YOU ARE HERE >
Main > Teacher Resources > JCC Survey Course
Steve
Holmberg 09
National History
Day
Westfield Academy and Central School
1. General
Overview of the Proposed Project:
I WOULD LIKE TO
CONTINUE AND ENHANCE THE NATIONAL HISTORY DAY PROGRAM AT MY SCHOOL.
THIS WOULD INVOLVE STUDENTS CREATING PROJECTS BE TO ENTERED INTO A
SCHOOL COMPETITION AND REGIONAL COMPETITION. PROJECTS WOULD THEN GO
FURTHER IN THE NATIONAL HISTORY DAY COMPETITIONS IF THEY WIN AT THE
LOWER LEVELS. THE PROGRAM WAS STARTED LAST YEAR, AND I WOULD LIKE TO
CONTINUE TO BUILD THE PROGRAM HERE BY INVOLVING BOTH MIDDLE AND HIGH
SCHOOL STUDENTS.
2. Clear Purpose
and Objective:
THE OBJECTIVE IS TO
ENGAGE STUDENTS IN IN-DEPTH RESEARCH OF ONE TOPIC. STUDENTS WILL
LEARN RESEARCH SKILLS, CLASSIFYING AND CATEGORIZING INFORMATION, THE
DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRIMARY AND SECONDARY SOURCES, AS WELL AS
PRESENTING AND EXPLAINING THEIR PROJECTS TO HISTORIANS AT THE
COMPETITIONS.
3. Stakeholders:
grade level, who will benefit, who will participate in this project.
ALL 8TH –
12TH GRADERS WILL HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY TO PARTICIPATE,
BUT PARTICIPATION WILL BE VOLUNTARY. ALL STUDENTS WILL BENEFIT
BECAUSE THOSE COMPLETING A PROJECT WILL PRACTICE THEIR PRESENTATION
SKILLS BY PRESENTING TO THEIR CLASS, SO ALL STUDENTS WILL GAIN AN
UNDERSTANDING OF THE VARIOUS TOPICS COVERED BY THE PARTICIPANTS.
4. U.S. History
Content Area
WORK DONE WILL
RELATE TO THIS YEAR’S NATIONAL HISTORY DAY THEME, THE INDIVIDUAL IN
HISTORY. TOPICS MUST BE ABOUT AMERICAN HISTORY AND RELATE TO THIS
THEME.
5. Outline
Describing Content
EXAMPLES OF POSSIBLE
TOPICS INCLUDE: WILLIAM SEWARD, MARTIN LUTHER KING JR, LORETTA MOTT,
AND MANY, MANY MORE. ANY HISTORICAL FIGURE WILL FIT THE CRITERIA
FOR THIS YEAR THEME. I PLAN TO ENCOURAGE PARTICIPANTS TO CHOOSE
SOMEONE THEY KNOW LITTLE ABOUT, ESPECIALLY THOSE REPRESENTING
MINORITY GROUPS.
6. Software to
be used, internet materials, contacts, etc.
COMPUTERS AND ONLINE
DATABASES AND JOURNALS FOR RESEARCH, DIGITAL MEDIA, iMOVIE, MOVIE
MAKER, THE TDHAH.COM WEBSITE, DIGITAL HISTORY TEXTBOOK- ITEMS USED
WILL VARY DEPENDING ON TYPE OF PROJECTS BEING COMPLETED.
7. Level of
Student Involvement
STUDENTS WILL BE
INVOLVED DEVELOPING TOPICS AND IDEAS IN OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER,
WORKING ON PROJECTS IN DECEMBER AND JANUARY, COMPLETING PROJECTS IN
FEBRUARY, ATTENDING THE REGIONAL COMPETITION IN MARCH, AND GOING ON
IN THE COMPETITION IF THEY ARE SUCCESSFUL
8. Evaluation
process (include students when possible)
STUDENT PROJECTS
WILL BE EVALUATED BY TEACHERS IN THE SCHOOL DISPLAY, AND BY THE
JUDGES AT THE REGIONAL COMPETITION
9. Timeline: how
you envision the project being carried out between start up and
conclusion
OCTOBER- INTRODUCE
PROGRAM/ OVERVIEW
NOVEMBER- STUDENTS
DECIDE TO PARTICIPATE/ INITIAL MEETING
DECEMBER- TOPIC AND
PROJECT TYPE CHOSEN- RESEARCH BEGINS
JANUARY- FINISH
RESEARCH/ BEGIN PROJECT.- 2 SATURDAY WORKDAYS
FEBRUARY- FINISH
PROJECT, APPLY FOR REGIONAL COMPETITION
MARCH- ATTEND
REGIONALS/ APPLY FOR STATE COMPETITION?
MAY- ATTEND STATES?
