America's Field Trip and Young People's Continental Congress

July 4, 2026, marks 250 years since the signing of the Declaration of Independence. With that, opportunities are arising for students and teachers. Here are two of them.

Young People's Continental Congress 

YPCC provides an opportunity for student-teacher teams to study history and civics in Philadelphia from July 19-25. Flights, lodging, and meals provided. The program covers all flights, hotels, and meals. Participants will interact with students and teachers from across the country, explore our nation's founding, and learn how the ideals of the founding era continue to be debated, discussed, and refined over the last 250 years. Teachers can teach grades 4-12, any subject area. School librarians are eligible. Teachers can come from any type of school (public, independent, charter, homeschool). Students must be enrolled in 10th or 11th grade in the 25/26 school year. Last summer Harlowton teacher Taylor Olsen went and said her student found the experience life changing. Apply by November 14. 

America's Field Trip

America 250 is sponsoring a contest with the prompt "What does America mean to you?" Students from grades 3-12 may submit artwork or a written response. A total of 250 students will be awarded a special behind-the-scenes field trip experience this summer or a cash prize. Students will be judged in three categories (elementary, middle, and high school) and submissions will be evaluated based on Student Voice (50%), Clarity of Idea (25%), and Presentation (25%).

• Find teaching resources.
• Learn more about the contest and the prizes.
• Submit entries by March 30, 2026.

2025-2026 NHD MT Teacher Fellow Program

Thanks to a grant from the Library of Congress, National History Day in Montana is recruiting Montana teachers of grades 6-12 to join a cohort that will receive training in historical research and argumentation, primary source analysis, National History Day, Library of Congress resources, and Indian Education for All.

Participants will earn a $500 stipend, receive 3 credits and 39-56 renewal units, and access to all-expenses paid high-quality PD. 

Apply here by November 7, 2025.

Requirements for Participants

Complete Bi-Monthly PD Series (10 renewal units)

• 1 hour each.
• Attend live or watch recording (2 weeks to watch the recording)
• Successful applicants will receive recordings for sessions that have already happened.

Complete choice of online or in-person IEFA courses provided by Center of the West in Cody, WY (7-21 renewal units)

Attend History Day Regional OR State Contest as a judge OR with students (0-6 renewal units)

• See contest dates & locations

Complete Judge Training & Practice Judging (6-12 renewal units)

• In person at Regionals or State OR
• Later online if you have students competing at contests

Complete 12-week summer course in Historical Argumentation taught by Melissa Hibbard. 

• Worth 3 credits (graduate or lane-change credits, to be determined). 
• 4 live webinars (you have a week to watch the recording)
• 4 modules, all work completed asynchronously. 
• See 2025 Syllabus

Attend Summer Institute in Great Falls

• Led by Lynne O’Hara from NHD National Office
• August 4-5, 2026 (16 renewal units)

Submit 1 teaching resource for the NHD Teacher Portal

Benefits

• $500 stipend
• Enrollment fees & travel costs covered for all required PD
• 3 credits
• 39-50 renewal units
• Access to NHD Teacher Resource Portal
• Ongoing mentorship from NHD coordinators & fellow NHD teachers
• Chance to apply for scholarship to attend National Contest in June 2026

Questions? Contact Melissa Hibbard at nationalhistorydaymt@gmail.com. 

Best of, Elementary Lessons

 I can't believe it's October and I haven't shared favorite lessons yet! This is something I do every year--in spring I ask readers to tell me about their favorite Montana history or IEFA lesson or teaching strategy, the one they would absolutely use again. Then I share the responses in the newsletter. Better late than never! Here are the responses from elementary school teachers with some notes from me in brackets.

Fourth-fifth grade teacher Jodi Delaney of Helena writes: "This question is too hard - it's like choosing my favorite child! I'm looking forward to the Chinese Footlocker being available. I also love the 'No Smoking' lesson because they really have to think and the students do some real historical thinking. 'Where the Girl Saved Her Brother' is also still one of my favorites." [You can find "No Smoking" and "Rosebud Battlefield or Where the Girl Saved Her Brother" on the Montana: A History of Our Home Companion Website. No Smoking is in Unit 3. Rosebud Battlefield or Where the Girl Saved Her Brother? is in Unit 5. 

April Wills, who last year taught fourth grade in Bainville wrote: "I used the Gold and Silver trunk this year. It was amazing- Students always love the trunks. This was a new one for me and I thought the lessons were great. I plan to definitely use it next year." [Find out how to order our Hands-on Footlockers.]

Title I teacher Barb Brown from Lolo provided great details about her favorite lesson: Personal Winter Counts: Connecting the Past to the Present.

• In this lesson, students explore the tradition of the Lakota winter count, a historical record-keeping practice used by many Plains tribes. Through discussion and visual examples, students learn how winter counts were used to record one significant event for each year.
• Following the introduction, students are guided to reflect on their own lives and identify one meaningful event for each year they have been alive. Using drawings or symbols, they create a personal winter count to visually represent their unique life stories.
• This activity encourages students to connect with the cultural significance of oral and visual history, while also fostering personal reflection and historical thinking.
• Standards Alignment/Essential Understanding: SS.K12.3, SS.K12.5, EU 2.

