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Topic: US History General History Resources

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PBS Online
PBS is a great source for information on a myriad of historical events and personalities. PBS's assorted and diverse web exhibits supplement specific individual television series and generally include a sumary of each episode, interviews (often with sound bites), a timeline, a glossary, photos, and links to relevant sites. Categories include American History, World History, History on Television, and Biographies. Go to the PBS Teacher Source for lessons and activities.

Center for History and New Media
CHNM produces historical works in new media, tests their effectiveness in the classroom, and reflects critically on the success of new media in historical practice. CHNM's resources include a list of "best" web sites, links to syllabi and lesson plans, essays on history and new media, a link to their excellent History Matters web site for U.S. History, and more. Resources are designed to benefit professional historians, high school teachers, and students of history.

SCORE
The Schools of California Online Resources for Educators (SCORE) project is a terrific resource for teachers and students alike. Here you'll find reviews of education and history-related web sites, lesson plans, maps, and much more -- all arranged by grade level and content area. A must see.

Digital History
A great new site that includes a U.S. history e-textbook; over 400 annotated documents, primary sources on slavery, Mexican American and Native American history, and U.S. political, social, and legal history; short essays on the history of film, ethnicity, private life, and technology; multimedia exhibitions; and reference resources that include a searchable database of 1,500 annotated links, classroom handouts, chronologies, glossaries, an audio archive including speeches and book talks by historians, and a visual archive with hundreds of historical maps and images. The site's Ask the HyperHistorian feature allows users to pose questions to professional historians.

BBC: History
BBC's History section offers an impressive array of exhibitions, activities, games, photo galleries, and other resources. Major categories include Ancient History, Archaeology, Church and State, Science and Discovery, Society and Conflict, War and Culture, and Family History. There are also sections entitled Multimedia Room, Historic Figures, Timelines, Programmes, Reading Room, Talk History, For Kids, and History Trails.

History Teacher
An impressive, award-winning site from a New York high school teacher. It features many research links and curriculum resources for Global Studies, U.S. AP History, US European History, and American History and Government. It also has quizzes, news links, and more.

History Channel
A companion to the television channel, this commercial site contains a myriad of features and highlights for educators and students alike. Key offerings include study guides and activities, ideas from teachers, special exhibits, speech archives, discussions, and "This Day in History." Also, try the UK site at www.thehistorychannel.co.uk and student site: www.historystudystop.co.uk

The History Place
This informative site features worthwhile exhibits (eg. American Revolution, Holocaust, Civil War), special presentations, essays, homework aids, and a guide to historic American areas.

BUBL: History
BUBL is a national information service for the higher education community, run by the Centre for Digital Library Research at the University of Strathclyde in the UK. BUBL offers free access to over 12,000 selected Internet resources. Links are extensive and all sites are reviewed.

National Council for the Social Studies
National Council for the Social Studies offers support for social studies educators. Links are categorized by themes of the Curriculum Standards for Social Studies. Teachers share classroom experiences at the site and on the NCSS listserv.

WGBH Forum Network
The WGBH Forum Network is a free online archive of public lectures at educational or cultural organizations in the Boston area. Of special historical interest are the series of lectures examining the Civil Rights Movement from Brown v. Board of Education to the civil rights initiatives today. Visitors can browse archived content by category or contributing institution. Visitors download the lectures if desired and subscribers to the WGBH Forum Network RSS|New Lectures feed will receive their listing automatically

Academic Info: History
Academic Info is a gateway to educational resources; the History Gateway provides links to World History Resources, Country and Regional Histories, Topical Histories, European History, and Additional Sites of Interest.

Smithsonian Education
The site is divided simply into three main categories: Educators, Families, and Students. The Educators section is keyword searchable and features lesson plans -- many pertaining to history. The Students section features an interactive "Secrets of the Smithsonian" that teaches about the special collections at the Smithsonian.

Teacher Oz's History Page
An extensive and up-to-date list of humanities-related web sites covering: Ancient History, United States History and Government, The World, Wars and Military History, Middle Ages, Renaissance and The Enlightenment, England, France, Russia, Biographies, Religion, Cultures, and Women, and much more. Sites are usually not described or rated, however.

Voice of the Shuttle: History Page
Part of an extensive guide to humanities resources that provides numerous links to feature sites, teaching resources, electronic journals, course syllabi, and much more.

History Net
Offered by the National Historical Society, this well-organized site covers a diverse set of topics in World and American history. Noteworthy features include a picture gallery, archives, links to full-text historical magazines, eyewitness historical accounts, special features, and book reviews.

WWW-VL The History Index
The Central Catalogue provides direct links to network sites through its index and maintains a large number of files of pointers for countries, periods, and subjects for which there is not yet a member site. This Virtual Library is diverse and broad site with links to a multitude of topical historical areas. The scope of the listed categories is impressive, but some topics have a longer reach than others. Maintained by Lynn Nelson, Department of History, University of Kansas.

