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NCSS Annual Conference. How is StrataLogica Helping You and Your Students? The Best Online “Explainer” Tools For Current Events. A number of news sites have regular features called something like “explainer” or “explain it to me” where they provide — in either video or text — short explanations about current events or answers to reader/viewer questions. Here are my choices for best of these kinds of resources out there — please share suggestions for ones I’m missing: CNN regularly produces two-to-three minute video clips on current news topics (including ones related to science) called “Explain It To Me.”

They’re generally excellent. The best way to find them is to type in “Explain It To Me” in the CNN search box, as I have done here. Then click on “CNN Videos” at the top of the page, and you’ll see titles and thumbnail images of them all. Here’s a recent example: Slate has had a very popular “Explainer” series in text, and they have just begun create one video version each week. WNYC has an Explainer series in text. Foreign Policy also has a text feature called “Explainer.” Explania Common Craft. Goals for the New Year? - Social Studies Chat. Smithsonian Civil War Studies | A program of The Smithsonian Associates | Smithsonian Institution. New Page 1. 6 Historical Wartime Propaganda Films [Stuff To Watch] A while ago we featured a couple of historically important Disney animations commissioned during the Second World War in the form of propaganda.

Today we’re losing the cutesy animation and diving in with real footage of some of the most politically motivated films ever made. Propaganda is a by-product of nearly every war or major conflict, and acts as a concentrated effort by the government to influence, calm and control. The Second World War saw propaganda make the jump from posters and radio broadcasts to the moving image, in film form. Let’s take a look at some of those films. Why We Fight: Prelude to War (1943) Directed by Frank Capra and produced by the US Army’s own Special Services Division, Why We Fight: A Prelude to War tells the story (as of 1943) of the Second World War in 7 documentary-style films beginning with the 1931 invasion of China by Japanese forces.

Battleship Potemkin (1925) Bon Voyage (1944) Churchill’s Island (1941) The True Glory (1945) Death and Taxes 2012. It's the government, in six square feet. The Crusades (1095–1291) | Thematic Essay. Videos for Learning About Congress. HarpWeek: Explore History. Twitter in the Classroom: Watch This Teacher Engage Shy Students in Learning History - Education. Still skeptical about the value of using Twitter as a tool to engage introverted students in classroom lessons? You're not alone. A recent survey of almost 2,000 teachers found that half think that using Twitter (and Facebook) in the classroom "is harmful to the learning experience. " But, Los Angeles history teacher Enrique Legaspi disagrees with the naysayers. Last year he went to a workshop that discussed ways to use Twitter in teaching and now his students—even the shy ones—at Hollenbeck Middle School in East L.A. are speaking up more.

In the video above, you can watch Legaspi teach a World War I lesson, and hear him explain how Twitter has revolutionized discussions, helped him know more about his shy students, and modify his instruction to meet their needs. Marcus Tullius Cicero: A Life in Letters. Novus Homo Marcus Tullius Cicero (106 – 43 B.C.E) was a novus homo (new man i.e someone with no notable ancestors) born at Arpinium, south of Rome, to a reasonably well off family.

He studied as a lawyer and, as was the done thing for a Roman barrister, began a political career. Cicero’s time in office would span the crucial years of the end of Roman Republican rule and his own part in these affairs was significant, though in the end not decisive. Throughout his life he kept in correspondence with his good friend Titus Pomponius Atticus, a wealthy individual who lived variously in Greece and Rome and was well connected with the political elite at the time despite his own refusal to participate in such a career. Through these, and numerous other letters to leading figures of the day, we gain not only an insight into the machinations of the Republican political colossus of the epoch, but also a more personal understanding of the workings of one man’s mind within the system.

