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For those of you who are struggling through the last days or weeks of schools, save this post. You'll want to reread it when you have a moment to think about your curriculum for next year, because I really think you are going to want to carve out some time for National History Day.
If you've had your kids involved in the program in past years, you'll join me in celebrating the fact that after a few years on hiatus, National History Day (NHD) has a new home at Montana State University--Bozeman, a new website under construction, and new co-coordinators: Hailey Hancock, Assistant Teaching Professor at MSU-Bozeman (and former Middle School Social Studies teacher) and Melissa Hibbard, High School Social Studies teacher at Butte Central.
If you've never been involved in NHD, you are probably wondering why I'm making such a fuss. Here's a little background. According to the National NHD Office:
NHD reaches more than half a million students and tens of thousands of teachers each year via its international student history contest and its wide range of teacher professional development programs, curriculum tools, and other educational activities.
NHD’s core program is its competition in which students in grades 6–12 choose a topic and dive deeply into the past by conducting extensive research in libraries, archives, and museums. They then present their conclusions and evidence through papers, exhibits, performances, documentaries, or websites, moving through a series of contest levels where they are evaluated by professional historians and educators.
Through this process, students develop skills in communication, project management, and historical thinking. Their teachers do as well.
Here are the main reasons I love NHD:
- It gives students a chance to think, research, and write as historians rather than simply to consume history content. NHD aligns closely with Montana's Social Studies Content Standards (especially the skills section) and with ELA standards as well.
- NHD offers LOTS of support to teachers and students, and since there's so much support, it's a good way to teach your students how to conduct independent research projects.
- Students enjoy the process (except, to be fair, creating their annotated bibliographies. But many are willing to work on creating a good bibliography page because they want to do well in the contest.) And they learn a ton.
- It's not just for gifted students. The program lends itself to differentiation and some of the greatest success stories are those of "average" or typically low-performing students. Students can work individually or in teams and there are a range of potential projects: papers, performances, exhibits, websites, or documentary. (Of course, as a teacher, you can set your own limits.)
- You can use the NHD curriculum without having students participate in the NHD contests--but for many students the contest motivates them to do their best work. (See above re annotated bibliographies.)
- The program encourages revision. Students create projects for their teachers. They get feedback. For some students, that's where it ends. But others, who want to compete, can take that feedback to revise their projects. Then they present them at a regional contest (information on regionals is forthcoming.) At the regional, they get feedback. They have the opportunity to revise their project before going to state (April 6, 2024, in Bozeman), where they get more feedback. If they place well at state, they can take that feedback and revise before going to DC to compete in nationals (every year in June). Revision is what makes for good writing and good history--and discovering that early can be life changing.
Intrigued? Email Melissa and Hailey to learn more.
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