Education World
This worthwhile commercial site contains lesson plans and special features and is divided into 20 sub-categories including: Documents, Famous People, Women, Classical/Ancient History, and Preservation. They have reviewed over 700 web sites and have formulated yearly "Best Of" lists.

Spartacus: History
Run by a small educational publishing company, this website provides free online materials for major history curriculum subjects. Visitors can sign up for a free monthly e-mail newsletter covering web reviews and using technology in the history classroom.

Ask ERIC Virtual Library
Produced by the Education Research Information Center (ERIC) this site is an information clearinghouse on 16 specific subject areas. Of special note is its collection of thousands of lesson plans for varied grade levels and subject areas. There is a question-and-answer section and plentiful educational tips and guides.

Scholars' Guide to WWW
An extensive and well-organized guide to using the Web for general academic ends. Has an impressive set of history links.

Marco Polo
An impressive new entry that features reviewed links to top sites, professionally developed lesson plans, classroom activities, materials to help with daily classroom planning, and search engines.

Education Index
An annotated guide to the best education-related web sites. Reviews of historical sites are useful and comprehensive, though no distinction is drawn between American and World history. Well organized and reliable.

World History: HyperHistory
Hyper History Online covers 3000 years of history through timelines, lifelines, maps, and graphics. The over 2000 files are grouped into People, History, Events, Maps, Science, Culture, Religion, and Politics. This site contains alot of information.

Kathy Schrock's Guide for Educators
Sponsored by the Discovery Channel, this is a well organized and comprehensive guide for educators searching to make the best use of the web. Has good links in history section.

The Gateway
Contains about 7000 educational resources including lesson plans and curriculum guides. History links are divided by grade level and contain descriptions and reviews.

SchoolHistory.co.uk
School History is a bountiful online history site that offers huge numbers of freely downloadable resources, interactive and entertaining history games and quizzes, and interactive online lessons together with comprehensive links to other online resources.

AwesomeStories.com
AwesomeStories.com is free, non-commercial educational web site for educators (as the basis for lesson plans) and students. Stories link to organized primary and secondary source materials found principally at U.S. and other worldwide national archives, museums, libraries, universities, news organizations, and government websites. The purpose of the site (including its eight separate, stand-alone channels) is to take visitors on a virtual guided tour of relevant on-line source materials. Be sure to check out Click2History.

The History News Network
The HistoryNewsNetwork was created in June 2001 and features articles by historians on both the left and the right who provide historical perspective on current events. HNN exists to provide historians and other experts a national forum in which to educate Americans about important and timely issues, and it is the only web site on the Internet wholly devoted to this task. HNN is a nonprofit publication run by George Mason University, is updated daily, and averages roughly 1.5 million hits a month. Those of you who have visited the U.S. History landing page in Best of History Web Sites may have noticed that I link to HNN articles in the "U.S. History in the Making" section.

Teaching History
A journal of teaching methods, this site contains many links to web sites and includes contents of past issues.

eHistory.com
A great site for history fans, enthusiasts, and students, eHistory consists of over 130,000 pages of historical content; 4,500 timeline events; 800 battle outlines; 300 biographies; and thousands of images and maps.

History Buff
Produced by the Newspaper Collector's Society of America, this site includes press coverage of notable events in American history. It also showcases a President's Library, a Historic Voices Library featuring 12 audio recordings, and a Video library wiht famous historial, classic comedy, and vintage music videos.

Blue Web'n Weekly Updates
A Pacific Bell production, the Blue Web'n pages are an invaluable source of up-to-date reviews of education-oriented web sites. New sites are described, rated, and classified by grade level and content. Bi-weekly e-mail updates are free and are a great source of up-to-date information.

The Scout Report for Social Sciences(Wisconsin)
Here you'll find bi-weekly reports that cover select internet sites in the social sciences

McRel
The Mid-continent Research for Education and Learning (McRel) site provides educational resources, including lesson plans and many links to U.S, world, and general history sites. No reviews of sites, however

Classroom Connect
A respected source for educational resources such as web-linked activities. Has a popular newsletter on educational technology. Paid subscription is required to access most resources.

Footnotes to History
Footnotes to History is an award-winning guide that provides an overview of ephemeral states, micronations, secessionist states, and every other kind of country you never heard of in high school. It features The Atlas of Forgotten Nations as well as links and other resources.

studentsfriend.com
This non-profit, teacher-to-teacher site is a guide for high school teachers of world history and geography, although much of the content is suitable for teachers of other social studies subjects as well. Content includes fundamental information about history teaching, resources, a concise alternative textbook, and lesson plans.