Exile John B. Primaries - Election Center 2012 - Elections & Politics from CNN.com. Welcome to Google Docs. Geography Education. Welcome to Google Docs. Satellite Photos - Japan Before and After Tsunami. Mapping History. Prints & Photographs Online Catalog. Retronaut. Historical Maps :: Hargrett Library :: University of Georgia Libraries. The Hargrett Rare Book & Manuscript Library at the University of Georgia Libraries maintains a collection of more than 1,000 historic maps spanning nearly 500 years, from the sixteenth century through the early twentieth century. Although not limited to a single geographic subject, the collection heavily emphasizes Georgia as colony and state, along with its surrounding region.

The Hargrett maps database serves as a finding aid for the majority of Hargrett's map holdings and provides digital versions of most maps. Not currently included in the database are maps from the Confederate Imprints collection and the County Maps collection. For information on these, please contact the Hargrett Library. For more modern map holdings, visit the UGA Libraries' Map & Government Information Library.

Using the collection: Search the Historical Maps Database. Links to other map collections: For more historical maps: For more contemporary maps:UGA Libraries Map Library. The Collection. Mapping Colonial New England: Looking at the Landscape of New England. Activity 1. Crisis in the Colonies: King Philip's War, Bacon's Rebellion, and the Pueblo Revolt 1. European colonists in North America experienced a dramatic expansion in the seventeenth century. Coastal outposts along the Atlantic moved inland; those in New Spain inched northward into New Mexico. Still, in 1670 no sharp boundaries separated Indian lands and colonial settlements; Boston, for example, was only fifteen miles from an Indian village.

But the continued expansion of European settlements caused great alarm in Indian communities and by the 1670s led to Native American efforts to restrict or remove European settlement. 2. 3. Student LaunchPad Links to texts and images: 4. Questions: How did the three conflicts differ? Activity 2. 1. Questions to consider include: You may want to use the Digital Classroom's Map Analysis Worksheet for map exercises. 2. On the settlement of towns: 3. What information appears on each map? 4. (See separate PDF document for excerpts and annotations ) 5.

American Experience | Fidel Castro | Timeline. EdCamp Social Studies | edcamp. Edcamp. Mary J. Johnson: 2000 clay figures each rep... New York Historical Society. The Badass of the Week: Blenda and the Women of Smaland. Blenda Life as a Viking woman was pretty hard. Sure, Viking women enjoyed more freedom than many of their counterparts in other parts of the world, but Viking men were really really into raiding and plundering and killing and all that good stuff, and as a result they were usually "away on business" nine months out of the year doing their whole "sacking towns and pillaging monasteries" thing.

Sure, a dude's got to pay the bills somehow, but if you were a Viking wife you were generally expected to hang out around the homestead, raise the children, fend for yourself, and keep the community running pretty much on your own most of the time. During times of war and raiding, it wasn't uncommon for entire villages and towns to be left in the hands of the womenfolk.

This was pretty liberating I guess, but it seems like it would kind of blow to have to pick up the slack while you're husband is out there partying, feasting, and hitting people over the head with an axe. Now it was on like neckbone. Native_americans. Online Archive of California. 9 Places to Find Creative Commons & Public Domain Images. When students create multimedia projects they might be tempted to simply do a Google Images search and use the first images they see. But as educators we have a responsibility to teach students to respect copyright holders' rights. One of the ways that we can do that is to teach students to use Creative Commons and Public Domain images. Morgue File provides free photos with license to remix. The Morgue File photo collection contains thousands of images that anyone can use for free in academic or commercial presentations. The image collection can be searched by subject category, image size, color, or rating.

Morgue File is more than just a source for free images. The Morgue File also features a "classroom" where visitors can learn photography techniques and get tips about image editing. Wylio is an image search engine designed to help bloggers and others quickly find, cite, and use Creative Commons licensed images. What About Students With No Access? - FAQ - Katie Gimbar's Flipped Classroom. Calendar. Images - The Vietnam I Remember by Steven Curtis. NASA Visible Earth: Home. Welcome to The Ancient Web - The Ancient World's Great Civilizations. EdCamp Social Studies. EDSITEment | The Best of the Humanities on the Web. What topic would YOU like to discuss for Monday Jan 2, 2012 ? It's #sschat's first chat of the new year! Join the conversation!

