These adjoining northwestern South Carolina districts share the challenge of students who are unprepared in history; the majority of middle and high school students fail to achieve proficiency on standardized and end-of-course history exams. During the school year, teachers will establish school-based professional learning teams, conduct book studies and attend several 1-day and 5-day workshops; in the summer, teachers will participate in a 5-day summer symposium and a 4- to 5-day traveling history institute. All events will deliver content and pedagogy, and the summer institutes will include activities focused on developing classroom curriculum. All middle and high school teachers of American history in the two districts will participate in this project with the goals of learning to think like historians and translating this skill to their students. As the learning moves from Reconstruction to the present, content will emphasize the struggles and perspectives of women and cultural minorities and their contributions to shaping American history. Instructional strategies will focus on using primary sources, aligning instruction to standards, developing critical thinking skills and thinking like a historian. Professional learning teams will also develop teachers' skills around using student data and analyzing student work. A project Web site will house all teacher-created materials and links to relevant sites, making them available to all teachers.

The northern Rhode Island districts involved in A New Birth of Freedom: Developing Historical Thinking in American History make up one-third of the state's districts. When some teachers who will be affected by the project took an Advanced Placement U.S. history test, their average score was about 47 percent. Every year, academic and public historians and educators will introduce content and teaching strategies through 1-day fall and spring workshops, a series of after-school sessions, and a 5-day summer institute with field experiences. Leading New England scholars will initiate substantive work with project teachers to increase content knowledge and create excitement for American history. Project leaders will encourage teachers to build horizontal and vertical relationships among schools and with historians as the partnering organizations. Separate cohorts of 60 teachers each year will participate; priority will be given to teachers with the fewest opportunities for history professional development. The project will stress the themes of communication and flexibility while working toward building a statewide learning community. Content will focus on the ideal of "freedom" and how this concept has been expressed by influential figures, founding documents and landmark cases that have transformed American history. Teaching strategies will focus on using primary sources, differentiated instruction, document-based questioning and performance-based authentic assessments to help students develop historical, critical and reflective skills. Teachers will be able to earn graduate or continuing education credits for their participation as long as they complete unit plans that consist of several lessons. Model lesson plans and student work will be posted on the Web site to help other teachers find materials and learn from colleagues.

In this diverse Philadelphia district, 72 percent of the students qualify for free or reduced-price meals, and none of the targeted high schools has met its annual yearly progress goals. Teachers in this project will participate in (1) 10 day-long symposia at Saint Joseph's University, focusing on historical research through technology, student evaluations and core content-related teaching practices; (2) an annual 5-day summer institute, featuring historical content, teaching strategies, review standards, and the development of lesson plans and classroom-ready resources and materials; (3) a program of regular student pre- and post testing, in which teachers will meet in teams after school to review state standards and the district’s pacing guide, prepare monthly or unit pre- and posttests, and give the tests to their students; and (4) a teacher network, which will offer follow-up support between monthly meetings. The project will involve four overlapping cohorts of 30: Cohort A (Years 1-2), Cohort B (Years 2-3), Cohort C (Years 3-4) and Cohort D (Years 4-5). Each cohort will include two representatives from 15 schools. The most academically challenged schools will be targeted first for participation. The project will provide a standards-aligned study of American history from the crafting of the Constitution to recent times, examining the issues, themes, events and interpretations related to the question, "What did freedom mean?" Teachers will learn to use content-related teaching strategies, including primary documents, artifacts, first-hand accounts, illustrations and site visits to translate freshly mastered content into classroom lessons. Reviewed lessons and other resources generated by the teachers will be posted online.

