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Social Studies Alive! America's Past © 2010 Enrichment Resources

National

Internet Connections

Chapter 1. Geography of the United States
Degree Confluence Project
http://www.confluence.org/index.php
Confluence.org is an excellent way to bring your study of latitude and longitude to life. The goal of the Degree Confluence Project is to “visit each of the latitude and longitude … degree intersections in the world, and to take pictures at each location.” Working from the left-hand menu, you can either choose a country and then click on a point on that country’s grid, or choose “Search” and enter a set of coordinates. You’ll get a picture of that point, as well as the photographer’s story of what he or she had to do to reach that point. Using this site, you can compare different locations around the world at the same latitude, or see what’s on exactly the other side of the world from you.

Geology.com
http://geology.com/state-map/
Geology.com provides a physical contour map, an elevation map, a county map, a highway map, and a map of lakes and rivers for all fifty states.

Mapmaker, Mapmaker, Make Me a Map
http://pr.tennessee.edu/ut2kids/maps/map.html
How do maps get made? Meet Will Fontanez, mapmaker at the University of Tennessee, who explains what he does in order to make a map.

PBS: New Perspectives on the West
http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/resources/archives/three/luzena.htm
To learn more about Reading Further’s Luzena Stanely Wilson, her cross-country trek, and the life she found in the West, visit PBS’s “New Perspectives on the West” to read from her diary.

Chapter 2. American Indians and Their Land
Creation, Migration, Origin Stories
http://www.indigenouspeople.net/legend.htm
IndigenousPeople.net hosts this page of origin stories from American Indian groups and peoples around the world.

Lakota Winter Counts
http://wintercounts.si.edu/
“Lakota Winter Counts” from the Smithsonian Institution paints a rich picture of the winter counts you learned about in the Reading Further. A beautiful introduction leads to information on the counts and the Lakota who created them. You can look at winter counts and click on the pictographs to learn about the event each one represents.

nps.gov: Bering Land Bridge
http://www.nps.gov/bela/
The land bridge across the Bering Sea and the land around it are called Beringia. If you’re interested in this area, the Bering Land Bridge National Park site provides information on the region, including photos, history, and discussions of migration and Ice Age wildlife.

nps.gov: Bering Land Bridge Animation
http://instaar.colorado.edu/QGISL/bering_land_bridge
The Bering Land Bridge Animation from the University of Colorado lets you watch the Beringia land bridge shrink down to the Bering Strait we know today.

Chapter 3. American Indian Cultural Regions
Edward S. Curtis's The North American Indian: Photographic Images
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/ammem/award98/ienhtml/tribes.html
This site from the Library of Congress has many photographs of American Indians. A photographer named Edward S. Curtis took more than 2000 pictures of Indians in the early 1900s. Because the pictures were taken by a white man, they show how white people thought of the Indians, rather than showing how the Indians thought of themselves. But the photographs are still an important record of many Indian cultures. The pictures are arranged by geographic region and tribe name.

Native American Facts for Kids
http://www.native-languages.org/kids.htm
Native Languages.org’s site features pages on Native American groups, as well as detailed information about hairstyles, homes, and food.

Chapter 4. How and Why Europeans Came to the New World
Latitude
http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~feegi/
This friendly site from Rice University provides information on lots of topics related to navigation in the Age of Exploration, including ships, ocean currents, latitude and longitude, maps, and much more.

Navigation Methods
http://www.heritage.nf.ca/exploration/navigate.html
“Navigation Methods” has good information on latitude, astrolabes, compasses, and other important tools that made navigation possible in the Age of Exploration.

Predominant Winds and Explorers’ Routes
http://www.ucalgary.ca/applied_history/tutor/eurvoya/map.html
Wondering why Columbus landed in the Caribbean rather than, say, New England? The animated map on this site shows how trade winds work and how they made it easy for ships like Columbus’s to reach the Caribbean. You’ll be able to see how these same trade winds affect sailing in other parts of the world, too.

Chapter 5. Routes of Exploration to the New World
Enchanted Learning: Explorers
http://www.enchantedlearning.com/explorers/1500a.shtml
For information on all the explorers from this chapter and many more from the early 1500s, visit this page from EnchantedLearning.com.

ThinkQuest: Explorer Timeline
http://library.thinkquest.org/J002678F/timeline.htm
This interactive timeline of some of the key dates in the Age of Exploration allows you to click in for more information on individual explorers.

Chapter 6. Early English Settlements
History Globe: Jamestown
http://www.historyglobe.com/jamestown/
Settling in a new land involves important choices – where to build, what to eat, how to get along with the people who already live there. The “Jamestown Online Adventure” lets you make these decisions for yourself as you land in Virginia and settle Jamestown. For each decision, you can ask settlers, Indians, and the royal charter for their advice on what you should do. At the end, you’ll see the results of your choices.

