Primary source documents provide a unique way to explore the past that allows
students to get a richer and fuller "eyewitness account" of things
that happened. By using primary sources, students can begin to see that history
is created by people like them--and is not just dates and names to be memorized.
They can begin to realize that they are historymakers themselves.
Primary sources also help students develop knowledge, skills, and analytical abilities.
By dealing directly with primary sources, students have to ask questions,
think critically, make intelligent inferences, and develop reasoned
explanations and interpretations of events and issues in the past and present.
More information about using primary source documents in the classroom is available
on the Library of Congress Learning
Page, including a Lesson Framework.
The Ohio
Historical Society also has a suggested lesson plan for teachers
and students who are using primary source documents for the first time. Information
from both sites is drawn on below.
What is a primary source document?
A primary source is one created by people
who actually saw or participated in an event and recorded that event or their
reactions to it immediately after the event. A secondary source is one created
by someone either not present when the event took place or removed by time from
the event. A primary source document could be a letter, a picture, a diary, etc.
On this website, you will find a selection of primary
source documents taken from the Charlotta
Bass Collection and from the California Eagle,
the newspaper she published for forty years.
How can primary source documents be incorporated into the classroom?
Teachers can have their students examine primary source documents and ask
some preliminary questions. What type of document is it? What is its date? Who created it?
Why did they create it?
Then the students can begin to analyze the document. What does
this document say about the person who created it? What does this document
say about life at the time the person created it? Do the students believe the
document is an accurate representation of what was happening; why? What questions
are left unanswered by the document? If they could ask the author of the document
a question, what would they ask?
Teachers should consider the following when using primary sources.
How will the primary sources be used (as the basis for class
discussion, written reports, in-class presentations, role playing, or other
instructional strategy)?
How will they organize students for an activity? Will the primary source activity
lend itself to individual, small group, or whole class participation?
How much time must they allocate for the students to complete their tasks?
What product or performance will they students create as a result of this experience
with primary sources? How will the teacher assess that product or performance?
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