Engaging History Lessons

If you teach history you are intimately familiar with the look 80% of your kids give when you even mention the word “history”. Most of the kids glass over and groan “I hate history. It’s so BORING”. Sound familiar? If not, you either come to work in full theatrical costume every day or I’m doing something terribly horribly wrong.

I happen to develop my love for history very late in life. So, I appreciate what it feels like to be one of those glassy-eyed students who would have rather given myself 1000 paper cuts than sit for an hour in history class. Gag! Especially since history seemed to be so disconnected from my own world.

Since I regret deeply developing my love so late in life, I want to help my World History students appreciate history while they are young. To that end, I believe student engagement really helps to raise the level of interest and ultimately achievement. A colleague of mine turned me on to some wonderful YouTube resources which have transformed my student’s interest.

The first resource is from History Teacher’s Channel on YouTube. If your kids are music lovers, they will adore these videos. Amy Burval is the actress and lyricist who writes and performs in all of the videos which parody popular songs with a history twist. They have 52 videos on topics ranging from early world history, but seem to focus on the late middle ages and Renaissance period of Europe. They have a few key outside topics, like Mansa Musa and Chinese Dynasties. Below are a couple of my student’s favorites.

William the Conqueror (by HistoryTeachers)

Charlemagne (by HistoryTeachers)

 

The other site that I love is Horrible Histories. It was a series by BBC and is available for purchase though Amazon and Scholastic. Since the original aired in UK which is DVD region 2, pay attention to the region code to make sure that the videos you purchase are in your region. For the US, you will want Region 1.

Several clips are available on Horrible Histories YouTube. Unfortunately the BBC1 YouTube link has only a limited selection compared to what the rest of the site offers. It’s worth a few minutes just to search the site and find independently posted clips. I have included one of my favorites below. A good flatulence joke goes a long way in Middle School.

Roman Toilets (by Horrible Histories)

Now, having said all of that, if your district is anything like mine, YouTube is banned on district servers. I have a workaround that may help. My friend I mentioned converts that YouTube videos to MP4’s and saves them on a flash. She uses shareware to make the conversions. But there is also a simple way I have found that doesn’t involve downloading software. I have included a link for a how-to video that will give you some idea on how to DIY.

If you have other resources that you think would be share-worthy, don't hesitate to let us know!