Lesson 3
What is a primary source, secondary source, personal response and why are all three important in research?

Objective:
Students will learn to distinguish between a primary source, a secondary source and personal response. Students will consider different interpretations of key events and/or issues in history and understand the differences in these accounts. Students will view historic events through the eyes of those who were there, as shown in their art, writings, music, and artifacts.

Materials:
-- Computer with Internet connection and Inspiration software.
-- Projector to project website and Inspiration demo.
-- Fields of Fury book James McPherson, Atheneum, 2002 ISBN:0689848331
(note: Fields of Fury is an age appropriate book about the Civil War that has one and two page chapters that are easy to assign for a class session reading to go along with a computer work time for another part of the class. Any age appropriate book could be used as a secondary source for information about the Civil War and slavery.)

Procedures:
1. Open Inspiration using the projector.
2. Open the website http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/wpahome.html
3. Copy and paste a quote from an interview into the Inspiration web. Is this a primary or a secondary source of information?
4. Find a quote from the book that relates to the quote. Type this into another symbol in the Inspiration web. Is this quote, from the book, a primary or secondary source of information? What do you think about these two pieces of information? Type a personal response into a new symbol in the web. What type of information is this? (a personal response) Why is it important to include personal responses in research?
5. Refer to this site:
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/reading.html to discuss the origins of the Slave Narratives. What makes a transcription a primary source? Refer to this page for examples of other types of primary sources:
http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/lessons/primary.html
6. What is a secondary source vs a primary source
http://lcweb2.loc.gov/learn/lessons/01/indian/whatare.html
7. Students go to their computers, open their webs and copy, paste or type a primary, secondary and personal response into their webs. Students develop a key or system for showing which is which on the web. (Students may opt to label the links)

Optional discussion: Is history a primary, secondary or personal response? What does it mean to mediate history? Is history always mediated?
Use this URL to view some sources of information about slavery. http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/lessons/psources/slavery.html
Go to http://rs6.loc.gov/ammem/ndlpedu/lessons/psources/genquest.html
To discuss what it means to believe history.

Comments of fifth graders about the Slave Narratives online and books in our library:
-"This interview was interesting. I like how she had to explain every detail so that gave me a picture of who it was. Even though this took place a long time ago, I felt like I knew her." -Collin
-"I made a webpage about a slave named Walter Calloway. If I did not use the Internet as a resource, I wouldn't know half as much about him as I do now. In other words, the Internet helped me a lot with my webpage. Civil War books also helped me with the webpage. I got factual information that helped me write about the time period of the Civil War.

Assessment: Can students show different pieces of information in their webs and explain which are primary, secondary and personal responses and why they fall into each category?