Barb also says that "inviting a tribal historian, elder or cultural educator from a local tribe to speak about winter counts from a community informed perspective would greatly enrich the Winter Count lesson. They could share stories of actual winter counts, explain the cultural importance of oral and visual histories, and demonstrate how symbols are chosen and what they represent. This brings authenticity to the lessons, honors indigenous knowledge, and supports IEFA principles by centering native voices into the curriculum." [You can find lessons and a PowerPoint on winter counts on MTHS's Art of Storytelling webpage.] 

Some teachers chose to answer anonymously: 

• The Question Formula Technique is something I will use more next year. I will use it in more projects!
• Montana History Day Poster Contest - Had each student in grades 1+ create a poster about a history day topic. [Learn more about the Elementary Poster Contest here.]
• Mapping Montana A to Z [An abbreviated version of this lesson is included in Unit 1 of the Montana: A History of Our Home Teachers Guide.]
• One of the most powerful lessons I taught this year was a biography project on Montana tribal leaders, which helped students connect deeply with the history and living cultures of our state’s Indigenous nations. Through research and presentations, students gained a richer understanding of Native contributions while building critical literacy and communication skills. This project will remain a priority every year because it fosters respect, relevance, and real engagement. [MTHS has some biographies of tribal leaders on the Montana Biographiespage and others on the Gallery of Outstanding Montanans page, along with biographies for many other Montanans. Montana: A History of Our Home Chapter 6 also features biographies.]
• Next year, I’ll be using the “windows and mirrors” strategy to help students connect personally with IEFA content by seeing themselves (mirrors) and others (windows) in the stories and histories we explore. This approach promotes empathy and understanding by integrating Native perspectives through literature, storytelling, and discussion. It supports meaningful, inclusive learning and aligns with Montana’s IEFA goals by honoring the diversity and sovereignty of tribal nations.

 

Stay tuned for your middle and high school colleagues' favorite lessons and strategies. 

New Footlocker on Montana's Chinese History Now Available

 MTHS worked with Mark Johnson to create a new footlocker focusing on The Chinese Experience in Montana.

This is a big deal, folks! Mark is the author of The Middle Kingdom under the Big Sky: A History of the Chinese Experience in Montana, which won the 2023 W. Turrentine Jackson Award & The Caroline Bancroft History Prize. He's also the Associate Clinical Professor for Notre Dame's Alliance for Catholic Education and a former classroom teacher who trains teachers on subject-specific methods and practice. He knows his stuff: both pedagogy and the history of the Chinese in Montana. (He's also a dynamic presenter. If you have a chance to go to one of his lectures or workshops, you should jump at it.)

It was an honor to work with Mark on this footlocker. It was great too to get input from fourth-fifth grade teacher Jodi Delany, a MTHS teacher leader in Helena whose students tested all of the lessons in her classroom. And props also go to MTHS Historian and former classroom teacher Melissa Hibbard. This was a team effort that resulted in one of the best footlockers we've ever produced.

Why is this footlocker so great? 

The objects are fabulous! Mark brought back dragon marionettes, tomb sweeping offerings, and red envelopes from Chinatown in San Francisco. There are 22 historical photos, scrolls and brushes for practicing Chinese calligraphy, copies (and translations) of letters written by Chinese immigrants in Montana back to their families in China, a teapot and teacups, a rice bowl and spoon, a red lantern, and more. Check out the pictures starting on p. 5 of the User Guide.  

The eight lessons--some of which can be done without ordering the footlocker--are engaging, educational, and standards-based. Students:

• Learn about push-pull factors and why Chinese immigrants came to Montana.
• Analyze letters written by Chinese immigrants back to their families.
• Explore pictographic writing and how to write Chinese characters.
• Analyze census data and create or read line plots, graphs, and pie charts to discover what type of people came to Montana from China and the types of jobs they worked.
• Learn about anti-Chinese prejudice and the ways the Chinese and their white allies fought back.
• Participate in a Chinese tea ceremony and discover the cultural importance of tea.
• analyze menus, photographs and advertisements to explore the history and legacy of Chinese restaurants in Montana.
• Discover ways the Chinese maintained cultural and religious practices in the face of anti-Chinese prejudice.

The activities are hands-on. They are fun. Students practice ELA and math skills and engage students with primary sources. And--for middle school and high school teachers, Mark has lessons on his website that cover most of the same topics but at a higher level.

How can you order the footlocker or find the lessons in the User Guide?    

Anyone can download any of our user guides--all of which have lesson plans that you can use without ordering the footlocker--free of charge. Find links to all the User Guides here.

You can reserve the footlocker for two weeks by selecting the date you'd like to reserve it and then completing the Footlocker Request Form. Schools pay a $25 rental fee, while the Montana Historical Society covers the cost of shipping to the next venue. After a footlocker reservation is made, we will email you an invoice with a link to our secure payment portal. Visit our hands-on history footlocker webpage for more information.  

Resources for teaching October and November Holidays

 On May 9, 2025, Governor Gianforte signed Senate Bill 224 into law, making Indigenous Peoples Day an official state holiday, alongside Columbus Day, on the second Monday in October. 

