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
American Time Capsule: Three Centuries of Broadsides and Printed Ephemera
Broadside, Proclaim the truth! Financial management of..., 1868, Ephemera Coll.

This site furnishes more than 10,000 items of ephemera from the U.S. and [...] »

Pearl Harbor Attack Map
Avenge Pearl Harbor, Our Bullets Will Do It, c.1942-3, NARA, Flickr Commons

What did U.S. sailors mean when they refer to seeing "the meatball"? What [...] »

Samuel J. May Anti-Slavery Collection

With over 300,000 pages available for full-text searching, this is one of [...] »

History Quiz

Test your history knowledge
Manias of the Gilded Age

Fads, crotchets, crazes, rages, and cultural fevers. Test your knowledge of [...] »

Teaching the 20th

When does the past go from 'recent' to 'history?' Consider these questions [...] »

Reading Photographs: A Dusty Street

When and where was this photo taken? See what clues you can spot!

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Beyond the Textbook

Question textbook narratives
The Modern Civil Rights Movement: A River of Purposeful Anger
Dynamics of Idealism- Volunteers for Civil Rights, 1965-1982 432x240

Textbooks are silent about defining race and racism, even though the modern [...] »

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 [...] »

Coal and the Industrial Revolution
Photo, At the close of the day, January 1911, Lewis Hine, Library of Congress

How can the story of coal help students understand the nature of today's [...] »

National Resources

Federal teaching resources
U.S. Coast Guard
Art, Auxliarist, Lew Jackson, U.S. Coast Guard

Who protects U.S. interests in international and domestic waters?

[...] »
National Archives and Records Administration
Letter, . . . Flag Design Suggestion, 10/1958, Sheryl Byland, NARA

With more than 10 billion items addressing U.S. history, you're bound to [...] »

National Center for Education Statistics
Marginalia, CHNM

Ever wondered about the numbers behind the latest teaching trends?

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Ask a Historian

"Mapping" Primary and Secondary Sources

Is this map a primary source? Or is it secondary? How can you tell?!

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