Nine of this project's 13 districts have failed to make Adequate Yearly Progress, and few teachers have better than scant knowledge of American history. Three colloquia and a summer institute, totaling 11 days, will be offered each year, and sessions will be led by historians, instructional experts and master teachers. An annual book study will require reading, writing and discussions with professors and education specialists. Teachers will keep multimedia journals and compile collections of resources for classroom use. A cadre of 50 teachers will be recruited, with the goal of retaining all for the full 3 years to build an enduring, history-based professional learning community. By studying American history chronologically through the historian's academic lens, teachers will see the powerful cause and effect relationships and push/pull factors that have impacted our history. Teachers will engage in discourse and experiential learning with the goals of (1) developing historical reasoning skills, along with the ability to engage student learning and critical thinking; and (2) becoming trainers of colleagues in their schools and districts. Specific instructional methods will be introduced each year, and the historical reasoning approach will build a foundation for acquiring historical knowledge. Strategies will be bracketing history; E.Q.U.A.L., a strategy to study primary documents; and the Great Parley, in which students study events from multiple perspectives. All project work will be published on the Southern Oregon Education Service District Web site, and student- and teacher-created video resources will be posted to TeacherTube.

Project INSPIRE will serve rural districts with limited financial resources; many teachers have little background in American history and teach out-of-field. Activities will capitalize on experts in history and online learning to deliver in-person and distance learning experiences that are organized in five tiers: (1) a lecture series, (2) monthly online history activities, (3) annual colloquia at historic sites (e.g., Williamsburg, Boston, Gettysburg), (4) annual 2-day master teacher workshops, and (5) annual intensive summer workshops focused on a specific time period. Tiers 1 and 2 will be delivered mainly by 21st century technologies such as Skype, and all activities will be supported by such technology tools as Moodle, which will be used for lesson planning. The 57 teachers will be chosen on the basis of greatest need; all will participate for the first three years, and some will continue for the final two years, to be joined by additional colleagues. Each year 40 participants will rotate into the colloquium and master teacher workshop, with smaller groups of three per year selected for the intensive summer workshop. This 5-year training-of-trainers program aims to develop "teacher content specialists" who can sustain the professional development beyond the grant period. To build content knowledge of national and local history and to develop expertise in such research-based strategies as thinking like a historian, teachers will explore online resources and get hands-on practice with conducting research, using primary sources, and teaching from multiple perspectives. Participants will create lesson plans, book reviews, project activities and guides, and a Web site featuring student work and National History Day projects.

Teachers in Stark County schools often have limited American history knowledge—and limited resources available to improve their knowledge. Each year of The Meaning of Freedom will begin with a 1-week summer institute that includes scholar-led seminars and a 3-day visit to the National Constitution Center as well as nearby historic sites. During the school year, teachers will attend four theme-related seminars and visit two Ohio historic sites; in addition, mentor teachers will meet regularly with participants. In Year 1, intensive training will be provided to four teachers to prepare them as mentor teachers, and these teachers will support project staff to train an additional 30 teachers each remaining year of the project. The project theme looks at how the meaning of freedom—as first articulated in the founding documents of the state and nation—has been central to the struggles and achievements that have been key turning points in American history. The content outlined in the topic strands will be developed to align with state standards and to connect Ohio's people, places, documents and events to those significant to the nation's history; it will be delivered through a blend of in-person and proven online strategies. Applying a backward design process, teachers will learn to use and create inquiry-based lesson plans that integrate 21st century skills and technologies. When complete, the lessons and other project materials, such as seminar content and primary source documents, will be mounted on a Web site and made available to all teachers who want effective and engaging history resources.

This project will recruit teachers from mainly rural, small, relatively disadvantaged Ohio districts with significant instructional deficiencies (50 percent are in school improvement) and a lack of professional development opportunities in history. Each year, the project will present new historical materials and concepts during three all-day seminars and a 5-day summer institute. Between seminars, teachers will participate in guided discussion, assessment of digital resources and other activities organized through the project Web site. Project activities, such as lesson plan presentations and team collaboration, will take place across each year. In Year 1, 50 teachers will participate; in each succeeding year, 25 new recruits will join 25 veterans of the project. This mix will allow some teachers to continue their development while simultaneously reaching additional teachers in more schools. The teachers will explore the central issues and turning points of traditional U.S. history through the lenses of regional, state and local history. The project will incorporate a rigorous curriculum of graduate-level history founded on recognized milestones and movements in American history. In terms of strategies, the seminar instruction and teacher-generated products will emphasize detailed analyses of key documents, and the professional development format will offer three graduate credits in history from Miami University. A project Web site will include portfolios of instructional activities and resources developed by the teachers, presentations given by the content providers, and videos and other documentation from the most effective activities and content seminars.

