History teachers become students
By Lynn Moore
Muskegon Chronicle (Michigan)
December 10, 2008
WEST MICHIGAN -- More than 100 local teachers are getting lessons of their own this week as part of an effort to improve history instruction.
Scholars with the Smithsonian Institution and the National Portrait Gallery are among the presenters at three one-day American history workshops in Muskegon. They as well as history professors are in town as part of a nearly $1 million grant received by Muskegon and Ottawa counties earlier this year.
Fifth-grade teachers are learning about Benjamin Franklin and the U.S. Constitution, eighth-grade teachers are learning about President Abraham Lincoln and the Reconstruction period following the Civil War and high school teachers are studying President Theodore Roosevelt and the Progressive movement.
The seven Smithsonian presenters will discuss the development of the American democracy, economics and the changing character of American society and culture.
They are being joined by professors from Grand Valley State University, Pennsylvania State University and the University of Illinois who are experts on Franklin and the two presidents. Two re-enactors are portraying figures from American history through dramatic performances.
Teachers are attending full-day workshops Monday, Tuesday and today at GVSU's Michigan Alternative and Renewable Energy Resource Center in downtown Muskegon.
The Muskegon and Ottawa intermediate school districts formed a history teaching consortium and applied for federal grants, receiving $886,000 from the U.S. Department of Education in 2005. That three-year grant was followed by a second three-year grant for $999,999 awarded this year.
The Smithsonian Institution will present three-day workshops again next year and the following year.
In addition to the workshops, the grant will pay for classroom materials, conferences, stipends for teachers to attend summer events and payments for substitute teachers while teachers are attending workshops.
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$9,702,965,641,180.00
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$31,684.49 Per Citizen |
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