So I have made a major push in the last half decade to integrate primary sources into my class. It is NOT easy and I find one of the hardest things is to create the darned things. I am not a prepackaged textbook kinda gal but when it come to DBQs and primary sources I would much rather spend the time helping my kids dissect them than to spend the time making them . In walks Beyond The Bubble.
Stanford has done an amazing job at working with the National Archives and creating ready made, Common Core aligned primary source material and activities. Their major push is providing small assignments that are extremely easy to execute and focus one one piece of the CCSS (Sourcing, Corroboration, Contextualizing, Close Reading).
Over a couple of days I kind of pounded the kids with basically the same question with just different visuals for three days to really make the point of sourcing. One of the best things about the resource is they provide exemplars for comparison.
I think my kiddos made a valiant first attempt at this process.
Just to commend them again, Stanford University is doing an amazing job of creating programming to immerse our students in the wonderful world of primary sources. I recently tried their program, Reading Like A Historian, and it is outstanding!. It offers students multiple sources on a topic and scaffold the questioning experience try bring students to a higher understanding that there are many sides to a story. It's going to be fun embarking on this primary source, CCSS journey!
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