Jamestown Fort: Rediscovered
http://www.apva.org/ngex/
At “Jamestown Fort: Rediscovered,” you can explore the story behind Jamestown, some of the key people involved in the settlement, and a display of the artifacts archaeologists have found there.

Mayflower History
http://www.mayflowerhistory.com/History/history.php
This site is all about the Mayflower, the people who sailed on it, and what they did. You’ll find information on the ship, the voyage, the Pilgrims, the Pilgrims’ first impressions of Cape Cod, and the town of Plymouth they founded.

nps.gov: Fort Raleigh
http://www.nps.gov/fora/historyculture/index.htm
The National Park Service has a park where Fort Raleigh was on Roanoke Island. On the park’s “History and Culture” page, you can read more about the lost colony and some of the people who lived on the island.

Chapter 7. Comparing the Colonies
13 Colonies – A Timeline
http://www.timepage.org/spl/13timeline.html
“13 Colonies – A Timeline” shows the founding of the colonies and other important colonial events, such as wars, founding of cities, and the arrival of slaves. This easily viewable timeline is a great way to see how all the colonial events you’re studying relate to each other in time.

Colonial Charters
http://avalon.law.yale.edu/subject_menus/statech.asp
The Avalon Project, from Yale University, provides access to a vast number of documents relating to our nation’s history. At this page, “Colonial Charters, Grants and Related Documents,” you can read the text for all the charters and other documents for the founding of each of the thirteen colonies.

Colonial Wiliamsburg
http://www.history.org/Almanack/life/trades/tradehdr.cfm
Colonial Williamsburg is one of the best places we can visit today to see what colonial life was like. Their website has a page on trades in Williamsburg where you can explore different colonial jobs, including cabinetmaker, blacksmith, brickmaker, weaver, printer, and many more. They also have a page just for kids called “Kid’s Zone.”

Chapter 8. Facing Slavery
Kunta Kinte
http://www.kintehaley.org/rootskintebio.html
For more information on Alex Haley from the Reading Further, visit this “Roots” page to read more about Haley, his ancestor Kunta Kinte, and their family tree.

PBS: Music in Slave Life
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/experience/education/feature.html
As you read in the Reading Further, music was one piece of culture that helped Africans survive their harsh new lives. At “Music in Slave Life,” you can listen to slave songs and explore lyrics and instruments.

PBS: The Decisions Slaves Made
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/slavery/experience/responses/feature.html
As you studied in this chapter, the life of an enslaved African involved many difficult choices. To read more about the results of the choices slaves had to make, visit PBS’s interactive “The Decisions Slaves Made” page.

PBS: The Middle Passage
http://amistad.mysticseaport.org/discovery/story/middle.passage.html
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/aia/part1/1p277.html “The Middle Passage,” the journey slaves were forced to make from Africa to the Americas, was a nightmare experience. These two pages, from the Amistad site and from PBS, offer descriptions of what people endured as they were transported away from their homes.

Chapter 9. Life in Colonial Williamsburg
Colonial Williamsburg: Life in the 18th Century
http://www.history.org/history/#onlineresources
As you read in Chapter 9, Williamsburg has been restored and preserved much as it was in the 1700s. It is one of the best places we can visit today to see what colonial life was like. Colonial Williamsburg also maintains an extensive website where you can explore the people, places, dress, music, food, religion, and many more aspects of this town.

Chapter 10. Tensions Grow Between the Colonies and Great Britain
Boston Massacre Re-enactment Video
http://www.bostonmassacre.net/timeline.htm
Information on the Boston Massacre can be found at BostonMassacre.net. This site has pages on primary source accounts of the event, the people involved, the location, a timeline, images, a detailed description, little known facts, and much more. The site’s homepage has a seven-minute video of a reenactment, or acting out, of the event. The reenactment takes place on the actual site of the Massacre, in downtown Boston. The video gives you a sense of how loud and chaotic, or out of control, the event was.

Chapter 11. To Declare Independence or Not
Colonial Williamsburg: Patrick Henry
http://www.history.org/Almanack/people/bios/biohen.cfm#speech
The website for Colonial Williamsburg has a page devoted to Patrick Henry, whom you read about in Reading Further. At this page you can read or listen to his “Give Me Liberty or Give Me Death” speech. You can also read more about this famous speaker, and listen to experts discuss him.

Loyalty or Liberty?
http://www.history.org/History/teaching/revolution/a1.html#
If you had lived at the time of the Revolution, would you have supported the Loyalists or the Patriots? Would your choice be any different if you had been a slave? You’ll get to make these decisions at “Loyalty or Liberty.” At this site, you’ll play the role of a slave in Williamsburg with access to secret information. Just as colonists had to make choices every day about which side to support, you’ll have to choose which side you want to share your information with.

Chapter 12. The Declaration of Independence
A Day in the Life of Thomas Jefferson
http://www.monticello.org/jefferson/dayinlife/sunrise/home.html
To learn more about Thomas Jefferson, whom you read about in Reading Further, visit Monticello.org. At this site devoted to Jefferson’s home in Virginia, you can read about the daily life of the author of the Declaration of Independence.

