A pocket camcorder shrinks the technology of a video camera to the size of your pocket. While not the highest-quality recording device, pocket camcorders offer an easy way to point and shoot video. Although camcorders have been used in classrooms since the 1980s, greater availability of pocket camcorders has revolutionized the way we think about using video in the classroom. Before, a teacher was lucky to check out one camera for use in his classroom. Today, with pocket cameras costing around $150, schools can afford to have multiple camcorders in teachers’ hands. In addition, the pocket camera affords increased flexibility in storage and editing over its predecessors.

Pocket camcorders are relatively inexpensive with continually falling prices. Most pocket camcorder models cost between $150-$250. The difference in price is largely dependant upon the quality of video it produces and its memory capacity. When searching for a pocket camcorder, you should consider what it will be used for in the classroom. For most projects high definition video and zoom capabilities are valuable, but not a requirement. However, battery life and ease of uploading should be considered. Controls for recording and playing back video should be easily found on the unit. Many media centers have invested in these devices, but if yours has not and you would like to have a few cameras in your own classroom, funding need not hold you back. Currently, there is a 2-for-1 deal on Flip brand video cameras at the nonprofit DigitalWish.com. Also, you can look into buying refurbished pocket camcorders online for around $75.

Increasingly we see smartphones with video capabilities in students’ hands. This will likely make the pocket camcorder technology short-lived. But for now the pocket camcorder offers all students a chance to learn by creating video. I feel there is no need to worry as the same teaching techniques can be applied with the new smartphones as these devices become widespread.

To use a pocket camcorder, you will either need a computer on which to upload the stored video (most often via USB) for editing and sharing, or a way to project video from the pocket camcorder to a television or LCD projector (usually via HDMI cable). Once you figure out the logistics of students presenting or sharing their videos, you’ll need a reason to have students use the cameras! I believe the pocket camera’s true benefit is providing students authentic learning and assessment opportunities. The new National Curriculum Standards for Social Studies put out by the National Council for the Social Studies includes a number of products that could be created with a pocket camera. Students could take pocket cameras home to conduct interviews of those that have witnessed historical events. Or, they could create a public service announcement publicizing healthy habits. Students could also use their cameras to capture visual evidence of culture in their community or create a documentary on a community issue. I have also seen teachers assign students the task of recording and narrating trips to historical sites to share with classmates. I had students create CommonCraft-like videos in which they explained a constitutional amendment “in plain English.” In this project students created a script and a storyboard, and used black-and-white cutouts to help explain their assigned amendment. If rehearsed properly students could shoot their two-minute video in one take and did not need to spend time editing. Aside from a pocket cam, the only other additional piece of equipment necessary is a tripod that will allow the camera to face downward to record action beneath.

The social studies classroom offers many avenues to incorporate the pocket camera into instruction and assessment. I hope that you experiment with other uses for the pocket camera and share them with us here.

The New York Public Library offers a digital gallery of many photographs and artifacts from its collections. The NYPL–Digital Gallery features a searchable index of thousands of pictures and artifacts related to a wide variety of subjects in American history. Best of all it is free and easy to use.

Next time you are looking for a photograph of an important historical figure, try using the NYPL-Digital Gallery to search for images of him/her. A simple search in the NYPL search engine box on the home page can unearth thought-provoking photographs, like this candid shot of President Grover Cleveland. This image says a lot more than the images one would obtain from a basic Internet image search.

Also from the home page, try browsing by subject and look for documents related to your state. There are many great images that capture towns and cities in the past. This is a fantastic way to tie in local history. On a digital map, instruct students to locate where an old building once stood using a site like WhatWasThere.com. Students could also compare this detailed 1911 collection of photos of 5th Avenue to a Google Maps street view of 5th Avenue today to show students the impact of urbanization.

The NYPL-Digital Gallery can also help locate sources that might display social change over time. For instance, you might find pictures showing how bridal fashion has changed over time. If you click ‘Browse Sources’ and type “brides” into the ‘Explore Subjects’ search box, you will see a link to pictures tagged by this subject from 1400 through 1939.

One of the skills we want to teach history students is how to ask the right questions. A way to practice this might be with the use of interesting images, like this one, of a “courting stick” in action. This photo begs students to ask many questions. A courting stick is a long, hollow tube around six feet long with a mouthpiece at each end. It allows courting couples to discreetly speak with one another while maintaining the appropriate physical boundaries. If you simply browse the depths of the NYPL-Digital Gallery for 10 minutes, you are bound to stumble across a treasure like this that will capture your students’ historical curiosity.

Another idea is to have students create a digital timeline incorporating images found in the Digital Gallery to demonstrate the concept of change over time. This assignment asks students to analyze changing American culture. Students could use the subject search feature of the Digital Gallery to find images related to sports, weddings, leisure, and other cultural phenomena in America over the last 250 years.

