Introduction to Activities within American Journey Online

The activities that follow are designed to introduce users to what American Journey Online has to offer for each of the seventeen chronological areas into which the database has been divided. They draw as widely as possible on the database both in terms of coverage among the different modules (that is, the activities for each chapter seek to utilize as many different modules as possible) and in search technique (that is, the activities provide suggested routes for locating documents that introduce users to the different ways they can move within the database). Some activities even ask users to work within more than one database. This allows users to see the database as an integrated whole. It also demonstrates the holistic nature of history, showing students that the same development can be considered within different frameworks. (An event that affects women might also be considered within the framework of civil rights, or one what occurs within the framework of war might have consequences for African Americans or Native Americans.)

By their nature the activities are selective. Users should bear in mind that they are not intended to provide complete coverage of the sweep of American history. They should instead be seen as supplements to college-level study of that subject, and as one set of exercises introducing users to American Journey Online.

Instructors using the activities should also bear in mind some general questions that can be asked of most of the sources explored here:

What type of document is being studied?
To whom was the document originally aimed?
What was the document trying to do?
What limitations, if any, are there to using this source?
What biases might the document, owing to its orgins, contain?
What caution should historians use when studying this document?

The activities can be used in many different ways: as the basis for in-class discussions; as the foundations for assignments that incorporate work in- and out-of-class; and as out-of-class homework assignments that students complete on their own. While the activities do not exhaust the possibilities of American Journey Online, it is hoped that they provide a good introduction to its contents and capabilities for instructors of the U.S. history sequence.