Primary sources and the use of technology to bring them to the classroom.

This is Brilliant! Primary sources help get student's "hands dirty" while learning. This article in edweek.org is about using primary sources while teaching history. I think this is awesome. It gives students first hand insight into historical events. I also think that it can be used in other subjects. Using historical material while teaching literature can go a long way to give students what writers are going through while writing. For instance Oliver Twist can be accompanied by historical artifacts showing the conditions during the era can help students understand what Dickens was talking about and connect students to the characters through common threads. I also think this can be used in math. A quick google image search for pythagorean theory primary source brings up thousands of images for proofs of the theory. These might not be primary sources but they can help illustrate the uses for the theory. The great thing about using this in math is that numbers have been used for a long time and even ancient texts can be deciphered because of the visual nature of math. Hopefully I can use these examples to show context and make connections for my students.