Allow yourself an opportunity to explore this vast collection of primary sources for use in your classroom. Give your students time to investigate the Digital Gallery as well. After all, this is one way historians craft questions about the past. In my browsing, I stumbled across this revealing group of photos related to African Americans serving in World War II. The photos capture the many ways African American men and women served during the war.

The NYPL-Digital Gallery is a one-stop-shop for primary sources on every topic in American history, and it is organized in a logical way, making it easy to collect documents and images. As you search for images you may want to create a collection of images for a class. You will note, above each image is a button to “select” the image. By selecting a picture it is stored in “My Collection,” accessible from the home page and from the menu bar at the top of each page. This function is handy when building a lesson around a group of documents. As you find new ways to use the NYPL-Digital Gallery I hope you will share them with us here.

Unfortunately, the arts are being squeezed out of school budgets and students’ schedules. Most would agree, though, that the arts play a vital role in fostering students’ creativity and helping students ask the “big questions” about the world around them. Fortunately, integrating the visual arts into any classroom just became a bit more fun with the launch of Google Art Project.

Google Art Project allows viewers to explore selected museums and zoom in on works of art. For those familiar with Google Map’s “street view” feature, the site functions in much the same way. Users feel like they are walking through the museum and can look up and down at museum features. When a work of art catches your eye, simply click on the image and you can zoom in on incredible detail of the painting or sculpture (see Google’s video about using Art Project). The Art Project lends itself particularly well to classrooms with interactive whiteboards with which students can feel like they are standing in the museum. I personally like the ability to take my time with a painting and have another browser tab open to find out more about a painting as questions arise in my head.

My students get excited anytime I mention the words “field trip,” and with good reason. Field trips not only offer students a get-out-of-school-free card, but also offer them a chance to learn through interacting and experiencing. When money and time are tight, field trips are cut. That is why I am thrilled that technology is allowing students to take virtual field trips. These virtual field trips are growing more interactive and more content rich every day. Google Art Project is the latest development in expanding student access to these rich sites.

A benefit of viewing works of art in a museum is being able to see and appreciate their relative size. As a simple image, one cannot appreciate how small the Mona Lisa is or how large Pablo Picasso’s Guernica is. With Google Art Project, students can get a sense of this by seeing paintings hanging in the museum without leaving their classroom.

Google Art Project provides information and related material when you click on a work of art. You and your students can also create collections of selected pieces to share. This makes it very easy to set up a gallery of artwork from a particular time period or region from different museums.

The Art Project offers several interesting possibilities to link history with the visual arts. A nice way to begin a lesson might be to have students “walk into the painting,” where students pretend to actually enter the painting and describe the scene using all their senses. Understanding works of art often requires students ask the same inquiry questions they ask in history class. Therefore, one instructional technique may be to require students to play art detective as they solve when and where an artist lived and produced their work. It may also be useful for you and your students to brush up on some of the terminology with which to discuss visual art. This way, students are seeing another adult (aside from their art teacher) model an appreciation of art.

Another instructional idea that blends history with understanding art is to select a group of romantic paintings, a group of realist paintings, and a group of impressionist paintings and discuss the different styles of paintings and the emotions each elicits. For example, many romantic paintings glorify subjects and can stir feelings of nationalism, while realist paintings can capture the daily hardship and struggles individuals must endure. Teachers can discuss with students how different styles of paintings capture prevalent ideas and emotions of the artists’ societies.

Art is also a great way to teach students about culture. Students could use Google Art Project to put together a collection of art related to a specific culture. Paintings can also teach students about trade networks. Often, paintings feature items or styles not native to the artist’s home country. Thus explaining, for instance, how the porcelain cups, featured in a painting, found their way from China to Spain could be a good lesson for students.

Some of the museums in the Art Project have interesting lesson plans that can accompany works of art in the museum. Check out these lesson plans from the Smithsonian and lesson plans from the Museum of Modern Art.

While the current offerings of museums are limited in the Art Project, the possibilities of the site are exciting as art becomes democratized.

Certainly, nothing can compare to physically being in the museum, but Google Art Project is making the world a little smaller, allowing us to visit multiple museums from one site.

On Feb. 2, the Department of Education released the Teaching American History Grant Program Notice Inviting Applications for New Awards for Fiscal Year (FY) 2011.

According to the Department, the Teaching American History program is

designed to raise student achievement by improving teachers' knowledge and understanding of and appreciation for traditional U.S. history. Grant awards will assist LEAs [local educational agencies], in partnership with entities that have content expertise, to develop, document, evaluate, and disseminate innovative and cohesive models of professional development. By helping teachers to develop a deeper understanding and appreciation of U.S. history as a separate subject matter within the core curriculum, these programs will improve instruction and raise student achievement.

