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##  Using Primary Sources on the Internet To Teach and Learn History.               ERIC Digest.                                                                 

The Internet enables teachers to enhance the teaching and learning              of history through quick and extensive access to primary sources.               This Digest discusses: (1) types and uses of primary sources, (2)               using the Internet to obtain primary sources, and (3) exemplary                 World Wide Web sites providing primary sources. TYPES AND USES OF             PRIMARY SOURCES.Primary sources are the building blocks of                  history.  These traces of the human past include ideals, customs,               institutions, languages, literature, material products, and the                 physical remains of various people (Craver 1999, 8). 
Primary                  sources are not limited to printed documents such as letters,                   newspapers, diaries, and poems. Artifacts (art, pottery, articles of            clothing, tools, and food), places (ecosystems, dwellings, and other            buildings and structures), sounds (music, stories, and folklore),               and images (paintings, photographs, videos/movies) can also be                  considered primary sources. 
A commonly overlooked type of primary             source is historic places, the sites of significant events, which               communicate the past to students in numerous ways.  Historic                    places "speak through relationships to their settings, their plan               and design, their building materials, their atmosphere and ambience,            their furniture, and other objects they contain" (Harper 1997,                  1). 
Primary sources are keys to reconstructing and interpreting               the past. Teachers and students alike might consider this adage:                learning is not received; it is achieved.  Introducing and using                primary sources in the history classroom will almost certainly lead             to active learning and development of critical thinking, reasoning,             and problem solving (Craver 1999, 10-12).  As students work with                primary sources, they have the opportunity to do more than just                 absorb information; they can also analyze, evaluate, recognize bias             and contradiction, and weigh the significance of evidence presented             by the source (Percoco 1998). 
Primary sources enhance the learning            process by allowing students to construct their own understandings              of people, events, and ideas.  Students can "uncover, discover, and             reflect on content and their conceptions of such through inquiry,               investigation, research, and analysis" (Marlow & Page 1998,                     11). USING THE INTERNET TO ACCESS PRIMARY SOURCES.The Internet            is a virtual gateway to an abundance of on-line educational                     resources; it is important to remember, however, that much of the               information on the Internet is uncensored and unregulated.  Students            may be exposed to inappropriate Web sites.  Therefore, teachers may             wish to take precautionary measures to maintain safe learning                   environments, such as searching the Web to locate and screen the                primary source material for appropriateness and validity prior to               using it in class.  This conserves classroom time, overcomes the                limitations of the one-computer classroom, and reduces the need to              purchase Internet filtering software. 
Until recently, "surfing"               was the typical approach to finding information on the World Wide               Web. Surfing begins when the user starts on a particular World Wide             Web site and follows links from page to page (making some educated              guesses along the way), hoping to sooner or later arrive at the                 desired information.  When you have time to explore, surfing can be             fun.  But when you need to find information quickly, surfing can be             inefficient and ineffective.  A number of tools exist that enable               users to find  information on the World Wide Web more effectively               and efficiently. One such tool is a search engine. 
Though they are            similar, not all search engines are created equal. Selecting the                best search engine depends upon the user's experience level and an              understanding of which elements in the documents are indexed by each            search engine.  Meta-search engines, which search multiple search               engines simultaneously, are preferable.  One example of a                       meta-search engine is Ask Jeeves http://www.askjeeves.com.  Its                 user-friendly interface allows searching using either questions or              keywords.  Another meta-search engine is MetaCrawler                            http://www.metacrawler.com, which pools and collates pages found on             several of the major search engines with consistently reliable and              accurate results. 
For those wishing to avoid sites unsuitable for             children, several strategies can be used.  The first and most                   desirable strategy is to encourage appropriate use and good decision            making by students.  This does not, however, eliminate the risk that            students will inadvertently or unintentionally come upon sites                  containing offensive material.  Another strategy is to                          use "child-safe" search engines that index age-appropriate sites and            focus on the specific needs and interests of children.  One of the              best "child-specific" search engines is Ask Jeeves For Kids                     http://www.ajkids.com, which allows children to search by asking                questions in plain English (also known as "natural language"                    searching) and offers options to help narrow the search in cases of             broad or ambiguous questions.  Other major search engines for                   children are CyberSleuth Kids http://cybersleuth-kids.com/, a search            guide for K-12 students, and KidsClick Web Search                               http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/KidsClick!/, created for children by                librarians (Braun & Risinger 1999). EXEMPLARY WEB SITES WITH                  PRIMARY SOURCES.One of the best Web sites for obtaining primary             sources is the American Memory Historical Collections for the                   National Digital Library http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/amhome.html.                  Maintained by the Library of Congress, American Memory features an              extensive collection of documents in original format, including                 manuscripts, sheet music, printed texts, maps, motion pictures,                 photos and prints, and sound recordings.  The following are examples            of sites that focus on more specific types of primary source                    material. 
The National Security Archive                                       http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/ was founded in 1985 by a group of                 journalists and scholars that had obtained documentation from the               U.S. government under the Freedom of Information Act.  Associated               with George Washington University's Gelman Library, the Archive is              one of the world's largest non-governmental repositories of                     declassified government documents on international affairs.  Current            collections include Chile, China, Cuba, Guatemala, Honduras,                    India-Pakistan, Iran, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Eastern Europe, and                nuclear history. 