EDSITEment | The Best of the Humanities on the Web. Three Trends That Define the Future of Teaching and Learning. Culture Digital Tools Teaching Strategies This week, we feature the most popular posts of the year on MindShift. In today’s dynamic classrooms, the teaching and learning process is becoming more nuanced, more seamless, and it flows back and forth from students to teachers. Here’s a look at current trends in teaching and learning, their implications, and changes to watch for. The Three Key Trends 1. If Web 2.0 has taught us anything, it’s to play nicely together. Lenny Gonzales Sharing information and connecting with others — whether we know them personally or not — has proven to be a powerful tool in education.

They’re finding each other on their own kid-specific social networking sites, on their blogs, on schools’ sites, and of course on Facebook and Twitter. Educators Unite But social networking is not just for teens, as evidenced by the 500 million-plus Facebook users. 2. Flickr:Randy Pertiet Creating media is another noteworthy tech-driven initiative in education. 3. Lenny Gonzalez. Please help us organise a monthly Global Education Twitter Chat for Asia! Please select your preferred day & start time (#globalclassroom) Using Old Maps as Tools to Explore Our World. What Is It? In this bulletin board activity, students work collaboratively to explore sections of old maps.

By closely examining these unique historical documents, students learn to see maps as more than just tools for locating places. And, whatever the grade level, this activity prompts students to grapple with the basic elements of the social studies: people, space, time, meaning, and purpose. Rationale Maps are essential tools in modern life but they also are primary source documents reflecting the people, time, and culture that produced them. Description After selecting a map, the teacher should photocopy it with two concerns in mind: It should be a suitable size for an available bulletin board or display area.

In the classroom, groups of students will work with single sections of the map, using a specific procedure (see Handout 1) that will help them uncover meaning in the map. Teacher Preparation Scheduling: Place this lesson into your school’s curriculum and your course calendar. Social Studies Chat. The Origins of Christmas. Dear Readers, We've published several articles this weekend that provide insight into how Christmas Day came to be such an important date of the world calendar. The first is "The Origins of Christmas," in which we note that "Since the mid-fourth century, Western Christians have celebrated Christmas on Dec. 25 to honor the birth date of Jesus Christ. The date is not supported by Biblical evidence, however, and the true origins of the celebration may lie in secular festivals centered around the winter solstice.

" We discuss the fourth-century deliberations, and how, in 17th Century Britain, Christmas was for a time banned because its celebration engendered immoral behavior. Some of this information is repackaged, and supplemented, in our Q&A article on the history of Christmas. Lastly, we take note of 9 famous historical events that happened on Christmas Day, from the crowning of King Charlemagne to Washington crossing the Delaware to Gorbachev resigning. Error. 'What's Christmas without chopsticks?' How other faiths celebrate December 25th. By Eric Marrapodi, CNN Belief Blog Co-Editor (CNN) - Two days before Christmas, Imam Mohamed Magid, the executive director at the All Dulles Area Muslim Society, preached about Jesus at Friday prayers.

"We live in a country with a majority of Christians, where Christmas is a major holiday... It's a reminder we do believe in Jesus. Jesus' position in Islam is one of the highest prophets in Islam," Magid said, adding that Muslims view Jesus as a prophet on par with Abraham, Moses, Noah and Mohammad. Often when he says the name of Mohammad or Jesus in conversation, Magid adds the Islamic honorific "Peace be upon him" after his name.

