A Guide to Primary Resources for U.S. History : The World of 1898: The Spanish-American War Library of Congress: American Memory Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures Library of Congress: American Memory These paired digital resources contextualize the Spanish-American War in a far more thorough way than is possible with the average high school textbook. "The World of 1898" is a digital exhibit located on the Library of Congress's highly-rated "American Memory" website, which offers a great variety of quality primary source material concerning the Spanish-American War. Also offered are thoughts and perspectives on the war from writers native to Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the United States, along with information about these writers. The "Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures" offers many short (less than one minute) clips from the following categories: (1)War Begins, (2) Cuba, (3) War Ends, (4) Philippine Revolution, (5)Homecoming, and (6) War Drama. The clips download quickly, even with a 56K modem. The clips are accompanied by interesting material on the advent of the moving picture and its use for political and documentary purposes which went beyond its primary focus as entertainment. Teachers may not be able to make use of all the resources found on these two sites, but it is likely any history teacher's students will be able to relate to one or more of the diverse artifacts found here. Students could read one of the short literary excerpts, such as Mark Twain's piece for the New York Herald, and respond in their journals to a prompt such as: "What do you think are two different perspectives on whether the United States was justified in going to war with Spain over Spain's continued colonization of these two lands? Explain which perspective you think is more reasonable." Students could share their responses in a class discussion, then read and view some of the materials found on this website. Students could write scripts of what a narrator, or the persons on screen, might say to accompany selected movie clips. The class could then view these clips, with the group providing the dialogue/narration they wrote. Students could read one of the literary comments made about the Spanish-American War, and write their response to it. They could then search the website's photographs and video clips to find evidence to support or refute the writer's position.

(a) explaining the changing policies of the United States toward Latin America and Asia and the growing influence of the United States in foreign markets;

The World of 1898: The Spanish-American War
Library of Congress: American Memory

Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures
Library of Congress: American Memory

Description: These paired digital resources contextualize the Spanish-American War in a far more thorough way than is possible with the average high school textbook. "The World of 1898" is a digital exhibit located on the Library of Congress's highly-rated "American Memory" website, which offers a great variety of quality primary source material concerning the Spanish-American War. Also offered are thoughts and perspectives on the war from writers native to Puerto Rico, Cuba, and the United States, along with information about these writers. The "Spanish-American War in Motion Pictures" offers many short (less than one minute) clips from the following categories: (1)War Begins, (2) Cuba, (3) War Ends, (4) Philippine Revolution, (5)Homecoming, and (6) War Drama. The clips download quickly, even with a 56K modem. The clips are accompanied by interesting material on the advent of the moving picture and its use for political and documentary purposes which went beyond its primary focus as entertainment. Teachers may not be able to make use of all the resources found on these two sites, but it is likely any history teacher's students will be able to relate to one or more of the diverse artifacts found here.

Teaching Tips:

"Do Now" Suggestion

Students could read one of the short literary excerpts, such as Mark Twain's piece for the New York Herald, and respond in their journals to a prompt such as: "What do you think are two different perspectives on whether the United States was justified in going to war with Spain over Spain's continued colonization of these two lands? Explain which perspective you think is more reasonable." Students could share their responses in a class discussion, then read and view some of the materials found on this website.

Suggestion for Using this Resource as Part of a Lesson

Students could write scripts of what a narrator, or the persons on screen, might say to accompany selected movie clips. The class could then view these clips, with the group providing the dialogue/narration they wrote. Students could read one of the literary comments made about the Spanish-American War, and write their response to it. They could then search the website's photographs and video clips to find evidence to support or refute the writer's position.