Use the Gateway to History for Your Teaching American History Website

Website construction can be a costly undertaking, unless your site is hosted by an institution with an existing web presence and where on-site web masters can navigate html’s and xls’s and the other technical bells and whistles necessary for a useful attractive website.

Rather than create a new site, consider using the Gateway to History, www.GatewayToHistory.org, for your Teaching American History program. Specifically created to enhance professional development opportunities for Ohio ’s history teachers, the Gateway to History is a cost-effective, easy-to-use website managed by the Ohio Humanities Council. Currently working with fifteen previously funded TAH projects, the Gateway to History is becoming one the best K-12 web resources available.

The Gateway to History – A Resource for Teachers and Project Directors

The Gateway to History, managed by the Ohio Humanities Council, offers a cost-effective solution to TAH web needs. Created in 2004 with funds from SBC Excelerator and the National Endowment for the Humanities, the Gateway to History is a content-rich website. It provides a vehicle for the numerous Ohio TAH projects to distribute curricular materials, communicate with one another, and enables teachers throughout the state to access the valuable classroom materials being created by TAH projects. As an archive for many of the TAH projects that have been completed, the Gateway to History makes sure that the enriching content created in TAH programs is available to the broadest possible audience for years to come.

Created by award-winning web designers at WGTE Public Broadcasting in Toledo, the Gateway to History offers portals for each Teaching American History project with a user-friendly platform. Easy to navigate tabs connect teachers to an array of information for the study and teaching of American History. The Gateway is also the home of the Buckeye Council for History Education, Ohio ’s statewide association for history and social studies teachers. Browse the site at www.gatewaytohistory.orgto view the possibilities.

Backed by powerful servers, the Gateway to History has virtually unlimited storage capacity to host TAH institute curriculum, lesson plans, classroom activities, photographs, illustrations, and links. Information can be uploaded from a variety of computer sources, including text, .pdf, and image files.

By using the Gateway to History as your TAH web site, you can offer project participants an extensive and up-to-date site full of resources. The Ohio Humanities Council offers training to TAH project administrators to access the site and upload content, year-round technical assistance, connection to other TAH project administrators throughout the state, and statewide distribution for your programs.

The Gateway to History can support your Teaching American History project in several ways:

- A pre-designed web platform that is cost-effective, accessible and attractive;

- An enhanced professional development experience with expanding on-line resources;

- An electronic community of educators, connecting your TAH program with other projects across the state;

- Statewide distribution of TAH materials;

- Training and year-round technical assistance;

- Sustainability for your TAH project with a website that will continue to house material after the conclusion of your three-year grant, backed by OHC’s on-going commitment to pre-collegiate professional development.

The Council will be pleased to provide a letter of commitment for use as an attachment to your Teaching American History grant application.