The TAH program has reached out to U.S. history teachers across the nation since 2001, when it awarded its first 60 grants. Last year, 124 applicants received grants. Learn more about the program at ED.gov—browse the abstracts of previous award recipients, learn how to apply, and read FAQs on eligibility, project priorities, and other topics. If you're applying (or are already a grantee), you may benefit from the Department of Education's webinars on grant management. Sign up, or read transcripts for past webinars.

Curious to see what others have learned from participating in TAH Grant projects? We have a section dedicated to highlighting TAH! Project Spotlights look at projects that share the resources they've created online, and Lessons Learned lets you in on the experiences of educators, project directors, historians, evaluators, and others who have participated in TAH projects.

My middle school students contain tremendous physical energy and can struggle with the transition into the adult world of sitting still. Meanwhile, real kinesthetic learning is one of the most difficult areas to incorporate effectively into your history classroom. Last year, to meet my goal of getting the students moving in a relevant and productive manner, I created Policy Pull-Out—a fun and interactive game related to the key concepts of American Expansion.

Picture students moving around, excited about history vocabulary, with all learning levels engaged. Welcome to Policy Pull-Out! As the winter months drag on, allowing the students to be active will be extra important to their moods and their excitement about learning. This game will also reinforce and add a dimension to ideas vital to American history class.

Policy Pull-Out was created to specifically support and review for DC's 8.5.2: Explain and identify on a map the territorial expansion during the terms of the first four presidents. The game has been played with 8th grade in American History but I feel could be age-appropriate from 4th through 10th depending on your students and your spin on it. Although a teacher hopes that students always picture history in 3-D, that concept seems especially important in this unit. The students should be able to reflect on what expansionism means, what Manifest Destiny looks like, and what isolationism feels like. Once the students have a deeper understanding of these political concepts, they can begin putting themselves in the position of 1800s decision makers imagining the benefits and foreshadowing the issues that will arise.

Policy Pull-Out stemmed from a game that I had played as an after-school coordinator, called “Huggie Bear.” In Huggie Bear, the students mingle around until the teacher calls out a number. Whether the number is seven or two, the students have to gather in a group of that number of students. If students do not find a group that size or cannot find a group fast enough, they are out.

In Policy Pull-Out, we use history-related calls demanding different numbers of people group together or do a specific action. The motions they use in these calls directly relate to understanding the meaning of the words.

As mentioned, the students mingle in place until they receive one of the following calls:

• “Diplomacy” – (ALL) Everyone continues moving around but has to shake hands with everyone.
• “Isolationism” – (one person) Stand in place alone and cover your eyes.
• “Negotiate” – (two people) Find a partner and shake hands.
• “Expansionism” – (three people) Three people need to hold hands (with the ends unbound and spread out as far as they can).

Once the students have those four calls, I then add on three more rules:

• “Manifest Destiny” – (ALL) Everyone runs out to the borders (basketball court lines) to show we are spreading our territory to the coasts.
• “Expansionism + number” – (Teacher picks) Same except the number expanding changes.
• “George Washington” – (Representing his farewell address – three people) One person shakes a finger at the other two who stand back to back.

First, you need to secure an adequate space. For teachers whose weather permits, I recommend trying this outside. For other teachers, a gym or large classroom would be appropriate. A basketball court is a useful playing field because it allows definite borders.

Before leaving the classroom, I recommend reviewing the first four calls and having a volunteer demonstrate each one. The students should have already been introduced to the key concepts and vocabulary but this would be a good time to discuss why certain words represent certain motions and allow them to make the connections for themselves. Perhaps they could even add to the game with their own ideas! You can give students the option of a cheat sheet depending on the situation.

After the class has arrived at the chosen location, the games can begin! The students love this game and are always very excited to be doing an activity out of the norm, but it is important to anticipate problems and set up ground rules about student-to-student contact, referee absolutes, and what to do when you are out. In the past, the students have been very invested in playing the game and are afraid to be taken out as long as you define clear borders. I limit the first round to four calls and then add as we go by gathering the group back together.

At the end of the game, debriefing is necessary in order to reinforce the purposefulness of the game: Did anyone feel safe when they were isolated? Did anyone prefer expansionism? How did you like running to the borders for Manifest Destiny? Do you think that our early presidents may have experienced some of these feelings? As the individuals within a class will form different opinions of their favorite motions, there are mixed opinions about the policies that would be best for our country.

This conversation should be a jumping-off point for more directly connected historical thinking activities. As the following step in scaffolding, I recommend using a collection of primary sources including documents that supported expansion and ones that warned against it. As another logical step, several research assignments could stem from this. For example, the students could compare George Washington to the later presidents that preferred expansionism, or research the motivations of different presidents who did expand (e.g., Thomas Jefferson’s motivations compared to James Monroe’s). Policy Pull-Out should be viewed as an early scaffold to more critical thinking about these concepts.

I hope that you and your students enjoy this game! It has been a highlight of my teaching. When spun correctly, Policy Pull-Out will reinforce the connection between human history and geography to help your students remember and understand why our 50 states exist today!