The When History Happens project
The When History Happens (WHH) project offers training and professional development to K-12 educators and students on teaching and learning about the Democratic National Convention.
Teaching with Primary Sources – Colorado, a project of Metropolitan State College of Denver, is collaborating with the Colorado State Library and the Colorado Historic Newspaper Collection, the Post-News Educational Services and the Council for 21st Century Learning on WHH.
The project is a new, unique way for educators and students of all levels and disciplines to create powerful knowledge through studying and actively participating in the DNC. The locality of the convention will allow educators to combine 21st century learning skills (critical thinking, inference, perspective and compare/contrast), standards-based toolkits (background, context, lessons, primary sources, and digital newspapers), collaborative technologies (wikis, blogs, community journalism, and text messaging), and proper assessment to generate learning that would otherwise be impossible to foster.
When History Happens Conference
A When History Happens Conference was held July 30-Aug. 1 at Metro State. Each day focused on a specific theme, such as media and Democracy and 21st Century learning design, that allowed educators to slowly dive deeper into the learning strategies and resources that will make the DNC such a powerful learning opportunity.
When History Happens Learning Community
All conference participants were granted access to the When History Happens Learning Community, an online environment that includes grade-specific annotated resource sets related to the 1908 and 2008 Democratic National Conventions, first-hand information from teachers and students positioned inside the DNC, access to an online peer network for generating learning ideas and improving existing activities, and a When History Happens wiki and blog.
If you did not attend the conference, but would like access, please send an e-mail to: info@whenhistoryhappens.org and include name, address and school/district.
For more information, please visit www.whenhistoryhappens.org and click on the “Learning Community” link.
Community Journalism
When History Happens will have a select group of teachers and students inside the convention relaying information as it happens via text message. This information will then be transferred to When History Happens’ blog and wiki, allowing the WHH community to become a part of the action.