Themed Resources

• Library of Congress Online Resources for Educators 
• Abraham LincolnArt of War:
  WWI and WWII PostersCartoon AnalysisChildhood Lost:Child Labor During Industrial Revolution
• Coles County: Taught with Primary SourcesCorp of Discovery:
  Revealing the American WestIllinois: Taught with Primary SourcesPresidential Campaigns: Packaging the PresidentsUnderground Railroad:
  A Path to FreedomVerse and ChorusWWII

Special Projects

• Constant Motion:
  The Job of Railway Post Office ClerksSeptember 11 NEWAbraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum Tools 
• Constitution Day
• Teaching with Lincoln
• Lincoln Assassination CSI Activity
• Veterans Day
• Patriotic Songs

Professional Development

• Summer Institute
• TPS in Action
  (onsite workshop series)
• Customized Teaching with Primary Sources InstitutesTBA

Additional LInks

• EIUTPS Google Search Tool
• National TPS Site
• Library of Congressloc.gov Teacher PageAbraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum

Brrrrr....  

 This January 6, 1912 issue of the Hawaiian Star featured a headline expressing concern for those in the Midwest and Mid-Atlantic regions suffering during a horrendous cold wave.  The Library of Congress historic newspapers featured in Chronicling America offer unique tools for the classroom to study various topics and how they were reported. At this time, Chicago reported multiple days during which the high temperature was zero or below.  Let's hope that 2012 is much kinder! 

What is Teaching with Primary Sources?

The The Library of Congress, the nation’s oldest federal cultural institution, is the world’s preeminent reservoir of knowledge, providing unparalleled integrated resources to Congress and the American people. Founded in 1800, the Library seeks to further human understanding and wisdom by providing access to knowledge through its magnificent collections, which bring to bear the world’s knowledge in almost all of the world’s languages and America’s private sector intellectual and cultural creativity in almost all formats. The Library seeks to spark the public’s imagination and celebrate human achievement through its programs and exhibits.

In doing so, the Library helps foster the informed and involved citizenry upon which American democracy depends. Today, the Library serves the public, scholars, Members of Congress and their staff—all of whom seek information, understanding and inspiration. Many of the Library’s rich resources and treasures may also be accessed through the Library’s award-winning Web site www.loc.gov.

The mission of the Library of Congress Teaching with Primary Sources (TPS) program is to: build awareness of the Library’s educational initiatives; provide content that promotes the effective educational use of the Library’s resources; and offer access to  and promote sustained use of the Library’s educational resources.

The Library achieves this mission through collaborations between the Library and the K-12 educational community across the United States. The program contributes to the quality of education by helping teachers use the Library’s digitized primary sources to engage students, develop their critical thinking skills and construct knowledge.  Learn more about the Library’s TPS program and other resources available to teachers at www.loc.gov/teachers.

Members of the TPS Educational Consortium assist in the design of the TPS program and offer TPS professional development on an ongoing basis, year round. Visit www.loc.gov/teachers/tps to view a list of current Consortium members and their respective states.

Funded by a grant from the Library of COngress, the Teaching with Primary Sources proram at Eastern Illinois University has been actively collaborating with Central Illinois K-12 educators since the program inception in January 2004.  We are proud to support the goals and mission of the national TPS program through workshops and presentations at no cost. TPS was brought to the EIU campus thanks to the efforts of Senator Dick Durbin.

Resource Spotlight

• Welcome to a new year and the January 2012 edition of The Source. This month we look at The Constitution with interesting facts, classroom resources and amazing primary sources for you to use in your classroom.

• The Source Blog. What are you waiting for?  Check it out at http://eiutps.blogspot.com/

• Podcast - TPS EIU Director Dr. Cindy Rich joins Dr. Tom Grissom,  Director of the EIU Instructional Technology Center for conversation about teaching with primary sources on the popular TechTalk4Teachers. Listen or download TechTalk4Teachers at http://techtalk4teachers.blogspot.com/

Changes! The Library of Congress updated the SEARCH capabilities and it is awesome! Take a look and if you need a little extra support, click here to download a printable version of our Library of Congress Site Update Sheet.  

News, Announcements and Opportunities:

• Planning a trip to Washington this summer? Library of Congress  2012 Summer Institutes!  The Library of Congress is now accepting applications for its 2012 Summer Teacher Institutes in Washington, D.C. The five-day institutes will provide educators with the tools and resources to effectively integrate primary sources into classroom teaching.

• Refresher Course Our calendar is filling with activities to be held in east central Illinois schools!  If you are interested in a "refresher" course to review the benefits of teaching with primary sources and learn about updates to the Library of Congress website, have or are new faculty eager to learn about new tools and resources for your classroom or have a specific theme or topic that you want to focus upon and develop curriculum --- contact us! For more information or to simply ask questions, visit our TPS in Action at EIU  page or contact Cindy at cwrich@eiu.edu or 581-7857.

• Classroom Activities - We are developing pages that will post teacher created TPS EIU Classroom Activities online. The activities designed for elementary, middle school and high school classes are available in both html and pdf format. This is a work in progress, so check back often for new activities. 

We welcome your comments and ideas about our site. Please email us if you would like to see something new or have an idea for a theme.