Teaching with Historical Places

Just this week, I was reminded of a great site for teachers of U.S. history! It is called Places Teach! and is part of the US National Park Service website. This site comes complete with lesson plans, maps, historical information, and activities linked to the National U.S. History Standards for grades 5-12. What a find!

The many "places" included are properties listed in the National Park Service's National Register of Historic Places. There is a database of lessons and places that can be searched by location and state, theme, time period, and curriculum standards. Searching by state will give you some great ideas for field trips within your state that can go hand in hand with the lesson plans.

A time period search gives choices of Pre-Colonial, Colonial and Revolutionary, Federal and National, Mid to Late 19th Century, Gilded Age and the Progressive Era, Early to Mid 20th Century, and Mid to Late 20th Century. If you are teaching a certain period of U.S. history, doing this type of search can be very helpful.

Lessons are also organized by theme, allowing teachers to focus on themes such as U.S. Presidents, the Civil War, transportation, science and technology, or one of the many others on the list.

Each lesson follows a similar format and includes a table of contents, an inquiry question, background information, maps, historical readings, images and activities. There are also related links and information as well.

All of the lessons are available free of charge. On-line lesson plans are ready for immediate use in the classroom. They can be used directly on the computer or they can be printed out, photocopied, and distributed to students.

There is even a template for creating your own lessons, and information on submitting your lessons to the lesson plan bank!

Right now there are some great lessons for Back to School that focus on important aspects of the history of education and educational facilities.

Here are a few others that caught my eye:

Lafayette Park: First Amendment Rights on the President’s Doorstep
“Learn how a group of determined women selected Lafayette Park, across from the White House, to demonstrate for their right to vote, providing a First Amendment model for many others.”

The Emerald Necklace: Boston's Green Connection
“Have students look at modern and historical maps of their community to compare the type of information each map contains. Have students, in groups, pretend to represent a landscape architecture firm creating a proposal to design and build a park and then present their proposal to the class to make the case for why their design should be implemented.”

Saratoga: The Tide Turns on the Frontier
This lesson gives historical background and includes much about local history. The maps and photos are accompanied by questions for study, and the final activities are all great.

The site also focuses on lesson plans that feature historic sites in the "Preserve America Communities" section.

So, whether you can actually plan a visit to one of these historic places, or if you just plan to use them as a virtual tour in your classroom, this site is well worth a visit for all teachers of social studies or U.S. history! 

Copyright 2012 Irene Taylor.All rights reserved.