📜 📚 SUMMER PROJECTS from the Library of Congress and National Archives

Tuesday is our regular Books & Libraries Day in the River Houses when we recommend library-related resources you can browse, save, and share with your homeschool students. If you’re looking for some indoor educational activities for older students this summer — in the evenings or when it’s too hot to go outside — take a look at the wide range of wonderful cooperative projects available from the Library of Congress and the National Archives, projects that are available right now and throughout the year:

• ➢ “By the People” Projects at the Library of Congress (loc.gov)
• ➢ Citizen Archivist Missions at the National Archives (archives.gov)

These are real online projects managed by our U.S. national libraries that involve transcribing, tagging, documenting, and organizing important digital resources in our national collections. For example, you might help index the papers of famed American composer Leonard Bernstein; or you might help transcribe letters sent by citizens to President Theodore Roosevelt; or you might document the diaries and records of famed Civil War nurse Clara Barton, the founder of the American Red Cross; or you might help transcribe the pension records of soldiers who fought in the American Revolution — or you might contribute your efforts to any of a host of other projects in United States and world history.

All these projects offer high-school-age homeschoolers exceptional opportunities to develop research and study skills that will be important in their careers or in later college work. And successful participation in one or more of these projects would certainly look very good on a future college application as well. Explore the complete lists of available projects linked above and dive right into one this week!

What educational discoveries have you and your students been making (online or offline) in your library this Hercules Term? 😊

❡ Dukedoms large enough: Have you found all the local libraries in your area? There may be more than you realize, and there’s no better homeschool field trip than a field trip to a new library! The WorldCat Library Finder will help you find all the library collections near you — public and private, large and small — and the WorldCat catalog itself will help you locate the closest copy of almost any book in the world. 📖

❡ Books in the running brooks: The sidebar on the River Houses website has links to several wonderful online library collections that we like to explore. Why not sit yourself down at a large screen for a while (rather than a phone) and give them a browse. 🖥

❡ When in doubt, go to the library: This is one of our regular Homeschool Books & Libraries posts. Add your name to our weekly mailing list and get great homeschool teaching ideas delivered right to your mailbox all through the year. 📫

❡ Homeschool calendars: We have a whole collection of free, printable, educational homeschool calendars and planners available on our main River Houses calendar page. They will help you create a light and easy structure for your homeschool year. Give them a try today! 🗓

❡ Support our work: If you enjoy our educational materials, please support us by starting your regular Amazon shopping from our very own homeschool teaching supplies page. When you click through from our page, any purchase you make earns us a small commission at no extra cost to you. Thank you for helping us to keep going and growing! 🛒

❡ Join us! The aim of the River Houses project is to create a network of friendly local homeschool support groups — local chapters that we call “Houses.” Our first at-large chapter, Headwaters House, is now forming and is open to homeschoolers everywhere. Find out how to become one of our founding members on the Headwaters House membership page. 🏡