MAY- FINISH PROGRAM-
WRITE UPS FOR THE NEWSPAPER AND SCHOOL NEWSLETTER
10. Comments or
Questions:
SUPPLY MONEY TO BE
USED FOR EXHIBIT BACKDROPS, COSTUMES, PROPS, ETC. AS WELL AS FOR
SUPPLIES FOR THE 2 SATURDAY WORK DAYS.
Steve Holmberg
8th Grade Social
Studies
Westfield Central
School
Having done the National History Day program once, I was excited to
begin this year with a little background knowledge of how the
process worked. There were two main things I had as goals this
year. One was to include more students and have entries in both the
junior AND senior division; the second was to go to Cooperstown to
get a better feel for what students are preparing for when they
revise their projects following the regional competition.
To
begin this year I discussed the program with all my 8th grade
students and invited them all to participate. I set the date for an
after-school meeting in mid November. I also this year invited any
interested high-school students to participate. All students
interested were to attend an informational meeting in my room
after-school. I had about 20 students attend this meeting and I
went over the basics of choosing a topic and a category, the theme
for this year, and the general rules and requirements for all
categories.
The
next meeting I held for interested students was in the library to
work on research skills, this was in late November- after
Thanksgiving. Our librarian gave us a lot of help in showing
students where to find primary resources and making them aware of
all the resources that our library had. Students didn’t really have
time to begin their research at this point. At this point about
half students attended, a few of them were not able to make it-
others decided not to participate. By Christmas break in December I
had a descent idea of who was going to follow through and complete a
project. I had 6 interested students who had begun a project at
this point.
I
held 2 Saturday work days for students to come in and work, get help
from me, and use the school resources. I found this to be valuable
last year, and again this year as it gave us an extended period of
time to work. In the usual after-school time many students would
just get their work out and begin making progress and it was time to
clean up their materials and leave for the day. These work days
were very successful, students made a lot of progress and I was able
to give them quite a bit of feedback during this time. Once of
these days was held at the end of January and the other in mid
February. All students who ended up competing attended at least 1
of these days.
Aside from the workdays I continued to meet with students
after-school and check on their progress during the school day.
Many of them needed a little direction in finding sources or
formatting the bibliography and they continued to work
independently. I did give students some deadlines for when I wanted
to see at least 5 primary and 5 secondary sources, when they should
have started their process paper, and when I should be able to see
the actual project itself taking shape. I found that this helped to
alleviate the last minute problem I had last year, though it did not
completely eradicated it.
As
competition day, March 7th, neared three of the four students I had
working were making good progress. One ended up dropping put
because of a cheerleading competition, but there were three that
competed in the regional competition at SUNY Fredonia. Of the three
that competed 2 earned the chance to go onto the state competition
in Cooperstown. One of those 2 ended up going on to Cooperstown.
Thanks to TAH I had the opportunity to experience the Cooperstown
competition this year, which was a great experience. There was
plenty to do and see pertaining to the competition itself and other
things related to history. The most valuable thing about it was
that I now had a better idea about what occurred at the competition
which will allow me to better prepare students for attendance at the
competition in coming years. Last year I found it difficult to
explain the logistics of Cooperstown and the competition to students
and parents when I had never been before.
I
feel I learned just as much this time around as I did the first time
running a history day program at our school. The main thing was
seeing firsthand how the Cooperstown competition worked, which will
allow me to better prepare students for the competition in the
future. I also found that while having students in both the junior
and senior divisions was not a problem, it was more difficult to
have students competing that I did not see for class regularly. I
had a greater number of people drop out from the group of students
who I did not have in class. I think setting a meeting time or a
time to touch base regularly with the students not in my class will
be important for next year. Even if it’s just an agreement that
students will check in with me on a certain day once a week at
lunchtime for 5 minutes, I think that will make them fell more
connected and encourage them to stick with the program.
Students who were in the competition were pretty enthusiastic about
their experience, even the ones who did not advance beyond the
regional competition were glad they had participated. If possible,
next year when I introduce the program to my 8th graders I would
like to have students who have participated in the past come in and
share their experience to help encourage new students to
participate.
Participation in this project will help academic achievement in a
few different ways. First the project shows students new skills to
use as they research. Sorting out what information is valuable and
relevant to their project and what is not is a skill that students
developed as they worked. Often students would find good
information and want to use it, however not all information
pertained to their specific topic and could not always be used.
The
project also showed students the value of using primary sources as
evidence to support their opinion. In order to do a project
students have to find and be able to analyze primary sources which
helps prepare them for social studies classes in general, and also
for the state assessments in middle school or regents exams in
high-school. And finally there is the import life skill of
preparing for long-term assignments, breaking a big project into a
series of smaller tasks, and planning time. No project can be
completed the day or even the week before it is due. Students have
to pace themselves and set time aside to work on the project. I set
dates when I want to see certain portions of the project completed
by to help guide students, but they also have to take responsibility
to be working independently to complete their project.
Overall the National History Day program is one that teaches very
valuable skills and is fairly easy to run with all the regional and
state support. I would encourage anyone interested to give it a try
as we try to expand the program in this area.
|