The Appalachian Mountains of western North Carolina rise abruptly from the Piedmont, the state's central plateau, and include the ranges of the Balsam, Black, Blue Ridge, Great Smoky, and Nantahala Mountains. The region is home to several of the highest peaks east of the Mississippi River. The rugged geography of these mountains delayed the arrival of European settlers to the area, slowed the pace of development, and for many years preserved a distinct regional culture.

While development and change were slow in coming to the Mountain Region, the last half a century has seen a surge in both. This site focuses on the story of Madison County, North Carolina. Listen to members of the community candidly discuss tradition, growth, loss, and balance as you experience the story of change in the North Carolina mountains.

In this interdisciplinary seminar, we explore a variety of visual and written tools for self exploration and self expression. Through discussion, written assignments, and directed exercises, students practice utilizing a variety of media to explore and express who they are.

Historic Pittsburgh, an extensive digital resource created at the University of Pittsburgh, offers both an entry point and substantive classroom resources for teachers of American History at various grade and university levels.

This Web site enables access to historic material held by the University of Pittsburgh's University Library System, the Library & Archives at the Heinz History Center, Carnegie Museum of Art, Chatham College Archives, Pittsburgh History & Landmarks Foundation, and Point Park University Archives. The project represents a model of cooperation between libraries, museums and institutions of higher learning in providing centralized access to selections of their respective historic materials.

The books allows teachers to focus on historical currents, social movements and individual historical personalities, both famous and less well-known. Thousands of photographs offer students at all levels opportunities for observation, comparison and inference. The decennial census contains a wealth of information about the occupational, racial, gender, family, and residential structure of a key industrializing region, from pre-Civil War years to the Gilded Age. The chronology captures significant events that took place in Pittsburgh throughout three centuries.

Holidays video clip prompts students to write about two of their favorite family traditions.

The fifth lesson in the Family, History and Memory module centers on developing students' research skills. Using the book The Diary of Anne Frank as a starting point, it guides students through the necessary steps for conducting good-quality research and developing a subsequent presentation. Students work as a group to develop their presentation. The lessons can be delivered as a module or as individual units.

The fourth lesson in the Family, History and Memory module focuses on developing students' presentation skills. It offers students detailed guidelines on how to deliver a good presentation and invites them to practice the skills using their family stories. Peer group evaluation is included in this class. The lessons can be delivered as a module or as individual units.

Use of family photographs to introduce the concept of the family tree and connectedness.

Besides being simple mementos family photographs can offer insights into the past. This unit looks at some of the ways photographs can reveal, and sometimes conceal, important information about the past. It teaches the skills and provides some of the knowledge needed to interpret such pictorial sources.

In the second of five lessons in this Family, History and Memory module, students analyze memoir as a genre. They then organize the information researched in the first lesson and put together their own family memoir. The lessons can be delivered as a module or as individual units.

In the first of five lessons in this Family, History and Memory module, students are encouraged to research and write about their family stories and to share their memories with the class. The lessons can be delivered as a module or as individual units.

In the third lesson in the Family, History and Memory module, students explore their family stories in a historical context. The PBS documentary Daughter From Danang is used to illustrate the dramatic impact that the Vietnam War had on the family and identity of an Amerasian child as she grew into womanhood. The lessons can be delivered as a module or as individual units.

This lesson plan introduces students to examples of how wars and technological developments have impacted the movement of people throughout United States and world history. Students will learn about the effects of political, technological, and geographical issues on the population of one North Carolina community. Listening to oral histories by North Carolinians, students will hear first hand accounts about the impact of wars and road building on Madison County. Using a timeline depicting events and changes over two hundred years of national and regional history, students will begin to connect historical events with the people they impacted. They will then investigate where their families fit into history in both time and place. After researching their family history, students will create a timeline of their own depicting where their relatives were at important junctures in history. Through discussion with classmates, they will consider what was happening throughout the country and the world at different points in time. The oral history, timeline, and discussion exercises will emphasis the personal impact of political and technological change.