Spotlight on Elementary Education

History has been shaped and influenced by the out come of ancient trials—such as the Trial of Socrates in 399B.C.—to Rosenberg Trial in the 1950s. This site offers a comprehensive look at 50 prominent court trials throughout history and its resources can be used to give young learners an introduction to the history of the modern judicial system.

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Website Reviews

Find quality websites & primary sources
Civilian Public Service Story

Unearth an important part of U.S. military history—the conscientious [...] »

AdFlip

Nostalgic for X-ray glasses advertisements?

[...] »
Images of African Americans from the Cook Collection of Photographs
Photo, Children on fence eating watermelon, 4th quarter of the 19th cent., VCU.

What might your life have been like as an African American in Virginia c. [...] »

History Quiz

Test your history knowledge
Women's History Month: Picturing Pocahontas

What do you picture when you hear her name?

[...] »
Sand, Sea, and Oil: Operation Desert Storm

It's in the name: "Desert." How did the environment affect the Persian Gulf [...] »

Pre-Modern Pop Music

Before "pop" music reigned supreme, jazz and ragtime amassed great public [...] »

Beyond the Textbook

Question textbook narratives
The Early Conservation Movement
photographic print, Quentin Roosevelt Planting a Tree, c1904, Edward S. Curtis,

The "go-green" movement is rampant in modern America. However, support for [...] »

Jim Crow Segregation: The Difficult and Anti-Democratic Work of White Supremacy
Print, For the Sunny South. An Airship. . . , 1913, Library of Congress

The fight against segregation and its discriminatory practices does not [...] »

20th-century Jewish Immigration
Dry plate negative, approx. 1920-1930, Jewish colonies and settlements, LOC

Divided into two waves of immigration by textbooks, the continuity of [...] »

National Resources

Federal teaching resources
Federal Highway Administration
Lithograph, Chas. H. Kabrich, c. 1896, Donaldson Litho. Co., LoC

Do you fit today's transportation norms? Do you reside in a suburb or a city [...] »

U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency

How did recreational drug use grow into a U.S. drug culture? How did it [...] »

Smithsonian American Art Museum and Renwick Gallery

American art makes the interpretive nature of historical knowledge clear. [...] »

Ask a Historian

Stonewall Jackson and the Battle of Chancellorsville
woods blown apart by artillery fire at Chancellorsville

The Confederate battle plan at Chancellorsville was extraordinarily daring [...] »