Using Documents and Texts with Students

Focus: to use primary source texts to help teachers more effectively teach with primary sources by using literacy strategies to enhance student learning.

Standards Assessed

• Reading and Writing Standard 1: Students read and understand a variety of materials.
• Reading and Writing Standard 2: Students apply thinking skills to their reading, writing, speaking, listening and viewing.
• History Standard 2.2: Students know how to interpret and evaluate primary and secondary sources of historical information.

Assessment

Review the lesson you are in the process of creating. When you have included primary source text into the lesson, have you incorporated literacy strategies to enhance student understanding of the text? If not, go back to your lesson and think about how to incorporate such strategies.

Standards Addressed

• Information Literacy Standard 2: The student who is information literate evaluates information critically and competently.
• Determines accuracy, relevance and comprehensiveness.
• Distinguishes among facts, point of view, and opinion.
• Identifies inaccurate and misleading information.
• Selects information appropriate to the problem or question at hand.

Time: One hour session

Materials/Teacher Preparation

1. For the Word Splash, review the directions.
   
2. Have a word splash sheet and a reading for each student.
3. Break the class into small groups, make sure there is one recorder for each group writing down the narrative, and one spokesperson who will relate the narrative to the class.
   
4. Have a chalk board or dry board available to list common elements from the class discussion.
   
5. For It Says...I Say...And So, have a copy of the chart and the seven letters available for each student.
   
6. Break the class into small groups for the discussion.
   

Possible Procedures

Part 1: "Word Splash"

The following activity helps to activate prior knowledge during reading.

1. Refer to the following sheet and spend a little time thinking about what kind of story or article could include all of these words or phrases.
   
   
2. In small groups, decide what the story will be about. Create a narrative or an explanation that will include all of the words or phrases.
   
   
3. Share your narrative or explanation with the class. As you listen, look for common elements.
   
   
4. List the common elements you heard on the board.
   
   
5. Individually, read the excerpt.
   
   
6. In small groups or as a whole class, discuss the similarities and differences between the narratives you constructed prior to reading the selection, and the actual selection. Remember there are no "right" or "wrong" predictions. Make sure to discuss the reasons for the differences, the number of possible approaches authors have available to them when deciding to write about a particular subject.

Part 2: "It Says...I Say...And So"

The following activity uses a strategy to help the reader make inferences and draw conclusions.

CHART

1. Download and print the chart. As you read the letters, fill out the chart using the information from the seven letters.
   
   Based on the information you have collected on the chart, answer the following questions:
   
   
2. What common themes are there in the seven letters?
   
   
3. What inferences can you make about the society and times in which the authors lived?
   
   
4. What questions do you have about the letters you would like answered?
   
   
5. What do the letters tell the reader about the effect of Japanese American Internment on young adults in this society?
   
   
6. How might you use these letters (or similar primary source documents) in your classroom?
   
   
7. What challenges might you face in using letters like these?
   
   
8. Discuss your responses in small groups.

Support Materials

• Word Splash Sheet
• Word Splash Directions
• George William Vogel: Manuscripts from the Federal Writer's Project, 1936-1940,The Library of Congress, American Memory
• 'It Says, I Say and So' Chart
• Amache High School Student Letters,Amache Digital Collections Project, Archives and Special Collections Department of the Auraria Library and the Stephen H. Hart Library of the Colorado State Historical Society.