Gateway Writing Project

Exploring How Primary Sources & Place-Based Writing Can Expand Our View of the World

This project, run by Gateway Writing Project  at the University of Missouri-St. Louis  , worked in partnership with the Gateway Arch National Park and Missouri Botanical Garden to design field trip experiences that bring together primary sources and place based writing. The goal of the project was to broaden the definition of literacy by asking students to approach the park’s museum as a text/source for writing. The project trained in-service teachers in the use of digital primary sources from the Library of Congress, provided immersive field trip experiences, and closed with the in-service teachers sharing their experiences with the broader Gateway Writing Project network.  

Good morning! A research team from National Louis University is thrilled to announce that we have received funding from the TPS Midwest Region for a new grant project in collaboration with Illinois State University. A description is provided below.

“Integrating Critical Visual Literacy with Library of Congress Visual Primary Sources for Equitable Education in Illinois” 

The proposed professional development project aims to assist pre-service and in-service teachers in Illinois in developing critical visual literacy skills necessary for analyzing and utilizing Library of Congress visual primary sources to create engaging classroom activities. A critical visual literacy framework and tools for integrating critical visual literacy skills into lesson planning will be developed and implemented into teacher preparation and teacher education programs at National Louis University and Illinois State University. In addition, a virtual workshop series will be offered to educators in Illinois to guide them in utilizing visual primary sources through a critical visual literacy lens into their lesson planning and implementation in their settings.

We welcome collaboration with others interested in this topic and look forward to hearing from you!

The Teaching with Primary Sources Midwest Region is proud to showcase an article composed by Midwest Region Consortium partner Meghan Davisson with the Minnesota State Historical Society! This article titled, "Empowering Communities with Local History" showcases some of the excellent work and strategies utilized through the completion of their grant project, "Inquiry in the Upper Midwest."

This article is now live on the resources page of the Midwest Region's updated website, on which we hope to continue to gather writing to showcase the work of our excellent grantees! Thank you, Meghan, for your contribution!

The PBL3 STEAM Institute in Detroit is a multi-day professional learning experience introducing teachers to project-, problem-, and place-based learning. The institute leverages Detroit's histories, culture, museums, community organizations, and outdoor spaces as launching pads for PBL3 unit ideation. 

Using Detroit’s island park, Belle Isle, as home base, a cohort of fifteen Detroit Public Schools Community District teachers (DPSCD) grades 3 through 7 will visit an array of local, informal learning spaces to discover everything from underlying histories to current community-action efforts. Institute staff will then lead collaborative conversations with our participants, helping them see the valuable connections these rich community resources have for student learning across grade-level curriculum connected to larger educational goals.

To deepen and enrich their unit, we will introduce teachers to relevant Library of Congress primary sources and strategies from the Teaching with Primary Sources program. For example, teachers in our institute visit Henry Ford’s automobile assembly Piquette plant and discuss the societal impact of car production from the past, and the industry’s continued effects today. We will deepen this experience by layering in primary sources from the Library, such as this text set on early electric vehicles from Chronicling America, the blog post on early electric cars from the Teaching with the Library of Congress blog, and images from the Prints and Photographs Division at the Library like these. We recognize that the Library is rich in historical documents that teachers can use to enhance their PBL3 units, and we will guide them through discovery of these relevant resources, model use of primary sources, and assist them to incorporate the Library resources into their teaching. 

The Institute will conclude with a gallery walk of teachers presenting their unit plan to their colleagues and to community leaders from the spaces they visited during the week.

The PBL3 STEAM Institute in Detroit is designed and enacted by InnovatED313, a nonprofit that creates and delivers innovative educational programs and teacher PD in Detroit (the 313 area code).

Good Morning! The East Tennessee Historical Society has enjoyed the past 18 months of partnering with Teaching with Primary Sources Middle Tennessee State University and Knox County Schools to identify and work with a pilot cohort of 8th grade social studies teachers from this Appalachian urban and rural district. The key goals of the project are to identify student gaps and needs; to revise resources to meet C3 Framework inquiry design and assess for effective classroom instruction; and to design a responsive model of professional development delivery that will be used in future trainings. The project is a combination of in-person and Zoom sessions. To check out lesson plans produced by the cohort, visit https://library.mtsu.edu/tps. A number of the lessons featured on the home page address the Founding Era of American history through using local and regional history, a resulting focus of the project. TPS MTSU specialist   Kira Duke  is a great asset to this partnership and would be glad to share more information as well.

