Primary sources are artifacts, original or facsimiles of documents, maps, diaries and items from a historical time period. 

Museums, Libraries and Other Archives

• Library of Congress - teaching primary sources lessons and information http://www.primarysourcelearning.org

• Smithsonian Teaching with Primary Sources includes videos, DBQs and samples

• National Archives education lessons

• Washington Rural Heritage, from the Washington State Library- historic images, documents, film, and oral histories depicting rural life from over 25 public libraries and 40 local history museums and private collections across Washington State

• Washington State Historical Society searchable artifact finder

  Washington State Library Historical information- newspapers, timeline, original state constitution and more

  Pacific Alaska Region of the National Archives-- Links to CBAs and Our Documents

• Library of Congress - American Memories - Focused topic searching guide digital artifacts with teacher lessons and help - http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/
  

• National Archives - http://www.archives.gov/education/index.html

  • National Archives video on Google - http://video.google.com/nara.html

  • National Archives (U.S. artifact analysis sheets and lessons) http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/

  • National Archives (Great Britain) - http://www.learningcurve.gov.uk/

• Northwest Digital Archives http://nwda.wsulibs.wsu.edu/

• Regional Archives Pacific Alaska in Seattle - http://www.archives.gov/pacific-alaska/seattle/education/

• Regional Universities

  • University of Idaho Special Collections Library - Digital History Primary Resources

  • University of Washington Libraries - http://content.lib.washington.edu/

  • Washington State University Libraries - http://www.wsulibs.wsu.edu/digital/

• Washington State Historical Society tools of the trade - http://www.historylab.org/curriculum/tools_resource_kit.htm

Interactive Primary Sources:

• Martha Ballard Diary - includes teaching tools such as the magnifier/translator that shows the original diary and changes it into an easy-to-read font. Students can even try their own interpretation of the original script.

• Diary of Opal Whiteley - the diary of a young girl in Oregon at the end of the 19th century, including teacher's guides, a timeline and more

• Spokane Historical is a student driven project from EWU. Take a virtual tour of Spokane.

• Valley of the Shadow- 2 communities divided during the American Civil War. Told through primary documents.

Primary Source Collections in the Pacific Northwest by Nancy Bunker ( Greenwood 2005) covers all the museums and historical collections with details about their unique collections and access to online resources, if available. Nancy is a reference librarian at Whitworth College.

Presentations about Primary & Secondary Sources

• Explanation of Primary and Secondary Sources | Marianne Hunter Timberline High School, North Thurston, Lacey, WA | PowerPoint

• Judy Pitchford, Washington State Library, presented at WLMA 2005 conference
  primary print resources
  primary online resources
  Washington museums with educational programs
  museums with traveling boxes

• Linda Corets, Shannon Lynch, Noella Natalion, and Marjorie Ann Reeves | Archival Activity Guide for primary resources by ischool students presented at the WLMA 2004 conference-

Misc. Primary Sources

• Texts of American History documents

• Joyce Valenza's Pathfinder Wiki primary sources

• Wenatchee SD list of primary sources - http://pio.wsd.wednet.edu/library/primarysources.html

• Culturally Responsible Curriculum for Secondary Schools- Evergreen University

• William and Mary Teaching Model (scroll down for two versions of teaching primary sources and research model) has analyzing primary sources and questions to help students critically examine information. There is a chart that guides studies through the process.

• Center for History and New Media contains 1000 of primary source documents, audio, and images. Their are lists of annotated American History web sites and material for high school and college American history survey classes.

• Primary Source materials and Document Based Questions from Advanced Placement History courses

• ALA- ACRL History Section maintains sources for using primary sources on the web