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Syllabi, Lessons Plans, and Other Teaching Materials

MIT Open CourseworkWhile there is an ambitious plan to expand the scope of materials available to teachers at all levels, those available today are limited. Currently, one of the best sources of ideas and materials is the MITopencourseware Web site for the department of Science,Technology, and Society at MIT. Available here you will find Web-based and downloadable course materials for nearly 50 different STS graduate and undergraduate courses on the History of Technology and the History of Science.

An extremely useful source of lesson plans and related teaching materials is the National Endowment for the Humanities sponsored Website, Edsitement: Lesson Plans. A search for “history of technology” or a specific subject can yield a lesson that includes an introduction, guiding questions, learning objectives, preparation instructions, lesson activities, and a section on extending the lesson through the use of other materials and resources.

SIGCIS, the SHOT Special Interest Group on Computers, Information, and Society maintains an extensive syllabus repository with more than 40 examples of courses in the field, authored and compiled by SHOT members.

You Can Help Build the SHOT Library of Teaching Materials

While many of us teach the history of technology as a discipline or as one aspect of some other historical field, we don’t always have the opportunity to share the ideas and techniques we use to engage students on the subject. Now you can make those ideas and techniques available to other educators by contributing a variety of materials–from syllabi to individual lessons plans–to the SHOT Website. We are seeking syllabi for survey courses and narrower topical courses in the history of technology, as well as materials on the subject as an integrated component of another historical field. We are also seeking materials that are useful in teaching K-12 students, museum visitors, and non-traditional audiences. You may email a link for your course Website or you may send PDFs of your course materials as an email attachment to the SHOT Secretary. Please, help accelerate the rate at which material is added to this site by participating.

Thank you for your generous assistance in building this valuable resource.