This Day in History 10/17: Burgoyne Surrenders at Saratoga
Image via Wikipedia Everything about the Battle of Saratoga–including its name–has been scrubbed clean by scores of textbooks. On October 17, 1777, after a punishing four-month campaign, British...
View ArticleOccupy Wall Street Videos for the Classroom
The Occupy Wall Street protests are obviously on many peoples’ minds lately. In my scotch fog (more like cheap Bourbon, in my case) not only did I not take into account my lack of activity on this...
View ArticleThoughts on the Occupy Wall Street Movement
As a born and bred 99%-er, I have spent an inordinate amount of time among the 1%. Going to college with many of the sons and daughters of the top tier, I absorbed many of the traits, both good and...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: Election Day on Sesame Street
This was, honest to God, the very first time I ever heard about voting. When I was a kid, it was shows like Sesame Street that introduced me to a lot of the basics of American life. This video is...
View ArticleMovies for the Classroom: A Christmas Carol (1971)
The holidays are never complete without Charles Dickens‘ immortal Victorian morality tale–and now you can show among the best versions of the story. In 1843, Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol was not...
View ArticleDr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Riverside Church Speech on April 4, 1967...
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. the civil rights activist is well-known. Dr. King the anti-war, anti-poverty and class liberation activist is often overlooked. In many classrooms, Dr. King’s legacy is...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: Interview about “Slavery by Another Name”
A few nights ago, PBS showed a documentary that chilled me to the bone. Slavery by Another Name is a documentary based on the Pulitzer Prize-winning book Slavery by Another Name: The Re-Enslavement of...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: Dr. Seuss’ The Butter Battle Book
In our belated homage to Dr. Seuss on his March 2nd birthday, the Neighborhood presents a video of one of Seuss’ greatest–and most controversial–works. In 1984, Seuss’ The Butter Battle Book caused a...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: What the Ancient Greeks Did for Us
Since I work double-duty as a social studies AND science teacher, I’m always looking for ways to combine the two…sometimes out of piquing interest, often out of laziness. Today’s offering is just...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: The Western Tradition
As regular followers of the Neighborhood can tell you, I was a pretty dorky kid. It wasn’t enough that I sat and read the encyclopedia cover to cover. Nor was it enough as a precocious 8 year old...
View ArticleMad Men and the King Assassination
Some of the cast of AMC’s Mad Men. Yesterday was that rare instance when television illuminates. Even so, the light shone by the tube can often reflect on our own mirrors—and the image is rarely...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: A Day in the Life…from BBC History
As we here at the Neighborhood sit patiently while Governor Cuomo calls us for an interview, I found this cool series of videos. In my year teaching ancient history, the BBC has been a veritable...
View ArticleReview of Khan Academy’s “American History Overview Part 1: Jamestown to...
I had not been a huge fan of Khan Academy. Even before I started working with one of its competitors, I generally took a dim view of anyone that thought they could do better than a teacher with just a...
View ArticleDavid Letterman – Top Ten Reasons I’ve Decided to Become a Teacher
I’m knee deep in LearnZillion work as I came back from my long break. The Gilder Lehrman conference at USC was great–wonderful professors, cool colleagues, and a special shout out to the folks at Tiki...
View ArticleThis Day in History 10/1: The first Tonight Show appearance of Johnny Carson
I don’t usually watch late night television…and mostly because Johnny Carson isn’t a part of it. On October 1, 1962, temporary host Groucho Marx introduced the new permanent host of NBC’s Tonight...
View ArticleVideos for the Classroom: The Assassination of Abraham Lincoln
Today marks the 149th anniversary of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln. Maybe outside of the JFK killing, it is probably the most documented single homicide in American history. It has been...
View ArticleDid the Culper Ring get its due? A review of AMC’s “Turn”
From the poster of AMC’s “Turn” In the world of espionage, the best recognition is no recognition at all. The front of the headquarters of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in Langley, Virginia...
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