Declaration of Independence
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/declaration.html
View the original document and read the text.

nps.gov: Declaration of Independence
http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/declaration/bioa.htm
The National Park Service hosts this site with lots of information about the Declaration of Independence and the conflicts that led up to it. On this page, a list of all the signers allows you to learn more about each of them. As you click on each link, you’ll find a portrait and some brief information of the signer at the top of the page. Below this is a complete biography of the signer for more research.

Chapter 13. The American Revolution
PBS: Liberty!
http://www.pbs.org/ktca/liberty/perspectives_military.html
PBS’s “Liberty!” site is devoted to the American Revolution. Take a close look an American soldier and a British soldier on this page.

Chapter 14. The Constitution
Constitution of the United States
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution.html
View the original document and read the text.

The Constitution for Kids
http://www.usconstitution.net/constkids4.html
USConstitution.net provides a wealth of information on the Constitution and some other documents as well. You can find information on the people who created the Constitution and a detailed timeline of the Convention. You can read about misspellings in the document, what some of the unfamiliar terms mean, and the importance of different sections (or clauses).

Chapter 15. The Bill of Rights
Bill of Rights
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights.html
View the original document and read the text.

Do You Have the Right?
http://www.billofrightsinstitute.org/dnn/
If you’re having a hard time relating the Bill of Rights to your own life, visit “Do You Have the Right?” from the Bill of Rights Institute. This site has audio, video, discussion, real life situations, and activities related to the Bill of Rights, all presented in a friendly way.

Tinker v. Des Moines Independent Community School Distict
http://www.oyez.org/cases/1960-1969/1968/1968_21/
The Oyez site is a collection of media related to the Supreme Court. At their Tinker v. Des Moines Ind. Comm. School Dist. page, you can listen to a few minutes of the actual argument in the case (warning – it runs more than an hour!).

Chapter 16. Manifest Destiny and Settling the West
Animated Atlas: Growth of a Nation
http://www.animatedatlas.com/movie.html
“Growth of a Nation” from Animated Atlas presents a ten-minute animation of the growth of the United States. This movie is a good overview of the expansion of our country. It is also is a nice way of seeing how national growth fits in with the West, growing conflict over slavery, and the Civil War.

Jefferson’s West
http://www.monticello.org/jefferson/lewisandclark/index.html
Thomas Jefferson laid the groundwork for Manifest Destiny with his purchase of the Louisiana Territory and his sponsorship of the Lewis and Clark expedition. At the site devoted to Jefferson and his home Monticello, “Jefferson’s West” provides information on these beginnings of America’s move west.

Chapter 17. The Diverse Peoples of the West
History Globe: The Oregon Trail
http://www.historyglobe.com/ot/otmap1.htm
Explore the Oregon Trail. You can see the route of the trail on top of a map of the United States today or in 1843. Click on landmarks along the route to learn more about each one.

PBS: The West
http://www.pbs.org/weta/thewest/program/episodes/
PBS made a documentary series on the West, and this is the website they’ve created to go with it. Each episode covers a different time in the West and has explanations of events and quotations from primary sources and experts.

Chapter 18. The Causes of the Civil War
America’s Library: America’s Story
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi
The Library of Congress presents “America’s Story,” a website with stories about many events in American history. Visit these pages to learn more about this period that led up to the Civil War: - slave auction - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/reform/slaveauc_1 - Uncle Tom’s Cabin - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/reform/beecher_1 - John Brown - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/reform/brown_1 - Florida secedes - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/civil/florida_1 - Lincoln’s inauguration - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/civil/lincoln2_1 - Jefferson Davis - http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/civil/davis_1

Chapter 19. The Civil War
America’s Library: The Civil War
http://www.americaslibrary.gov/cgi-bin/page.cgi/jb/civil
Look at a timeline and read all about the Civil War at this Library of Congress site.

Chapter 20. Industrialization and the Modern United States
Amusing America
http://sfpl.lib.ca.us/news/onlineexhibits/amusing/intro.htm
Amusement parks, movie theaters, resorts, and elaborate fairs were an important part of popular culture in the 20th century. The San Francisco Public Library uses photographs to present the history of the some of the city’s most famous public amusements.

Greatest Engineering Achievements of the 20th Century
http://www.greatachievements.org/
GreatAchievements.org explores the many inventions that were made in science and technology in the 20th century. From electricity and automobiles, through highways and households appliances, to the Internet and nuclear energy, you can learn about many 20th century developments.

Picturing the Century
http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/picturing_the_century/galleries/galleries.html
“Picturing the Century,” from the National Archives, is a collection of photographs to represent the 20th century. The photographs are divided into eras, or periods of years, with each photograph capturing an important part American life at that time.

Social Studies Alive! America's Past © 2010 Enrichment Resources

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