"Jesus is a unifying figure, unifying Muslims and Christians," he said. The Quran, the Islamic scriptures, makes specific mention of Jesus and of his mother Mary. "It's very interesting that there are many places where the prophet (Mohammad) is quoting Jesus. " Christmas has a way of bleeding into other faiths in America. Explain it to me: The Hajj. Books and Films - Terry Jones' Medieval Lives. Memoir (Page Turner): Albert John Carpenter: Experiencing War: Veterans History Project (Library of Congress. Welcome to Google Docs. The Art of Storytelling. From Joke to Reality. Over the past year I've met some pretty innovative, productive and inspiring educators who invigorate and motivate me every day. During that time I've created some excellent lessons and used new tools that have helped my students and me learn better. Some of these teachers I now refer to as my colleagues and we are a collaborative team and at times we push each other to just be better.

We have formed a core group who run SSChat on Twitter and maintain a social studies ning SSChat Ning website. Our group was characterized by Dan Callahan as "kind of intense" and we have lived up to that label time and time again. One of these occasions was the night of our NCSS presentation proposal deadline. Sometime in May of this year during our Monday night sschat someone (Brad Campbell...cough, cough) jokingly said that they would love to see us do an EdCamp based on just social studies. After SSChat Monday evening some of us stuck around and threw around the idea of an Edcamp for social studies. Sedition Act of 1918. The Sedition Act of 1918 (Pub.L. 65–150, 40 Stat. 553, enacted May 16, 1918) was an Act of the United States Congress that extended the Espionage Act of 1917 to cover a broader range of offenses, notably speech and the expression of opinion that cast the government or the war effort in a negative light or interfered with the sale of government bonds. [1] It forbade the use of "disloyal, profane, scurrilous, or abusive language" about the United States government, its flag, or its armed forces or that caused others to view the American government or its institutions with contempt.

Those convicted under the act generally received sentences of imprisonment for 5 to 20 years.[2] The act also allowed the Postmaster General to refuse to deliver mail that met those same standards for punishable speech or opinion. It applied only to times "when the United States is in war. "[3] It was repealed on December 13, 1920.[4] Earlier legislation[edit] Enactment[edit] Enforcement[edit] The U.S. Sources[edit] Vaclav Havel, Former Czech President, Dies at 75. Magazine -- U.S. Edition -- November 21, 2011 Vol. 178 No. 20. Welcome to Google Docs.

WGBH American Experience | Teachers' Area. The Great Depression and World War II (1929-1945) Special feature 24 records found Jimmy Carter Boyhood on the Farm [Video] Watch video and read Carter's recollections of his rural Georgia childhood. Mount Rushmore Home Movies [Video] View three video clips of Gutzon Borglum and the workers as they sculpt a national monument. Carving a Mountain [Flash interactive] New York: The Center of the World Online Forum [Text-based] Experts answer your questions about the Trade Center, Manhattan's urban development, and New York's role at the center of the postwar economic order. Partners of the Heart Pivotal Decisions [Non-Flash interactive] Take a low-paying but interesting job? Public Enemy #1 Online Poll [Opinion (poll, submission, forum)] Do you think criminals are born bad, or do they learn to lead a life of crime?

Whodunit? Do you have what it takes to be a forensic expert? Newsreels [Video] Crime Spree [Text-based] Track Dillinger through his last year alive. Riding the Rails Added Obstacles [Text-based] Only Yesterday--F.L. Allen. GCSE Bitesize: Causes of the Depression. World War I Pictures. Internet Catalogue. The Christmas Truce — History.com This Day in History — 12/25/1914. World War I Letters - 1. World War I. History: World War One. Civil War Letters Collection. World War I, 1918-1942 : Europe plunges into War. The map as history. More people died playing football than SWORD-FIGHTING in Tudor times. BUBL LINK: Medieval history. EDSITEment | The Best of the Humanities on the Web. Ancient humans understood medicine and insecticides over 77,000 years ago. Which topic would you like to crowdsource during this week's #sschat ? (Choose 2!)

Why SOPA is unconstitutional. World, 500-1000 A.D. Sschat [licensed for non-commercial use only] / SSChat. Social Studies Chat.