Teach Michigan History
Do you teach Michigan history? Do you need content support? Let us help!
Michigan History Center (MHC) staff develop education content for Michiganology. We support educators with the tools to teach historical analysis. MHC’s staff of certified teachers develops content aligned with the Michigan common core and social studies standards. We center content around Michiganology’s digital collections of over ten million items. Let’s get started!
Getting Started
Explore the Learn section of Michiganology. This section offers three types of education content for K-12 educators:
The Learn section also offers content by subject areas. You can find primary sources sets, stories and activities all related to a specific era or topic within a subject area. Learn more about how we develop this content below.
Ask Us!
If you have questions about teaching Michigan history, please visit our Ask Us! page. We want to hear from you. Ask us history questions, questions from your students or classes, or questions about our jobs.
Share with Us!
Do you have a story or activity your students love? If so, please send it to us through the form on the Share with Us! page. When you make a submission, we ask permission to share your resource on Michiganology.
You can also share content requests through the same form. Content requests help us decide priorities for developing education content. Your input matters! We build community by sharing.
Visit History Museums
Michiganology’s Learn section supplies content for your classroom. Check out the Michigan History Center website for information about visiting the Michigan History Museums and field sites.
We want to help your students learn to love history – especially Michigan history!
Types of Education Content
Teach with Primary Sources
Primary sources are an original account of history. These documents or objects are original, unique, and historical. Primary sources are different from secondary sources. Secondary sources retell, interpret, or analyze events after the original event occurred.
Teaching with primary sources gives students an opportunity to engage with history as it unfolds rather than having it recounted to them. We know finding primary sources to use in the classroom is a big job but we’re here to help!
The Michigan History Center staff does that challenging work for you. We spend hours researching items available on Michiganology and the Archives of Michigan. In the end, we develop sets of primary sources along with historical context, student outcomes, and teaching considerations. Our work is modeled after education initiatives at the Library of Congress.
Teach with Stories
You may remember publications such as the Mitten and the Michigan History Kids magazines. Originally published by the Michigan History Center, these stories are yet again available on Michiganology. Michigan History Center staff and partners updated these stories to be more inclusive and equitable. We add content regularly so check back with us often! Plus, you can download a PDF version of stories written for K-12 students. These PDFs include the story text and reflection questions.
In addition to K-12 audiences, staff author stories for educators and history enthusiasts. These stories provide a more detailed and historical context compared to similar stories written for students. You can find these stories under the “Teacher Resources” subject area.
Teach with Activities
Michigan History Center staff develop resources with distinct types of historical analysis worksheets and activities for your classroom.
Teach by Subjects Areas
Educators at the Michigan History Center curate collections of stories, activities, and primary source sets grouped into subjects. Subjects are era based as well as topic based under the Learn section at Michiganology.