In this northeastern Ohio consortium, the teachers lack adequate preparation in American history, and the fifth grade passage rate for the Ohio Achievement Test in American history is less than half the state expected average. The project will include (1) professional development with field study experience; (2) a teacher training program for CICERO: History Beyond the Textbook; (3) a monthly online, live professional development program for historical content and strategies; and (4) a bimonthly book reading and discussion group. Each year, 40 fellows will participate in a 2-day fall colloquium, a 3-day winter colloquium, a 2-day field study, four half days of research and review, and a 5-day summer institute. All elementary and U.S. history teachers not selected for a fellowship will be allowed to participate in the online professional development program and attend one day of CICERO training. The project's overarching themes are to examine traditional American history through the lenses of conflict and cooperation, and to study the political, economic, legal, social and ideological contrasts found throughout American history. The teachers will learn to research substantive historical content and collaborate with fellow students, teachers, project historians and history education specialists to generate historical narratives. Scholars will instruct the teachers in investigating specific events, primary sources, personalities, turning points, contemporary interpretations and historiographies pertaining to each field of study. Teacher-developed Web 2.0 sites will include wikis, blogs, peer-reviewed historical narratives and lessons, book reviews and teacher-vetted student work. In addition, student and teacher video resources will be made available on TeacherTube.com.

The overall average of teachers with master's degrees in these southwest Ohio districts is 64 percent, but only one percent of teachers of American history and related courses have a master's degree in history. In addition to boosting their content knowledge, teachers want to learn to use historical thinking skills and Web 2.0 technologies. Each year, project activities will include a 5-day summer institute and three 1-day seminars, plus online discussions and a 1-day field experience. Seminars will be presented by historians, professors and teacher leaders to combine scholarship, primary source analysis and teaching strategies; summer institutes will be intensive explorations of content, historical thinking skills and pedagogy. Teachers may elect to participate in more than one year and enter the teacher leader component of the project; this will prepare them to provide ongoing professional development to their colleagues. Voices of America aims to free teachers from textbook-based teaching and to re-ignite their enthusiasm for American history. Annual themes will be developed with an emphasis on using founding documents, determining the impacts of the actions of individuals, connecting national themes to state and local history, understanding economic development, and examining population movement and growth. All content will connect to state standards and will be eligible for graduate or continuing education credits. Field visits to local and regional sites will be tied to the year's theme and state standards. Project participants will create original multimedia history resources, lessons, document-based questions and more, all of which will be available on a Web site ("Gateway to History") and through presentations at professional conferences.

In this southwestern Ohio urban district, 70 percent of the student population is African American. Most high school history teachers lack adequate preparation, with fewer than 4 percent holding an undergraduate history degree. Each year, the project teachers will participate in a week-long summer institute to explore the annual theme's content, pedagogy and resources; two workshops focusing on additional content and pedagogical strategies; a field experience at the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, using artifacts and other resources to contextualize various aspects of African American history; and a minimum of four curriculum development group sessions. The project will serve 20 teachers the first year with approximately 10 returning and 10 newly recruited teachers each succeeding year. The themes focus on the Ohio Academic Content Standards for 10th grade, which link post-Civil War history to the story of America's early formation, which is covered in 8th-grade. This project will build the teachers' understanding of seminal turning points and issues that have shaped America's identity as a nation and a citizenry, and help them translate that knowledge into engaging, rigorous instruction. Strategies will include analysis of primary and secondary sources, historical debate and controversy, and appreciation of recent historiography by examining how historians develop differing interpretations. Teachers also will learn to incorporate the following historical thinking skills into their lessons: chronological thinking, historical comprehension, historical analysis and interpretation, historical research capabilities, and historical issues/analysis and decision making. A project Web site will house teacher-developed curricular materials, including lesson plans.