Maine Community Heritage Project

See call of participation below:

The Maine Historical Society, in partnership with the Maine State Library, is seeking Maine communities to participate in the 2009-2010 program cycle of the Maine Community Heritage Project (MCHP), an innovative program that promotes collaboration between local schools, historical societies, and public libraries through the exploration and celebration of local history. The MCHP grows out of the Maine Memory Network, the Maine Historical Society's nationally recognized statewide digital museum, and is supported by a National Leadership Grant from the Institute of Museum & Library Services.

The MCHP is a year-long program designed to mobilize Maine communities around the exploration and sharing of their local history. Each participating community will build a website on the Maine Memory Network that gathers and radically expands access to historical images, documents, and information related to the history of their community.

Applications from local partnership teams—each of which must include a local school (grades 6-12), library, and historical organization are now being accepted. Eight communities will be selected to participate in the program which will run from July 2009-June 2010. Participating communities will receive extensive training in digitization, access to powerful yet user-friendly online tools, guidance and support from full-time project staff, and funds of up to $7,500 to support project activities. All Maine communities are eligible to apply. The application deadline is: April 9.

For an application, or to learn more about the MCHP, please visit here or contact Kristie Littlefield by email at or by calling (207) 653-9287.

Maine Community Heritage Project

Promoting Community through the Exploration of Local History

Flyer
Description
Guidelines
Application

"It takes a village . . . "

Essential Question: How am I responsible for the communities that I am a part of?

Paul Houston of AASA speaks of acting locally:

"Every educator is familiar with the African proverb that “it takes a village to raise a child.” It is a nice but inadequate sentiment for modern America.

I have visited African villages and seen their focus on children. In Kenya, the Masai greet each other with the question, “How are the children?” America would be better off if we could say that to each other with meaning. But we don’t and we can’t rely on the village to raise our children because we no longer have even a sense of village.

Educators must find a way to become village builders, and I think that starts with helping our children see that as their role. We have to build character in our children so they become their 'brother’s keepers.'" More . . .

How are the Children?

Character Resources
Process Resources
Citizenship Resources
The Maine Council for the Social Studies

Maine Local History Handbook

Interested in doing local/oral history with your students? Need a model to get you started? Check out Laura Richter's notebook for rich suggestions, templates and examples. This is a gem created in the MLTI Noteshare application and saved as web files. Laura is an expert in working with children in investigating local history as demonstrated at Our Town Skowhegan Maine.




Related Resources:

Oral History
Video Interviewing
Noteshare
iMovie Workshop
Maine Studies