This collection uses primary sources to explore twentieth-century mining in the Mojave Desert. Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets are designed to help students develop their critical thinking skills and draw diverse material from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States. Each set includes an overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide. These sets were created and reviewed by the teachers on the DPLA's Education Advisory Committee.

On January 24, 1848, carpenter James Marshall discovered gold at Sutter’s Mill, a sawmill on the American River in Coloma, California. This news quickly spread across the country and around the world, igniting the California Gold Rush. Between 1848 and 1855, 300,000 fortune-seekers came to California, transforming its population, landscape, and economy. The largest wave of migrants—about 90,000 people—arrived in 1849, earning them the nickname “forty-niners.”

This is an investigation where students observe what happens to land after it is mined. Students will create a hypothesis, observe their model, conclude what happens to land after it is mined, and discover the role humans play in land conservation.

This activity simulates the extraction of limited, nonrenewable resources from a "mine," so students can experience first-hand how resource extraction becomes more difficult over time. Students gather data and graph their results to determine the peak in resource extraction. They learn about the limitations of nonrenewable resources, and how these resources are currently used.

Broad coverage of technology concepts underlying modern computing and information management. Topics include computer architecture and operating systems, relational database systems, graphical user interfaces, networks, client/server systems, enterprise applications, cryptography, and the web. Hands-on exposure to internet services, Microsoft Access database management system, and Lotus Notes. Information Technology I helps students understand technical concepts underlying current and future developments in information technology. There will be a special emphasis on networks and distributed computing. Students will also gain some hands-on exposure to powerful, high-level tools for making computers do amazing things, without the need for conventional programming languages. Since 15.564 is an introductory course, no knowledge of how computers work or are programmed is assumed.

Our modern world uses many different materials, often complexly constructed and difficult to recycle. Students investigate the elements in a smartphone and innovations in cement and steel. They also consider the challenge of communicating about large and complex numbers. This guide an extension of the TILclimate episode "TIL about materials."

In this lesson students will learn about Minnesota's natural resources, particularly iron ore.

This project is a great resource to the Grant County Historical Society (GCHS) and the Platteville area as it deals with a history not often told and one the GCHS does not have the resources to tackle on their own.   Several of the student reserchers said  “I hope that the exhibit will remind visitors of the complexity of our history and that there is always more to be told.”Even the boards used for the displays had a local connection.  They were designed by a Lancaster native who earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts with an emphasis in graphic design from UW-Platteville.By visiting the cemetery for photos and getting the opportunity to compile the information for the board from the historical markers and the Wisconsin Historical Society, researchers were able to  connect and learn more about an area that they thought they were already familiar with.  

This collection uses primary sources to explore coal mining and labor in West Virginia. Digital Public Library of America Primary Source Sets are designed to help students develop their critical thinking skills and draw diverse material from libraries, archives, and museums across the United States. Each set includes an overview, ten to fifteen primary sources, links to related resources, and a teaching guide. These sets were created and reviewed by the teachers on the DPLA's Education Advisory Committee.