Jimmy Carter on PBS

Watch the full episode. See more American Experience.

You can get the above video free on PBS on Jimmy Carter.  You can move the film to different parts that you want to show your students. Some other full length films found here are on Reagan, Tecumseh, the Panama Canal, Robert E. Lee, Trail of Tears and more. 

Summer Institutes with NEH

Years ago, before I was married and had three kids, I spent part of every summer participating in institutes put on by the National Endowment for the Humanities.  Usually they paid my way and gave me a small stipend.  While they are usually very competitive, as you can see from this list, there are some great ones to choose from.

PBS and Our Presidents

I just received this from the National Endowment for the Humanities (I might add they have tremendous summer opportunities).  Here are a number of completed lessons you can use with PBS shows.

US Presidents on Google Earth

You can now go here and see where each of our presidents lived, as well as details about each one, a map showing which states voted in the election and where the president was from. 

Review Guides

These are Virginia Standards of Learning (state exam) review guides, but they work fine for US and world history which your state would have. 

Peak at the Future

Kno is an educational tablet company that just might have the coolest laptop in the world which you can see in the above video.  Think if you connected to ipads together and you get Kno. You can drag things from one screen to the other, type (a la the ipad) on one screen, read on one side and use the Internet on the other, or even make it fold back on itself to have only one screen showing.  Take a look and imagine how your students could use it. 

The Real Meaning Behind the Wizard of Oz

The Wizard of Oz as an AllegoryI have found talking about the gold and silver standards, Wm Jennings Bryan, industrialization and farmers as a lot for a unit - but telling the kids the real meaning behind the Wizard of Oz makes it all soooo easy for the kids to get. Here is one interpretation that I like, but here are more.

Digital US History

This site has a ton of pictures as well as a description of the era that each is from.  One example is the Reconstruction period which is broken up into six sections, with pictures and descriptions. 

Using Google Docs w. Your Students

I did an in-service today was partly on how to use Google Docs, Google Presentation (PowerPoint), to create collections (folders), how to upload and how to link to one's student presentation tool (ie Blackboard, Google Sites, Edublog, etc.).  The advantage of doing this is that once you have the link set up, you can just make the change within Google and will never have to re-upload the document or presentation again.