Bringing the World into Our Classroom

Teaching in the 21st Century never ceases to amaze me. 

As stated in a post last year, I utilize Twitter in my classroom through a classroom Twitter account several times a week. I find it to be an incredible way to allow parents and our community to witness the work that goes in my History and Study Skills classes and to showcase school events and the amazing young people I teach. 

While posting a reminder about our school football teams' games on Wednesday a top hashtag caught my eye: #AskAnArchivist was trending.  I follow the United States National Archives  on Twitter and their latest post advertised an hour-long session in which a team of Archivists would answer questions tagged with this hashtag. I had less than 45 minutes before this window of opportunity closed.

My third hour class took advantage of this teachable moment and it turned out so well!

Student Historian groups came up with questions they hoped to receive answers for, I tweeted, and we began our planned activities for the day. 

Then my Twitter notifications began. 

The response was fantastic! The National Archives' Reference Staff answered, but so did many other museums and archivists from around the country--my students and I were excited and impressed! We received photographs and even answers through video clips from an Archivist in her lab, too. (I showed all of my other classes the updated responses as the day went on.)

It was heartwarming to see so many professionals give advice and encouragement to my students. These experts were helpful and accessible and made historical research seem interesting and cool. The world became smaller through this on-the-spot activity and my students were able to see first-hand that Social Studies and preserving the past is important.