Don't forget to update your feeds

Please remember to update your feeds to my new site

Teaching the Civil War with Technology Blog

Don't forget about Civil War Sallie over at http://www.civilwarsallie.com

Announcing ....

I have finally made the leap and purchased a new domain to host my blog & combined website.

Please take a moment to visit my new website at: http://www.teachthecivilwar.com

I have may ideas for the site but currently it hosts my blog and links to my wiki.

I will no longer be posting to this feed but plan to update some posts from here and post them to the new blog. I will then be slowly removing the posts from this page.

The first post on my new blog is by my daughter Sarah about Mary Todd Lincoln.

Please update your feed to my new blog and any links that you may have.

Thank you for your continued support.

Jim

Another Great Resource

The following is by far one of the best Civil War related websites for educators that I have seen.
MrNussbaums.com's Civil War Page contains a wealth of activities and resources including:

• Interactive Battle Maps
• Civil War Timeline
• Cause and Effects of the Civil War
• People of the Civil War
• Union and Confederacy
• Civil War Activities
• Civil War Clip Art
• Civil War Videos

Let's take a look at a few of these pages in more detail.

The Interactive Battles Map allows students to click on the name of a battle and it will pop up a brief description of the battle on the right side of the page. The map also shows Union vs. Confederate states, which side won a particular battle and more.

The People of the Civil War page provides some great information on many of the major players of the war including Abraham Lincoln, Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, Harriet Tubman and Matthew Brady.

The Civil War Activities page includes "reading comprehension exercises, cloze reading exercises, sentence surgeons, word searches, jigsaws, crossword puzzles and much more."

Be sure to take some time to explore this site and I'm sure you will want to share it with your class.

Until next time...

Civil War in Four Minutes

Hi,

Just a quick link today to show you this video called The Civil War in Four Minutes.

I'm off to the National Educational Computing Conference and hope to pick up some ideas there for more posts and discussions.

Enjoy...

More uses of Web 2.0 Tools

Mr. T, an 8th grade American Cultures teacher at Hershey Middle School, is the author of the American Cultures 2.0 blog. While reviewing his blog recently, I noticed that he has developed two great uses of Web 2.0 technologies for teaching the Civil War.

The first one is called What stories do these Civil War photographs tell? In this short blog post, Mr. T uses a quick VoiceThread video to get students to look at a photograph and answer questions. There are even several student responses to this post. Very cool!

The second one is called Civil War Day and shows a very nice Animoto photo slide show. The photo slide show is a collection of Civil War era photographs from the Library of Congress and is set to some somber period music.

So, here are two more examples of how you (and your students) can create and share things you are doing in your classroom.

Create & Collaborate!!!

Until Next Time...

Civil War Webquest

The concept of a WebQuest was developed by Bernie Dodge at San Diego State University in 1995 and they are inquiry based lessons that where learners obtain information from the Internet. These are very popular with teachers as a method for promoting inquiry while integrating technology into their curriculum.

While surfing the net for resources, I came across this Civil War Webquest from a school in Hawaii that I thought I would share with everyone. This webquest has all of the standard features and the Task is to create two distinct products: a Civil War portfolio and a song about the topic. The Process section provides very good guidance on how to complete the webquest while ensuring that resources are cited, that the Internet is not the only source of information and that everyone as role to play. There is an extensive list of resources ranging from songs and battles to weapons and medical related links. Finally, the detailed rubrics are provided so students know how their work will be Evaluated.

The coolest part of this particular webquest is the Student Work section that highlights the work of the students for the past three years.

So, take a moment to check out this webquest and let me know what you think. If you have your own or another favorite webquest, share it with me.

Happy webquesting...

Yet Even MORE Statistics

Thanks to the Wig-Wags Blog for posting this interesting article on The Civil War's Last Veterans, Wives and Stats to bring us even MORE statistics to ponder. Yippee!!

According to the post, the following table comes from Fact Sheet: America's Wars by the US Department of Veteran's Affairs:

Civil War (1861-1865)
Total U.S. Servicemembers (Union)..............2,213,363
Battle Deaths (Union)....................................140,414
Other Deaths (In Theater) (Union)....................224,097
Non-mortal Woundings (Union).......................281,881
Total Servicemembers (Conf.) ...........1,050,000
Battle Deaths (Confederate) ..................74,524
Other Deaths (In Theater) (Confed.) (note 3, 4)......59,297
Non-mortal Woundings (Confed.) .................Unknown

Discussion questions for your class:

1. What percentage of Total U.S. Servicemembers were killed in battle?
2. What percentage of Total Confederate Servicemembers were killed in battle?
3. According to the website, the Confederate figures are incomplete. Why do you think they are incomplete?

Now let's add in some additional figures from the same website:

America's Wars Total
U.S. Military Service During War................41,891,368
Battle Deaths.................................................651,022
Other Deaths (In Theater)...............................308,797
Other Deaths in Service (Non-Theater).............230,279
Non-mortal Woundings................................1,431,290
Living War Veterans..................................17,484,000
Living Veterans (War & Peacetime)............23,532,000

Based on this table ask your students:

1. What percentage of soldiers fought during the Civil War when compared to all America's Wars?
2. What percentage of Union Battle Deaths make up the total for all America's Wars?
3. How would having more accurate Confederate data impact these figures?

Don't you just love math. :)

Until next time....