All posts by Kori Green

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About Kori Green

I teach 9th and 10th grade history at Wichita High School East. I enjoy U.S. history, dabble in British history, and love incorporating technology in the classroom.

‘Hamilton’ Our history fix on Broadway

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It’s been getting a lot of press, the hip-hop telling of the man who set up the United State’s financial system. Before this musical most Americans could maybe recall that Alexander Hamilton was the one killed in a duel with Vice President Aaron Burr or figure out that he’s the guy on the $10 bill (for now, at least), but as Hamilton moves to Broadway we might learn to give this founder another look.

Flocabulary has been putting a hip-hop spin on history and other school subjects for years and School House Rock taught through song before that, but there’s something to be said for how deep Lin-Manuel Miranda took the history in this one. If you teach early U.S. history or government I would strongly recommend giving this a listen – it breathes a lot of life into the era and the historical figures who populated it without glossing over their faults (and the language can get a bit salty).

Our high school did an outstanding performance of 1776 last year, their production of Hamilton can’t come soon enough for me.

Check out NPR’s First Listen: Hamilton for the entire audio.

Pre-Service Teachers Contribute Curriculum

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Pre-Service teachers are getting into the game and classroom teachers can benefit. The HGSS undergraduates at KU have a thriving student chapter of the National Council for the Social Studies  – the Kansas University Council for the Social Studies (KUCSS) – and they’ve been using their powers for good.

KUCSS has partnered with the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics in Lawrence, Kansas to create instructional materials for middle and high school social studies teachers. The Dole Institute of Politics has launched an online exhibit commemorating Dole and his service in WWII which resulted in a debilitating injury that would later largely shape his work as a Senator resulting in the Americans with Disabilities Act (1995).

If you’d like to read more about the collection and their collaboration with KUCSS you can check out the full article here.

Make sure to check out the WWII Letter Collection from the Dole Institute and follow the In the Classroom link for the lesson plan.

And if you haven’t taken the opportunity to visit the Dole Institute of Politics in Lawrence it’s well worth a trip. Heck, make an I-70 road trip of it: start at the Eisenhower Presidential Center in Abilene, hit the Dole Institute, and then on to Liberty, Missouri for the Truman Presidential Library and Museum – just imagine all the government fun!