Authorized under the National Historic                       Preservation Act of 1966 and administered by the National Park                  Service, the National Register of Historic Places                               http://www.cr.nps.gov/nr/nrhome.html features over 2,300 National               Historic Landmarks.  Properties listed in the Register include                  districts, sites, buildings, structures, and objects that are                   significant in American history, architecture, archaeology,                     engineering, and culture. 
National Anthems of the World                       http://www.emulateme.com/anthems/ contains audio clips of many                  national anthems. The site also contains information about the                  economy, geography, history, people, and government of the                      countries. 
There are so many Web sites offering a wide variety of             primary sources that it is beyond the scope of this Digest to list              them all.  Here is a brief list of additional sites: 
*  National              Archives and Records Administration: The Digital Classroom:                     http://www.nara.gov/educational/classrm.html 
*  On-line Archival              Collections - Center for Women's History & Culture:                             http://scriptorium.lib.duke.edu/women/digital.html 
*  Eye Witness:            History Through The Eyes Of Those Who Lived It:                                 http://www.ibiscom.com/index.html 
*  Repositories of Primary                  Sources:                                                                        http://www.uidaho.edu/special-collections/Other.Repositories.html 
*            Euro Docs: Primary Historical Documents From Western Europe:                   http://www.lib.byu.edu/~rdh/eurodocs/homepage.html 
*  Social                  Studies Sources: http://www.indiana.edu/~socialst/ 
By encouraging             their students to locate and work with primary sources available                through the Internet, teachers empower them to develop inquiry                  skills through active learning methods.  Students learn to ask                  questions and seek answers independently.  Thus, they are challenged            to process information and comprehend their complex                             world. REFERENCES AND ERIC RESOURCESThe following list of                 resources includes references used to prepare this Digest.  The                 items followed by an ED number are available in microfiche and/or               paper copies from the ERIC Document Reproduction Service (EDRS).                For information about prices, contact EDRS, 7420 Fullerton Road,                Suite 110, Springfield, Virginia 22153-2852; telephone numbers                  are (703) 440-1400 and (800) 443-3742.  Entries followed by an EJ               number, annotated monthly in CURRENT INDEX TO JOURNALS IN                       EDUCATION (CIJE), are not available through EDRS.  However, they can            be located in the journal section of most larger libraries by using             the bibliographic information provided, requested through                       Interlibrary Loan, or ordered from commercial reprint                           services. 
Braun, Joseph A., and C. Frederick Risinger.  SOCIAL                STUDIES: THE INTERNET BOOK.  Washington, DC: National Council for               the Social Studies, 1999. 
Craver, Kathleen W.  USING INTERNET                 PRIMARY SOURCES TO TEACH CRITICAL THINKING SKILLS IN HISTORY.                   Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 1999. 
Harper, Marilyn.  INCLUDING              HISTORIC PLACES IN THE SOCIAL STUDIES CURRICULUM.  ERIC Digest.                 Bloomington, IN: ERIC Clearinghouse for Social Studies/Social                   Science Education, 1997.  ED 415 178. 
Kobrin, David.  BEYOND THE              TEXTBOOK: TEACHING HISTORY USING DOCUMENTS AND PRIMARY SOURCES.                 Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann, Inc., 1996.  ED 396 981. 
Lynn, Karen.              TEACHING WITH DOCUMENTS: A BIBLIOGRAPHY.  Washington, DC: National              Archives and Records Administration, 1991.  ED 339 626. 
Marlow,               Bruce, and Marilyn Page.  CREATING AND SUSTAINING THE CONSTRUCTIVIST            CLASSROOM. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press, Inc., 1998. 
Milbury,              Peter. "Primary Sources: Second to None on the Web."  BOOK REPORT               18 (May-June 1999): 45-48.  EJ 589 886. 
Milbury, Peter and Brett              Silva.  "Problem Based Learning, Primary Sources, and Information               Literacy.  MULTIMEDIA SCHOOLS 5 (September-October 1998): 40-44.  EJ            574 027. 
Nash, Gary B., and Linda Symcox.  "Bring History Alive in            the Classroom: A Collaborative Project."  OAH MAGAZINE OF HISTORY               6 (Summer 1991): 25-29.  EJ 445 194. 
Percoco, James A.  A PASSION             FOR THE PAST: CREATIVE TEACHING OF U.S. HISTORY.  Portsmouth, NH:               Heinemann, Inc., 1998.  ED 431 657. 
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This project has been            funded at least in part with Federal funds from the U.S. Department             of Education under contract number ED-99-CO-0016.  The content of               this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies             of the U.S. Department of Education nor does mention of trade names,            commercial products, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S.             Government.  ERIC Digests are in the public domain and may be freely            reproduced and disseminated. 
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Deanne Shiroma, a James                 Madison Fellow, is completing the Master of Arts in Teaching Social             Studies program at Indiana University, Bloomington.                          **Title:** Using Primary Sources on the Internet To Teach and Learn History.               ERIC Digest.                                                                 **Document Type:** Information Analyses---ERIC Information Analysis Products (IAPs) (071); Information Analyses---ERIC Digests (Selected) in Full Text (073); **Available From:** ERIC Clearinghouse for Social Studies/Social Science Education, 2805            East Tenth Street, Suite 120, Bloomington, IN 47408; Tel:                       800-266-3815.                                                                **Descriptors:** Active Learning, Elementary Secondary Education,  History,  History             Instruction,  Internet,  Primary Sources, Social Studies, World Wide            Web                                                                          **Identifiers:**  ERIC Digests                                                                
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