2009 VASS Conference - Calls for Proposals Due October 6th!

Mark your calendars! The 2009 Vermont Alliance for the Social Studies Annual Conference will be held on Friday, December 4th at the Sheraton Hotel and Conference Center in Burlington, Vermont. VASS is currently accepting calls for proposals for conference presentations, but not for much longer...they are due October 6th!

To submit your proposal online, go to http://creator.zoho.com/sigridlumbra/copy-1-of-registration-form/, or to receive an application via email contact Sigrid Lumbra.

Students Praise Obama in Song: Civics Lesson or Indoctrination?

From the Christian Science Monitor, September 30, 2009

A video of New Jersey elementary schoolchildren singing a song praising President Obama has sparked an uproar in conservative circles, with critics charging indoctrination – an echo of similar charges earlier this month when Mr. Obama spoke to schoolchildren in a nationally broadcast address.

In the song, originally written by a second-grade teacher and her class in recognition of Black History Month in February, students rap and pay tribute to Obama’s accomplishments.

The video has stirred up the conservative blogosphere, and people across the political spectrum agree that the song may be an error of judgment on the teacher’s part. But more broadly, it raises questions about the place of politics in the classroom and how schools and teachers can discuss Obama’s presidency – and perhaps recognize its historic nature – in appropriate ways.

“The biggest thing that worries me is that we’ll make our schools into politics-free zones where you can’t talk about anything that might offend anyone,” says Peter Levine, director of the Center for Information & Research on Civil Learning & Engagement at Tufts University in Medford, Mass.

Already, notes Professor Levine, far fewer kids take courses devoted to current events than did several decades ago. “I think we’ve squeezed most of the controversy out, which is bad for kids’ civic development.”

Click here to read the rest of the article, or click here to watch the video.

• Is this a "teachable moment" in social studies? If so, what is the lesson?

World Digital Library Now Online

The World Digital Library has made available on the Internet, free of charge and in multilingual format, significant primary materials from cultures around the world, including manuscripts, maps, rare books, musical scores, recordings, films, prints, photographs, architectural drawings, and other significant cultural materials.

The objectives of the World Digital Library are to promote international and inter-cultural understanding and awareness, provide resources to educators, expand non-English and non-Western content on the Internet, and to contribute to scholarly research.

Use the timeline at the bottom to search documents from around the world in similar time periods.

Shipwrecks! Live Webcast

The Lake Champlain Maritime Museum (LCMM) is expanding their popular Shipwrecks! program with a live webcast of the shipwrecked schooner Sarah Ellen on November 5, 2009 at 10:00am (EST). This FREE hour-long broadcast will take you deep under the cold dark waters of Lake Champlain where you'll hear the tragic story of the schooner's sinking in the winter of 1860. Then meet their nautical archaeologists who will tell of her underwater discovery in 1989. You will also see footage captured by a remotely operated vehicle (ROV), over 300 feet below the surface. And, since this will be broadcast live, they'll be able to take your questions via email!

How does the webcast work? Simply visit their website (http://www.lcmm.org/) shortly before 10:00am on November 5th where you'll find a link to register for the program and watch the hour-long broadcast that begins at 10am. A high-speed Internet connection is necessary.

Going to miss the live broadcast? Don't worry, they'll be posting the recorded program on their website shortly after the initial broadcast.

For more information, contact LCMM at (802) 475-2022; info@lcmm.org

Conference at Calvin's

On October 23rd the President Calvin Coolidge State Historic site will hold a conference, "The Citizen in the Community: Roles, Responsibility, and Action." The conference includes a program, materials, an exploration of the site, and lunch at the historic Wilder House. Other highlights include:

• The keynote address will be by Secretary of State Deb Markowitz: "Citizenship in Vermont: Lessons Across Time." Secretary Markowitz will discuss her findings about how student experiences can influence future civic involvement.
• Bill Jenney, Site Director of the site, will introduce the influences of this community on the development of the young Calvin Coolidge.
• VPR commentator Cyndy Bittinger will describe her research on the history of African Americans in Vermont.
• Participants will have the opportunity to explore primary resources such as letters, town reports, diaries, and account books.

For more information email education@calvin-coolidge.org, or call 802.672.3289.

C-SPAN's Student Cam National Video Competition

C-SPAN's "StudentCam" is a national video documentary competition. This year C-SPAN asks students to create a 5 to 8 minute video documentary that addresses an issue of national significance. Students must present more than one point of view and include C-SPAN video in their documentary.

Students for this year’s competition will have the opportunity to produce a documentary on either of the following topics:
A) One of the country’s greatest strengths;
-OR-
B) A challenge the country is facing.

The competition’s deadline is January 20, 2010. C-SPAN is awarding a total of $50,000 in cash prizes. The top winning videos will air on C-SPAN, and can be viewed at http://www.studentcam.org/.

Vermont Archeology Virtual Museum Opens!

The following is from an email from Giovanna Peebles, Vermont State Archeologist:

We’re excited to announce that the prototype Vermont Archeology Virtual Museum, funded with a Digital Start-Up Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities, is launched, warts and all! Play with it, kick the tires, have fun with it, hopefully you’ll register to experience it’s full functionality. Please complete the Survey Monkey at some point!

Go to: http://emergentmediacenter.com/vtarch/ Bookmark this!

The web museum site will serve as Vermont’s archeology portal. Of course it’s only a prototype, developed over 4 months this summer, so there’s only a few exhibits thus far but enough to give you the lay of the land. There’s also slow loading, funny spacing, too much on exhibit’s main page, just a few photos, etc… A WORK IN PROGRESS!

There are 3 types of visitors:
1) Visitors who don’t register and just poke around for information and to see what’s happening
2) Visitors who register - - they will have the full functionality of the social-networking features, are part of the museum community, can contribute comments, articles, links, save favorites, etc.
3) “Curators,” who will register as such - - this group includes mainly archeology professionals working in VT who will populate the web site with “exhibits” as they discover sites, write reports, etc. as well as special guest curators, for example, Abenakis and other Indigenous community members, perhaps historians, geologists, avocational archeologists, and others as appropriate.

We are very excited about this initiative and look forward to your feed-back. Many thanks!!

Please distribute to other who may enjoy seeing this, testing it, and starting to take advantage of the resources it offers