The Library of Congress's Teaching with Primary Sources (TPS) program works with a number of colleges, including Mars Hill, to help teachers use the Library’s vast collection of digitized primary sources to enrich their classroom instruction. Formerly known as An Adventure of the American Mind (AAM), we are committed to bringing teachers and school library media specialists professional development with primary sources as its central focus.

Primary sources are actual records that have survived from the past, like letters, photographs, articles of clothing and music. They are different from secondary sources, which are accounts of events written sometime after they happened.

Primary sources are all around us – in our homes, communities, libraries and museums. The primary sources found at the Library of Congress include documents and books, correspondence, newspapers, advertisements, maps, pamphlets, speeches, public records and music, as well as visual arts items like photographs, paintings, cartoons and films. More than 13 million of these are digitized and accessible by computer.

Primary sources make your classroom come alive by providing an unfiltered record of artistic, social, scientific and political thought and achievement, produced by people who lived during that period.

Students are enthusiastic about learning directly from primary sources. Use of primary sources in instruction guides students toward higher-order thinking and better critical thinking and analysis skills. Studying primary sources helps students form reasoned conclusions, base their conclusions on evidence, and connect documents to their larger context of meaning. In analyzing primary sources, students move from concrete observations and facts to making inferences about the materials.

The TPS staff, TPS advisory board and Mars Hill College faculty are working together to bring classroom-tested primary source activities to your school. In a series of snap-together modules, we can create a custom workshop that connects your students with the past and makes learning fun and engaging.

Dr. Tom Destino
TPS Director
828-689-1182
tdestino@mhc.edu

Tom Destino is the director of the TPS program and the chair of the Division of Teacher Education and Physical Education at MHC. He completed his Ph.D. in 1994 from The Ohio State University in Second and Foreign Language Education and is a strong supporter of Primary Source teaching and learning and has been active in Professional development for teachers throughout his career.

AnneMarie Walter
TPS Assistant Director
828-689-1181
awalter@mhc.edu

AnneMarie Walter in the assistant director of the TPS program at Mars Hill College and has been involved with helping pre-service and in-service teachers use primary sources since 2001. With a background in corporate professional development, she has been involved in all aspects of the earlier AAM program, developing and implementing workshops in schools and on the MHC campus as well as writing and distributing the AAM eNewsletter for seven years. From 2003 to 2006, Walter selected, mentored and accompanied teachers to state and regional conferences to present their exemplary learning objects. She received her M.S. in Instructional Technology from East Carolina University in 2007, with a certification in Distance Learning.

MHC TPS Advisory Board

The Mars Hill TPS program will continue to draw upon the talents of three other AAM directors from Western North Carolina. Wendy Fusco of Montreat College, Jodi Huggins of Brevard College and Dr. Beth Rodgers Coulter, now Media Coordinator at Swain County Middle School, will continue to provide feedback for pending projects, contribute learning activities and assist with the occasional K12 workshop.