I'm pleased to post that the Rutherford B. Hayes Presidential Library & Museums was awarded a TPS grant to fund a workshop developed in collaboration with the United States Capitol Historical Society for middle and high school teachers of history, social studies or government that focused on the electoral college with the contested election of 1876 as a case study.  The workshop took place at Spiegel Grove (home of the Hayes Presidential Library & Museums) on February 22 and 23, 2024 and featured a series of new lesson plans developed by USCHS and its partner, StoryWorks Theater, in consultation with expert Hayes Presidential staff.  Lesson plans highlighted key primary sources from the Library of Congress, the National Archives and Records Administration, and manuscripts and artifacts from Hayes Presidential’s collection, such as President Hayes’s diaries, letters, and campaign materials.  Given the current focus on the electoral college, the need for informed voters, and the likelihood that the issue will be debated by elected officials and the public for some time, it is important that educators have excellent tools and knowledge necessary to teach students about this topic.  The role of the electoral college in presidential elections is complex, yet through inventive approaches, it can be thoroughly understood.  If you would like access to these resources, please let me know.  The materials are also soon to be posted at rbhayes.org and on the USCHS "We The People" hub.    9 - 12    Social Studies/History  

If you need help in creating or updating your organization's page on the TPS Consortium Created Materials (CCM) website, consult the resources below. You can also ask a question by posting a comment to this discussion.

• CCM Walkthrough and Info Sheet
• CCM Webinar Recording & Slides

All types of materials created in conjunction with your TPS projects are welcome. 

The DeKalb County History Center is hosting a teacher workshop this summer based on connecting sources from the Library of Congress and our collection to develop curriculum materials that include the "unheard voices" in local history and in the classroom. Using the inquiry method, teachers will explore how local history lessons can be "teachable moments" that inform that national narratives that are already taught. Resources from our Arts in Action (createchange.today) project will be used to illustrate how local history can be woven into the larger fabric of American history narratives using the Library of Congress' resources. 

This will be a four-day workshop, with one full day dedicated to using primary sources to teach Native American history a new mandate from the Illinois State Board of Education. Teachers will then be invited to help create lesson plans. There will be additional meeting where teachers will regroup on a Zoom call to check in on their status. By the end of the year the inquiry-based lesson plans will be on our website. 

We are looking forward to learning more about all of the other amazing projects going on in our region. 

Hello! I look forward to participating in the conversations with the TPS Midwest Region. . 

Our project focuses on utilizing primary sources within the Nebraska Stories of Humanity web portal. Through in-service and workgroups, we engage teachers and preservice teachers in the use of primary sources through a digital humanities tool developed at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln, by the Harris Center for Judaic Studies and the Center for Digital Research in the Humanities. Recently, Nebraska lawmakers passed legislation requiring the teaching of Holocaust and genocide education in secondary schools. The resource aggregates diverse artifacts from local Holocaust survivors and liberators of Nazi camps and provides Inquiry Based Lessons for the classroom. We collaborate with the Nebraska Department of Education to develop teaching resources that comply with Nebraska state standards. This generous grant will support in-services for educators and preservice students and will allow us to continue to train university student interns who transcribe essential materials for the site.

The Teaching with Primary Sources Midwest Region is excited to announce their attendance at the Illinois Council for the Social Studies in Springfield, Illinois tomorrow, April 12^th!

We will be exhibiting and promoting the opportunities of the regional program, including our recently revised professional development sequence: Fundamentals of Primary Source Instruction. This online workshop will run between June 8^th and July 23^rd with virtual meetings every other week. To register, email Joseph Skotzke or click here!

Additionally, we will be distributing copies of primary source “postcard sets” which can be used at any level for entry into specific topics. These are used in conjunction with the Library’s Primary Source Analysis Tool!

If you are attending this conference, please come and stop by the Midwest Region table! We would love to speak with you and hear about the great work that you are doing. We hope to see you there!

  ICSS