LOC and National Archives

In the same vein as the previous post.... another great govt. website, The Library of Congress.  A few years ago I took a trip to D.C. and got a tour of the Library of Congress and the National Archives.  It was a fascinating tour of the history of the buildings and agencies, but the best part for me was the educational outreach  areas.  The library has a program that emphasizes using primary resources in education.  This and the National Archives are the depository of most of our nation's important history-making documents, most of which are available in digital format.  For example, you have access to the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, letters, and pictures that can make a lesson come alive for your students. These two sites are worth taking a look at.

  

FREE

     We all love free stuff and there is a government site that provides some great open resources for teachers to use.  In its inimitable way, the govt has created an anachronism; F.R.E.E.-- Federal Resources for Educational Excellence.  There are links to many federal agencies that have provided lesson plans and primary resources for educational purposes.  For example, under the topic of American Revolution, there are links to National Park Service sites (national historic parks), The Smithsonian, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Museum of American History, Dept. of State, National Archives, Library of Congress, and the list goes on.  You could find those things on your own, but it's nice to have a database to tap into that organizes lessons by topic.   Check it out, I think you'll find some really useful resources.

Happy Valentine's Day

Came across a cute little site to add to your Valentine's flipcharts.  Its called Candy hearts and you can personalize an image of a candy heart and add the image quite easily to your flip page.

Art Project powered by Google

Google has collaborated with some of the best known art museums around the world to bring their gallery to you.  Using street view technology, you can travel through the museums of your choosing looking at thousands of works of art.  The zoom feature is spectacular and the high resolution detail provided is really something. 

You can see brush strokes and layering quite well in this zoomed image of Van Gogh's Farmhouse in a Wheat Field.  It's hard to tell from this little image, so check out the site yourself.  Art Project, powered by Google.