Inquire, Interact, Engage Grant Awarded through Regional Teaching with Primary Sources Program

The Nevada Center for Civic Engagement has been awarded a Teaching with Primary Sources Grant.

The project is focused on teachers in grades 4-8 in elementary and middle schools across the state. Teachers will meet virtually for one week in the summer to lay the groundwork of this project, learn from content area experts, and begin their deep dive into the using Primary Sources to implement an informed action program in their classroom. Zoom will be used to meet for synchronous instruction and Canvas will be used for asynchronous instruction. Participants will also meet monthly with a project coordinator who will guide them through the use of primary sources in their project implementation plans in a synchronous meeting (via Zoom). Before the monthly meetings, teachers will have the opportunity to engage and interact with experts from various partner organizations (ex. The Mob Museum, UNLV, UNR, District Courts, and more) through our Ask the Expert webinar series. Then the following Saturday during the synchronous meeting teacher will work through sources related to the Ask the Expert topic using various methods of source analysis and pedagogy. 

Each teacher will also implement one of our programs (We the People, National History Day, Project Citizen) in their classrooms and become ambassadors for using primary sources to engage students in historical thinking. By using one of those programs’ teachers have an opportunity to implement an authentic assessment to share student learning, each program requires students to use primary sources to lay the groundwork for their project. During their monthly meetings teachers will also meet in breakout rooms with their small groups who are participating in the same program.