Geography is a major factor in the development of every civilization, including ancient Athens. Learn the ways in which the natural features of Athens helped...

How can a shirt show us what people did for fun back in the day?

Bowling got its start at least as far back as the Middle Ages, but the game we know today became big in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, and Wisconsin got in on the game. Bowlers like Earlene Fuller made and wore custom-made shirts and sets that matched their team, showing fashion and cultural connections to bring them luck at the lanes.

This episode is part of The Look Back, a series made for learners in grades 4-6 that explores eras from Wisconsin’s history through artifacts. The collection is hosted by historians who model an inquiry process: sharing artifacts, asking questions, visiting archives and museums to learn more, telling the story of their findings as they go, and making connections to our lives today.

Audubon Christmas Bird Count
The nation's longest-running community science bird project fuels Audubon's work throughout the year.

Click! In the 1970s that word signaled the moment when a woman awakened to the powerful ideas of contemporary feminism. Today “click” usually refers to a computer keystroke that connects women (and men) to powerful ideas on the Internet. Click! aims to bridge the gap between those two clicks by offering an exhibit that highlights the achievements of women from the 1940s to the present. This exhibit explores the power and complexity of gender consciousness in modern American life.
Students will be able to explore, research, and analyze various topics such as women in politics, the Civil Rights Movement, the Feminist Movement, Body and Health, and Workplace and Family.
Educators will have the ability to retrieve lesson plans on various topics such as free lesson plans to give teachers content materials and activities that will allow them to integrate the history of the modern women’s movement into their curriculum and help students engage with important historical questions about the struggles that have made the United States more equal and democratic. Each lesson plan focuses on a historical topic that engages with the concerns of students: politics and social movements; body and health; and workplace and family. These topics are investigated through the histories of individual women, their organizations, and their struggles for greater rights and social justice. Their stories are situated within larger histories to help students connect the modern women’s movement to other changes in post-World War Two America.

This National Geographic video explains the origins of the El Niño Southern Oscillation using animations and shows the impacts on humans, wildlife and habitat, particularly in the United States.

How do amateur newspapers document the experiences of young people during the Progressive Era?

Young people writing and printing their own newspapers became popular in the late 1860s and 70s. This was a time of significant industrialization in the United States. With the invention of a small, hobby printing press, young people could make and share news via their own newspapers and grow communities by printing and swapping them.

This episode is part of The Look Back, a series made for learners in grades 4-6 that explores eras from Wisconsin’s history through artifacts. The collection is hosted by historians who model an inquiry process: sharing artifacts, asking questions, visiting archives and museums to learn more, telling the story of their findings as they go, and making connections to our lives today.

What do hit records tell us about life and business in post-WWI Wisconsin?

After World War I, factories and mass production were booming—and so was the record business! People had income to buy records and record players, and companies took notice. Paramount Records, started by the Wisconsin Chair Company based in Port Washington, sold records by well-known musicians of the time until the Great Depression crashed the party.

This episode is part of The Look Back, a series made for learners in grades 4-6 that explores eras from Wisconsin’s history through artifacts. The collection is hosted by historians who model an inquiry process: sharing artifacts, asking questions, visiting archives and museums to learn more, telling the story of their findings as they go, and making connections to our lives today.

This is a two-part interactive game for middle school students that introduces them to the concepts of globalization and interdependence. In the first part, the students discover how clothing is sourced globally. The second part describes the issues related to the pieces and parts of a MP3 planner (this part is a little dated, but I have been able to connect it back to cell phones).

Games can be played as a group with the utilization of a Smartboard type device.

The resources includes an educator guide and integration with Google Classroom. I have used it as part of a larger lesson segment in Business Exploratory on Corporate Social Responsibility and Globalization.

Students will do an activity in which heat is transferred from hot water to metal washers and then from hot metal washers to water. Students will view a molecular animation to better understand the process of conduction at the molecular level. Students will also draw their own model of the process of conduction.

This collection of essays includes the biographies of many different people from different backgrounds who made major contributions to Wisconsin History. Each grade-level essay below is designed for a single class period. When reading, students should consider the following questions:

Who (or what) are the main subjects and where did they live (or originate)?
How did they respond to the challenges they faced?
What role do each play in our shared story?
How have their actions or stories affected present-day Wisconsin? How have they affected your life?

How does toast tell us about the time of the fur trade in Wisconsin?

Before and after the American Revolutionary War, French explorers were coming to the area we now know as Wisconsin. One of those people was a blacksmith named Joseph Jourdain. He and other blacksmiths used fire to heat metal so it could be shaped into tools like an iron toaster, which was used to make toast over a fire.

This episode is part of The Look Back, a series made for learners in grades 4-6 that explores eras from Wisconsin’s history through artifacts. The collection is hosted by historians who model an inquiry process: sharing artifacts, asking questions, visiting archives and museums to learn more, telling the story of their findings as they go, and making connections to our lives today.

These resources regarding the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II highlight the story of internment and redress through two collections at HSP - the Iwata Family Papers and the papers of Philadelphia activist Sumiko Kobayashi, that represent the experience of internees who were relocated, and those who led in the movement for redress.

Students will do an activity in which heat is transferred from hot water to metal washers and then from hot metal washers to water. Students will view a molecular animation to better understand the process of conduction at the molecular level. Students will also draw their own model of the process of conduction.

Students will help design an experiment to see if adding energy (heating) affects the rate of evaporation. Students will look at molecular animations to help explain why heating water increases the rate of evaporation. Students will be introduced to a more detailed model of the water molecule. Students will create 3-D Styrofoam models of water molecules.

Students will investigate a wax candle and a piece of clay to understand why the candle floats and the clay sinks even though the candle is heavier than the piece of clay. Students will discover that it is not the weight of the object, but its density compared to the density of water, that determines whether an object will sink or float in water.

Students place hot and cold colored water into room temperature water. They observe that the hot water floats on the room temperature water and the cold water sinks. Students will combine the concepts of temperature, molecular motion, and density to learn that hot water is less dense than room temperature water and that cold water is more dense.

Students will make a 2-D model of a salt crystal and use water molecule cutouts to show how water dissolves salt. After seeing an animation of water dissolving salt, students will compare how well water and alcohol dissolve salt. They will relate their observations to the structure of salt, water, and alcohol on the molecular level.

Students will observe the dissolving of the sugar coating from an M&M when it is placed in water. Students will then help design an experiment to see if the type of liquid the M&M is placed in affects how much of the coating dissolves.

Students will design an experiment to see if temperature affects the amount of dissolving of the sugar coating of an M&M.

Students will place isopropyl alcohol, mineral oil, and corn syrup in water to see if any of these liquids dissolve in water. Students will extend their understanding and definition of “dissolving” and see that certain, but not all, liquids can dissolve in water.