During the same session, the legislature also passed HB 591, which requires schools to engage in “commemorative exercises” on days designated by the legislature or governor as legal holidays.

In my first post on SB 224, I promised I'd continue to share resources around recognizing holidays.  

Indigenous Peoples Day and Columbus Day

OPI's Indian Education Department has created this lesson for Grades 4-8 on Critical Thinking About the Arrival of Columbus. Their high school lesson, The Colonization Era – An Interview with Dr. James Loewen and Textbook Analysis, asks students to examine myths and challenges them to think about historical events (including Columbus Day and Thanksgiving) from multiple perspectives (Essential Understanding 6). 

Everyday Native has resources for grades 4-12 to dispel stereotypes and teach about contemporary American Indian life.

Edsitement has an elementary lesson called "What Was Columbus Thinking?" that has asks students to identify the stated aims of Columbus's voyages, characterize changes in Columbus's purposes, describe the indigenous people Europeans encountered and the results of their contact, compare the goals of early European exploration with the results, and evaluate the impact of Columbus on the indigenous people of the Americas and his legacy.

Veterans Day

I listed several resources for recognizing Veterans Day in my first post about Freedom Week, including one of my favorite MTHS lesson plans, Reader's Theater: Letters Home from Montanans at War. 

Our friends in the OPI Indian Education Program pulled together this list of resources for teaching about American Indians in the Military.  

The Library of Congress has interesting primary source sets, which include oral histories, and ideas for using them in the classroom.

• Veterans' Stories: The Veterans History Project | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress
• Veterans' Stories: Struggles for Participation | Classroom Materials at the Library of Congress | Library of Congress

And, if you are interested in having your students collect oral histories from veterans, they have information on how to participate in their ongoing Veterans History Project. If you do decide to do an oral history project, the User Guide for our Oral History in the Classroom Mini Footlocker has some really good exercises and useful advice on how to prepare your students. 

Thanksgiving

Last year Mike Jetty wrote a guest post for Teaching Montana History on Demythologizing Thanksgiving. It's still relevant. Here are some other OPI resources and/or links that Mike shared with me: 

• "American Indian Perspectives on Thanksgiving," National Museum of the American Indian 
• Colonization and American Indian Perspectives
• 1621: A New Look at Thanksgiving (Grades 6-8) 

One of my favorite historical questions is "What's changed and what's remained the same?" It makes a great research question around the holidays. Here's a post I wrote with suggestions on how to engage your students in examining Thanksgiving traditions. 

StoryCorps annually puts on the Great Thanksgiving Listen. Consider having your students participate or listen to some of the stories that have been recorded over the years. 

 

MFPE in Missoula (and a Training in Sidney)

 MFPE in Missoula is going to be SO FUN, y'all! Especially the Montana Council for Social Studies kick-off event: Unseen Tours in the Heart of Missoula. On Wednesday, October 15, from 5:30 p.m.-7:30 p.m. MCSS is sponsoring 3 tours: 

• Basements & Back Alleys, a tour exploring, what Missoula downtown life looked like back in the late 1800s and early 1900s, meets in Caras Park near the Carousel. This tour calls for a range of mobility that requires climbing more than 5 flights of stairs; for this reason, it is not ADA accessible. 
• Carnal Enterprises, a tour of Missoula's red-light district--and home to many Missoulians who were pushed to the margins--meets in front of The Wilma. This tour covers about five city blocks and is ADA accessible.
• Hotels & Hooligans, a tour focused on how folks lived and recreated during the city's railroad boom, meets at Burlington Northern Plaza, at the statue of Captain John Mullan by the XXXs on North Higgins. This tour will cover about 10 city blocks. 

If you are attending MFPE, you do NOT need to check in ahead of this event. You will sign in upon arrival at the tour and earn 2 CEUs.

There's going to be great sessions on Thursday and Friday, too, including: 

• Centering Indigenous Voices
• Montana in Literature and History--Part One and Part Two
• Engaging Students through Storytelling
• Power up IEFA with PBS!
• Social Studies For All-Inclusion in Politically Heated Times
• Using Inquiry to Teach (and Unteach) History
• From Oh! Susannah to This Land is Your Land: Teaching US History Through Music
• The Women of the Montana Constitutional Convention of 1972
• EconoQuest: Exploring Montana's Industries and Opportunities on the Global Stage
• Teaching Humanities in Polarized Times
• Student-Driven Research in the Social Studies Classroom
• Wonder, Inquiry, Discovery: Unleashing the Power of Primary Sources in the Social Studies Classroom
• NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER'S HISTORY: Exploring a More Balanced Version of American History in Montana
• MT League of Women Voters Civics Education Courses
• WWII Alien Detention Center Tour at Fort Missoula

Plus, I'll be there staffing the MTHS table. 

Register today.

P.S. If you live in the eastern part of the state, teach grades 6-12, and don't want to drive all the way to Missoula, consider attending consider attending Teaching Historical Thinking through Indigenous Histories on Thursday, October 16, in Sidney. Learn more.