Kentucky Teacher

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) will host a “Food for Thought” luncheon program, “Pine Mountain Settlement School,” with Nancy Adams, executive director, and James Greene, Harlan Independent school district curriculum supervisor, March 20, at the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History in Frankfort.

Located in the mountains of Appalachia in southeastern Kentucky, Pine Mountain Settlement School was an early source of education for the mountain youth of the area, offering a hands-on approach to education that continues to be a model for today’s schools. Join Adams and Greene as they discuss the important role this school has played in the community.

Tickets to the Food for Thought luncheon are $20 for KHS members and $25 for other patrons. To make a reservation, contact Julia Curry at (502) 564-1792, ext. 4414. Reservations are required by Friday, March 15.

To find out more about Food for Thought and other KHS programs, visit www.history.ky.gov.

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) offers museum skills workshops that help teachers turn a standard field trip into an experience of creativity, collaboration, communication and critical thinking for their students.

Field Trips 101 will focus on booking transportation, scheduling a visit and engaging students. Participants will also have the opportunity to learn about the many field trip options the Kentucky Historical Society has to offer. KHS offers field trips designed to support and enhance Common Core English Language Arts Standards and 21st-century skills. All programs encourage students to think critically, develop creative points of view and communicate their own understanding. Through these programs students will analyze primary source documents and artifacts while using evidence to support their interpretation.

Teachers will learn how to best tour the museum with students as well as various questioning strategies and activities that can be done both prior to and after the museum visit.

The next workshop will be Jan. 26 at the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History in Frankfort. To register, contact Leslie McWhorter at (502) 564-1792, ext. 4424. Registration deadline is Jan. 25.

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) is working with Strategic Marketing and Research, Inc., to understand educators’ perceptions of historical organizations (museums, historic houses, battlefields and archives) and to gauge interest in using these organizations as a resource in classroom environments.

KHS is looking for school administrators, curriculum staff and educators in grades 4-12 currently teaching social studies, English/ language arts or a humanities course to participate in a focus group. The discussion will be held on Wednesday, Jan. 23, from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. ET in Louisville. Participating teachers will receive a $50 Amazon gift card.

Those interested in participating and sharing opinions should contact Tim Talbott at tim.talbott@ky.gov, or (502) 564-1792, ext. 4428.

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Ron Adkisson discusses the Age of Exploration with his 8th-grade American History class at South Oldham Middle School (Oldham County). Adkisson was named the 2012 Kentucky History Teacher of the Year.
Photo by Amy Wallot, Oct. 2, 2012

South Oldham Middle School’s Ron Adkisson may be the 2012 Kentucky History Teacher of the Year, but he credits his wife with inspiring him to be a better teacher. Before you think Adkisson is just trying to score brownie points with his spouse, realize that he means it literally.

Cheryl Adkisson works at South Oldham as a gifted and talented coordinator, and it was she who encouraged the 8^th-grade American history teacher to start a “living history” program in his classroom similar to what they saw on a trip to Colonial Williamsburg about 10 years ago. The program involves him and his wife dressing as historical figures three or four times a year and asking the students to do the same.

“I don’t want to just teach history – I want the kids to do history,” Ron Adkisson said. “So any time I can get a group of kids dressed up and role playing, acting our parts of history and doing an interpretation of a character, I want them doing it. We bring history to life by teaching it this way.” Read the full story

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) offers many field trips designed to support and enhance Common Core English/ language arts standards and 21st-century skills.

All programs encourage students to think critically, develop creative points of view and communicate their ideas. Through these programs, students will analyze primary source documents and artifacts while using evidence to support their interpretation.

Museum educator led programs

• Visual thinking strategies - Students will analyze and interpret primary source artworks, photographs and artifacts using visual thinking strategies, an open-ended discussion format that fosters critical thinking and communication skills.
• National History Day - Students will learn how to access and analyze primary source documents and begin developing the skills necessary to create a project for National History Day. Read the full story

A pocket watch that once belonged to Abraham Lincoln, now in the Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) collections, is featured in Steven Spielberg’s newest film. Lincoln opens nationwide Friday, Nov. 16.