Conversations With History
In this UC Berkeley site distinguished men and women from all over the world talk about their lives and their work. They reminisce about their participation in great events, and they share their perspectives on the past and reflect on what the future may hold. Guests include diplomats, statesmen, and soldiers; economists and political analysts; scientists and historians; writers and foreign correspondents; activists; and artists.

Social, Economic and Political Change
Social, Political and Economic Change is supported by The International Consortium for the Advancement of Academic Publication. It features links to free resources about long-term changes in social, political, and economic systems. It also links to online history books and lectures. This site includes several reports about sociodemographic changes in the 20th century, as well as very long term historical world population and economic changes.

CNNfyi
CNNfyi provides teachers with instructional materials for integrating current events across the curriculum. A student section keeps students in grades 6-12 aware of the latest news of interest to them. Lesson plans, background material, profiles, links to useful Internet sites, and forums for interaction with other teachers are also included.

The Pocahontas Archive and the Literature of Justification
The Pocahontas Archive and The Literature of Justification are two sections of a promising new Lehigh University digital project entitled "History on Trial." The Pocahontas Archive provides an essay introduction to the legendary figure as well as a searchable bibliography and an image collection. The image collection is particularly interesting; it features varied depictions of Pocahontas from 19th and 20th century sources. The Literature of Justification section presents case studies of European "justification strategies" and American Supreme Court decisions regarding Indian land rights. Of special interest are the "provocative" excerpts from primary and secondary sources and the audio commentary that accompanies some of them. Visitors will also discover a chronological display of documents, a small array of images, a bibliography, and several introductory essays. The creators of History on Trial aim to complete three more sections: Reel American History, Enola Gay Controversy, and Vietnam Wall Controversy. Reel American History will contain student projects on ten films about early America. (For now they are available at http://www.lehigh.edu/ReelAmericanHistory.) Both the Enola Gay and Vietnam Wall sections present the controversies via chronological presentation of documents. Though History on Trail remains under development it already represents an excellent tool for introducing student researchers to the struggle over shaping representations of history.

TeacherServe (National Humanities Center)
TeacherServe is designed to deepen course content by providing convenient access to scholarship tailored to classroom use. TeacherServe consists of a series of instructional guides on important topics in the humanities on the secondary level.

Federal Resources for Educational Excellence(FREE): Social Studies
More than 30 Federal agencies formed a working group in 1997 to make hundreds of Federally supported teaching and learning resources easier to find. The result of that work is the FREE web site.

History Central.com
History Central is offered by MultiEducatory, one of the earliest producers of multimedia software. It provides extensive information on American History and World History, with special sections on diverse subjects ranging from Presidential Elections to Naval History.

Cartoons in History
Focus On Cartoons by Learning Curve (UK National Archives) is an online investigation into the history and use of political cartoons. It includes activities ranging from simple quizzes to in-depth interrogations of cartoons.

Political Cartoons and Cartoonists
Commercial site with articles and commentary on political cartoons. Mostly American focus.

History in Focus: What is History?
Focus highlights books, reviews, and web sites that examine the nature of history and assess the changes in historical method and practice.

Economics Resources for K-12 Teachers
EcEdWeb is your headquarters for teaching resources for K-12 or pre-college economics. The menus at the top are designed to work the way you work: if you need a lesson or information on a particular concept (e.g. scarcity), start with Concepts.

History of Economic Thought
This website is a clearinghouse of collected links and information on the history of economic thought, from the ancient times until the modern day.

Clash of Steel
A small team of military historians has put together this site to further the study of military actions throughout history. This team is building a database of military engagements and commanders that can be searched for specific entries. It also powers a 'Battle of the Day' feature to which visitors can subscribe. This will e-mail daily information completely free on the anniversaries of actions and engagements. Visitors are also invited to contribute to discussion groups or to add information and entries to the database itself.

DailyPast.com
DailyPast.com is the brainchild of an English teacher in Europe who attempts to bring history to life by turning history into current events. DailyPast.com takes some creative license at times, but the "news" is engaging and historically accurate. There are also materials for educators, a forum, and book suggestions.

National History Day

Mr. Hostetler's Social Studies Home Page

Social Studies Central

The Concord Review
The Concord Review is a respected quarterly journal that has published 550 high school history papers by students from 42 states and 34 countries since 1987. Its web site offers 51 sample essays, including all the Ralph Waldo Emerson Prize (now $3000) winners from the last eight years. The National Writing Board, founded in 1998, offers independent assessment of high school history papers from 22 states and sends each author a three-page report, with scores and comments. Both the Concord Review and National Writing Board have received much praise from high school and university educators and administrators.

On This Day
Daily historical facts, events, famous birthdays, world history, United States history, and music history.

This Day in Alternate History
A daily calendar of alternate history events. "Alternate history is a type of science fiction in which the basic premise is that some specific historical event never happened, or happened differently."

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