with