Primary Source Toolbox
5 primary source archives
- National Archives, UK - The National Archives, UK is a great source for pictures and posters, maps, documents and many others forms of primary sources from the United Kingdom. While this archive does not necessarily specialize in military history, there is a lot of information on the world wars and general UK military history. http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/
- Asia for Educators - From the Weatherhead East Asia Institute at Columbia University, Asia for Educators is a rich source of primary sources of Asian history. Resources are organized by time period up to 4,000BC and by theme such as timelines, lesson plans, visual, or even for elementary education. afe.easia.columbia.edu/#
- National Archives - The National Archives website allows you to search through plethora of photos, documents, audio, look up family and personal military history, or order copies of historical documents. The search feature allows you to research information by person, topic, event, or place. https://www.archives.gov/
- EuroDocs - EuroDocs is a primary source archive that is organized by European Country. Then, from each country, you can search resources by time period, topic, government-related, or regional history. Because this archive caters to European history, some documents will be in the language of the country the information is from. Some have translations attached and some do not. eudocs.lib.byu.edu/index.php/Main_Page
- The American Presidency Project - The American Presidency Project aims at being a non-partisan source of public presidential documents. Information can be accessed by document, media presence, statistics, and president. The site also hosts analyses of presidents and president-related topics to further expand the context of research and ideas on this site. www.presidency.ucsb.edu/analyses
2 lessons
- This lesson examines the initial contact between Japan and Commodore Perry. The primary sources this lesson uses is the essay Black Ships and Samurai and images from this essay. Students work in pairs to analyze the images online by clicking them for some added context and then complete a handout with answers to questions and their analysis.Students are comparing and contrasting one event form two perspectives using primary sources. https://ocw.mit.edu/ans7870/21f/21f.027/black_ships_and_samurai/cur_teacher/bss_cur_02.html
- This lesson utilizes a photograph to facilitate discussion about child labor and allows the teacher to connect to a larger lesson or unit about the Progressive era. Students examine and discuss a photograph of children doing manual labor. Students then read what the photographer wrote about the picture and interpret his words and discuss what they think about his words and the emphasis he put on certain parts of the picture. Students will write their responses and discuss as a class. This lesson can be an introduction into child labor or a discussion about child labor in the middle of a unit on Progressivism. www.docsteach.org/activities/teacher/analyzing-a-child-labor-photograph
Analysis tool #1
Analysis tool #2