KHS was contacted in May by Ben Burtt, an Academy Award-winning sound designer working on the film. The sound team was dedicated to incorporating as many historically accurate sounds as possible that Lincoln would have actually heard in his lifetime – including the ticking of his pocket watch.

KHS Director of Museum Collections and Exhibitions Trevor Jones was reluctant to participate at first.

“Although I very much wanted to help, I was initially skeptical. Lincoln’s watch is an iconic artifact at KHS and is irreplaceable,” Jones said. “I was concerned that winding it could cause damage and I wasn’t going to risk a signature artifact.”

Closer examination by staff and experts determined that the watch is still in perfect mechanical working order. This summer, a sound technician visited Frankfort to record the ticking of the pocket watch at the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History. Read the full story

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) scholarly research fellowship program encourages and promotes research on all aspects of Kentucky history.

Fellowships are designed to assist researchers with travel and living expenses while using the KHS research collections. All applications are peer-reviewed by a panel of leading historians. Awards are based on the significance of the proposed research and on the anticipated time it will require in KHS collections. Awards typically range from $375 (for one week) to $1,500 (for four weeks). These short-term fellowships are intended to support serious scholarly work. They enable individuals to pursue advanced study and research in the collections of KHS.

Fellowship recipients are strongly encouraged to submit an article-length manuscript for possible publication in the Register of the Kentucky Historical Society and are expected to make an informal presentation on their research during their stay and to Read the full story

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) has received a $178,000 Landmarks of American History and Culture grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).

The funds will be used by KHS to host two weeklong teacher workshops called “Torn Within, Threatened Without: Kentucky and the Border States in Civil War America,” in the summer of 2013.

These workshops will enable teachers to better understand the complexities of the Civil War and what occurred in Kentucky and other border states through the use of primary sources. Participants will gain the experience necessary to use those primary sources, such as documents and Kentucky’s historic sites, in the classroom, creating an artistic, historical and cultural environment. Participants will study and interpret the border states region before, during and after the Civil War, becoming more familiar with the history and culture of the region through interactions with accomplished academics. The workshops also will provide connections between Civil War history and present-day society. Read the full story

The Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) Foundation has received a $110,000 grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). The funds will be used by KHS to create a curriculum called “The Right Answer,” a partnership between KHS and Kentucky schools.

The initiative will increase students’ skills in visual literacy, historical literacy and critical thinking with the aid of historical collections. KHS will conduct a pilot study that will result in a curriculum that can be shared statewide. The program will provide schools with a dynamic set of primary and secondary sources that can be used to teach across a broad range of disciplines, including history, social studies, government, humanities, reading, writing and fine arts.

IMLS recently distributed 152 awards nationwide totaling $18.1 million matched with $34.7 million in non-federal funds for Museums for America Program Grants. Read the full story

By Matthew Tungate
matthew.tungate@education.ky.gov

Kentucky Chautauqua performer Obadiah Ewing-Roush, as Berea founder John G. Fee, talks to Sioux Finney, a social studies teacher at Woodford County Middle School, after Ewing-Roush’s presentation at Boone Tavern in Berea. Photo by Matthew Tungate, July 13, 2012

Abraham Lincoln was a native Kentuckian, as Sue Breeding teaches her 8th-grade social studies students at Monticello Middle School (Monticello Independent). That he was an attorney, became president, freed the slaves and was assassinated are among the other highlights of his life Breeding shares with her students.

He was not, in any way or under any circumstances, a vampire hunter.

“I’m always saying, ‘Don’t learn history from Hollywood. They’re out to make money. The movies are fine for fun, but go to the primary sources to learn history,’” Breeding says, laughing and shaking her head.

She also encourages her students to visit historical sites, of which Kentucky has plenty.

“It just comes alive. It puts you there how it would have been 100 years ago or 200 years ago. You can’t get that from just reading,” Breeding said.

Breeding and about 30 other teachers visited several sites important to the history of emancipation in July as part of a tour organized by the Kentucky Historical Society (KHS) following the Kentucky History Education Conference in Frankfort. Read the full story