by Final Project Concept:
This week I have been working on putting together the final concept for the final project. I have shifted from creating a traditional lesson plan to creating an activity that uses oral histories and the digital exhibits that I have on my Omeka site. This activity can be used in a high school US history classroom and I do have plans to write up how to use this activity in a simpler way to adapt to a middle school classroom. I have pulled some inspiration from the Library of Congress Oral History and Social History lesson plan to create an activity that uses the oral history collection from Shenandoah National Park. This activity will be housed on my Omeka site under a new tab that I have created titled “Teacher Resources”.
Progress to Date:
I have done some research on oral history lesson plans and classroom activities, finding out what kinds of activities I could adapt to this project and what kinds of questions I could pose to learners. I have started a Google Doc with the activity I wish to use for this project, right now it does not look very pretty although it does have all the necessary information I am looking to have in this digital activity. I am also thinking of ways I can adapt this activity for a younger audience by simplifying the activity. I have been working through the collection of oral histories to determine which ones I will put on my Omeka site for use in this project. I have also created the teacher resources page that will be where this activity will be located on my Omeka site.
Next Steps:
- I need to work on making the teacher resources page a bit more user-friendly and look more streamlined. As of right now, the teacher resources page is private on my site so I also need to make that page public.
- I need to finish writing up the oral history activity and make it look a bit prettier than it currently is. I want to make sure the activity is easy to follow and I am playing around with the idea of embedding the activity into the site (right now I have the activity on Google Docs).
- I also need to cut up the selection of oral histories that I will have for the oral history activity. The oral histories in their entirety are over an hour each so I will cut them down into sections and provide the transcripts that correlate with the oral history as well.
- In addition to the oral history activity, I need to create one more digital exhibit that discusses archeological evidence that was found that concerns the way of life for the ‘mountain people’. This exhibit will help students learn about the contradictions between the way they were perceived by the media and what life was actually like for them by providing more primary source material to explore in addition to the oral histories.
Reflection on DH Projects:
I enjoyed viewing the other students’ final projects and exploring some of the DH projects that were selected for this module. I learned that the original concept for a digital project can shift and change over time, and to try and create something with a lot of thought for historical thinking skills. I resonated with Greta Swain’s final project as I am doing something similar in the sense of using primary source documents to promote historical thinking skills through activities that can be taught in a classroom setting. It was helpful to see her project and how it turned out and how the project can be further expanded on even after the course has ended.
