Teaching with Colorado's Heritage

Through a 2001 IMLS National Leadership, Education and Training grant, the CDP was able to create "Teaching with Colorado's Heritage," a state-based school librarian and teacher training program that taught over 200 educators how to locate and use digital primary source material as well as integrate content-rich technology with state-based standards.  The primary digital source materials were available through Heritage West and the Library of Congress American Memory website.  Sixty-five lessons using digital primary source materials were created by participating educators, and are now available to educators nationwide through the Teacher Toolbox on BCR's CDP website as well as the Colorado Department of Education's online database, Standards in Action.  In addition, the seventy-nine participants in our regional, week-long workshops were required to train at least three other educators in their school building about these resources, thereby establishing a successful "train the trainer" continuum.

We estimate that up to ten thousand K-12 educators, librarians and archivists from around the country participated in 'Digital Treasures for Teaching and Learning'. Digital Treasures was a two-hour live teleconference conducted with a panel of experts to highlight Teaching with Colorado's Heritage and how other states could develop a similar program.  Long term sustainability of this program is guaranteed with the development of "A History of Us" workshops with Rocky Mountain PBS, through an existing professional development venue (the National Teacher Training Institute) in place in over 30 states.