Unit 12 Digital Online Archives

Posted 5 pictures to the site, what a cool idea.  I know Northern VA has changed a lot over time.

One digital project that I came across is Harvard-Yenching Library: The Hedda Morrison Photographs of China. The project is really amazing and has thousands of photos on it.  It also offers a really nice chronology section and looks nice and is easy to navigate.     The one that I came across that was not good for me was http://www.csusm.edu/history/masters/projects.html.  This project had a lot of links that did not work or where no longer active.  If you are going to have with past projects I think it needs to be closely maintained and up to date.

Project up Date- Right now I am working through the years of my life I have started with the 70s and have gotten through some of the 80s.  I am finding it difficult to pick out what I feel is most important for each year, but better to have too many options then not enough right?

Unit 10: What Is Real and Not Real in the Digital and Real Worlds

The first thought of reality and non-reality of the digital world, was that not all information online or that is digitalized is real.  That people/companies spend a lot of time changing and altering items that can be found online.  That not everything posted online is real.  I remember years ago having a conversation with my parents and them sharing an experience that they heard on TV and me stating, “You know that isn’t real life right.”  I feel like that same statement can be said about many things online and in the digital world.  

Then thinking about what this week’s lecture was about, is how physical, scanned and digital items can be seen as different.  I know that anytime a student or a person goes to a museum the thought of that object is way different then when they simple see a picture of it.  That holding a physical document can make your experiences a lot different.  In the world we life today the accessibility and flexibility of seeing more sources online is becoming more and more a reality. I do not believe that if a person could never see an area then it can never be a real experience.  

Physically touching a resource is the best but if that is not available I do believe that seeing this item as a scanned or digital item is second best.  I think these new items are going to become our world’s new reality. 

Unit 9: Project Proposal

When first presented with the idea of creating a digital history project thoughts of this grand website, and interactive site came into mind, with information that high school students could use and work with.  An exciting website that would be great.  This website would span the most present years 2000 to the present, this is the time frame that most high school teachers do not get to spend a lot of time on since they are usually so pressed for time preparing for the end of the year test.  In my years of teaching this area is only briefly touched upon and is usually covered in a PowerPoint or in a project based assignment.  Then I came to the part in the class notes where you said, have fun with this, make it something enjoyable and this grand website no longer seemed fun or enjoyable.  What would make this more enjoyable is to make it more of a personal touch.  So I decided instead of a lecture base, I would do a personal history/ archive. 

My thought is to use weebly and break my life into 5 year blocks.  I would like to look at finding in cultural, economic and political factors for each of these time frame.  I am hoping to include, pictures, videos, and possible some speeches.  I believe I will use the library of congress website a lot along with newspaper sites. 

I hope the site will help me to look back at the most recent years, and at what shaped the thoughts, and lives of the students I would be teaching in the future.