Georgia State University ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University Middle and Secondary Education Faculty Publications Department of Middle and Secondary Education 2014 Curation of Digitized Artifacts in the Study of Historical Fiction Ewa McGrail Georgia State University Kevin Powell Follow this and additional works at: https://scholarworks.gsu.edu/mse_facpub Part of the Curriculum and Instruction Commons, and the Junior High, Intermediate, Middle School Education and Teaching Commons Recommended Citation McGrail, E. W. A., & Powell, K. (2014). Curation of Digitized Artifacts in the Study of Historical Fiction. Teacher Librarian, 41(4), 37-41. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Middle and Secondary Education at ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Middle and Secondary Education Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks @ Georgia State University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. FEATUREARTICLE Curation of Digitized Artifacts in the Study of Historical Fiction EWA MCGRAIL AND KEVIN POWELL Peer reviewed. Accepted for publication April 1, 2014. and high-quality reproductions of primary S we all know, online communica- sourees or how to locate such resources and databases. In this article, we first review tion and information technologies websites of interest to teacher librarians to are reshaping today's education and help students search for high quality digi- A tized artifacts online. Next we analyze and work environments by changing the ways evaluate social bookmarking services that can be used to organize, share, and curate information is exchanged and retrieved. digitized artifacts online. We conclude the article with sample instructional activities For digital natives (individuals born after 1990), using interactive technologies to locate for using and curating digital artifacts in information and share digital content has become second nature. Their facility with so- cial networking platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Flickr (Houston, 2011) have actu- the classroom. ally led both to the vast improvement and reach of these programs and to the existence of both derivative and competitive programs, such as Reddit and Foursquare. In a sense, HIGH-QUALITY WEBSITES WITH all of these technologies are the natural result of an Internet that has made a virtually DIGITIZED ARTIFACTS endless amount of information available online to nearly everyone with a computer and a connection. There was (and is), therefore, a strong need for orientation and the creation We review five of our favorite websites for of relevance in this vast sea of information. teacher librarians who want to improve Among the many kinds of available information are digital artifacts. These are items students' understanding of historical fic- that have been collected online and are accessible to teachers and students alike. Such tion texts: Flickr Commons, Boston Pub- artifacts include texts, photographs, and video clips of tools and objets d'art used for vari- lic Library, New York Public Library, the ous purposes by the peoples of the past. These artifacts can offer a context for students' Smithsonian Institute, and the Library of understanding of historical fiction (Morgan et Rasinski, 2012). Studying these artifacts Congress. also brings authenticity to learning, since many artifacts embody the norms, culture, dis- Flickr, a popular photo-sharing web- course, and values of the people who lived in the past (Fühler, Farris, ft Nelson, 2006). site, includes a special section devoted to Digitized artifacts can often convey important understandings by reproducing original history and archived collections called the mediums and modalities (e.g., clothing items, pottery, audio/video recordings, or images), Commons (http ://www.fliekr.com/com- thus making such explorations interactive and engaging journeys. In addition, the use mons). In this section, users can click on of digitized artifacts in literature instruction provides opportunities for teacher librar- participating institutions' photo streams ians, literacy teachers, and content area teachers to collaborate (Kapitzke, 2001). Literacy (online photo galleries), browse a sampler and content area teachers share expertise in their discipline, while teacher librarians, for of photos, or use the search box to conduct example, provide expertise in subject-specific searches and different research tools, as a keyword search. By clicking on a par- well as assist the uninitiated with profitably searching online coUeetions (Dow, 2013; ticular institution, the user can also browse Loertscher Et Marcoux, 2010). sets of photos organized by historical era. Although many of these collections of digitized artifacts are available online, stu- The sets we enjoyed included the ones on dents may not always know which sources and publishers represent reliable scholarship women's suffrage, African American his- APRIL 2014 37 Table 1 - Reconmiended Artifact Databases Database Characteristics tory month, the San Francisco earthquake (1906), and the Girl Scouts. Users can cre- Flickr—The Commons Special section of the popular photo- ate their own accounts in Flickr where they http://www.flickr.com/commons sharing site Flickr devoted to historical share and comment on the artifacts they photos and artifacts find. The Boston Public Library and the New Repository of Primary Sources- A repository of over 5,000 websites York Public Library have special collec- University of Idaho describing primary sources searchable by tions on their primary websites. The Boston http://www.uiweb.uidaho.edu/special- geographic region Public Library (http://www.bpl.org/online) collections/Other.Repositories.html has a vast collection of manuscripts, news- Library of Congress for Teachers Artifacts from all periods of United States papers, rare books, and other digitized doc- http://www.loc.gov/teachers/ history, including films, maps, sound uments, notably on New England history. recordings, newspapers articles, photo- The New York Public Library (http://digi- graphs, and other documents talgalleiy.nypl.org/nypldigital/) website Eduplace A repository of primary sources catego- holds thousands of digitized maps, images, h ttp ://www. eduplace. com/ss/hmss/ rized into U.S. history and world history and other documents divided into catego- primary.html ries including arts and literature, culture and society, and history and society. The Smithsonian Institute website Boston and New York Public Libraries Special collections online, photostreams on contains online exhibits, digitized photo- http://www.bpl.org/online/ Flickr, and online galleries http://digitalgaUery. nypl. org/nypldigital/ graphs, and video and audio files at their online collection search center (http://col- Digital Library of Georgia http://dlg. Digitized manuscripts, books, photographs. lections.si.edu/search). galilco.usg.edu and government documents relevant to the study of the history of Georgia Just as the Library of Congress (LOC) was the primary place for research before University of California, Berkeley Includes tips for fmding primary resource www.lib.berkeley.edu/instruct/guides/ documents the rise of the Internet, the LOC website primarysourees.htm I (http://www.loc.gov) maintains its pre- eminent status as a comprehensive and Georgia State University http://digitalc- Digital collections specializing in ollections.library.gsu.edu/ documents from the American south. user-friendly collection of artifacts online. popular music collections, and oral histo- Users can examine artifacts from all peri- ries ods of United States history by analyzing National Couneil for the Social Studies Offers primary resources and teaching films, maps, sound recordings, newspaper http://www.socialstudies.org/publica- activities articles, photographs, and numerous other tions/twd documents. The LOC website also includes Yale University A collection of over 500,000 images a site devoted to teachers, with lesson plans and instructional ideas for using artifacts in the school library and classroom. All Smithsonian Institute Online exhibits and images four of the aforementioned institutions http://coUeetions.si.edu/search/ also have extensive photo streams on Flickr Commons. Table 1 lists the websites we describe here, as well other valuable National Archives http://www.archives. Teacher resources for using primary online resources with digitized artifacts. gov/research/topics sources, links by topic and media type, and online exhibits WAYS TO ORGANIZE DIGITIZED New Deal Network http://newdeal.feri. Documents gathered from the National «Hj ARTIFACTS org/texts/defa ult. cfm Archives, the Franklin D. Roosevelt Libraiyn and other collections With all of these readily available digitized artifacts online, the problem facing teacher American Rhetoric librarians and students today is how to ef- http://www.americanrhetoric.com/ Sound recordings of famous American fectively organize, share, and solicit feed- toplOOspeechesall.html speeches back on these artifacts. Fortunately, there are several options. Digital curation is an important role of teacher librarians; they 38 TEACHER LIBRARIAN 41:4 Table 2 - Recommended Platforms for Curation of Digitized Artifacts are uniquely adept at critically organiz- ing information to foster student growth. Diigo Additionally, researchers have emphasized A social bookmarking service that allows you to organize, bookmark, and save that digital curation