Documenting United States History: Themes, Concepts, and Skills for the Ap* Course - Tapa dura

Updated for the 2015 AP® US History Redesigned Course revisions.

Authored by experienced AP® teachers, workshop leaders, and AP® Exam readers, this document reader is the must-have resource for your redesigned AP® US History classroom. Documenting US History complements your textbook and in class work by helping students cultivate the historical skills they will need to think critically and purposefully.

The 22 chapters follow the 9 periods of U.S. History as defined in the new framework. Within each period and chapter, pedagogical tools scaffold students’ development of the historical thinking skills central to the course and the exam. Key concepts are illustrated by primary documents and secondary sources including written texts, drawings, photographs, maps, and charts.

The units are developed sequentially, beginning with fundamental building blocks to writing historical argument moving toward effective ways of using and organizing evidence and concluding with different ways of approaching historical argument.

Jason Stacy is associate professor of U. S. History and Social Science Pedagogy at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Before joining the history department at SIUe, Stacy taught AP(r) U.S. History for eight years at Adlai E. Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire Illinois. Stacy has served as an AP(r) U.S. History Reader, Table Leader, Exam Leader, Consultant, Senior Auditor, and question author for the redesigned AP(r) U.S. History exam.

Stacy is the author of Walt Whitman's Multitudes: Labor Reform and Persona in Whitman's Journalism and the First Leaves of Grass, 1840-1855 (2008), editor of Leaves of Grass, 1860: the 150th Anniversary Facsimile Edition (2009) and co-editor of Walt Whitman s Selected Journalism (2015). His research has appeared in Social Education, the Walt Whitman Quarterly Review, and American Educational History and his reviews have appeared in American Literature, the Journal of American History, and the Walt Whitman Quarterly Review. Stacy is also a contributing editor for the Walt Whitman Archive. Since 2009, Stacy has served as editor-in-chief of The Councilor: A Journal of the Social Studies. He is a former president of the Illinois Council for the Social Studies (2014).

Stephen Heller has taught for 28 years in the Chicagoland area, the last 16 of which have been at Adlai E Stevenson High School in Lincolnshire, IL, where he teaches AP(r) English Language and Composition. Heller has served as a Question Leader, Table Leader, and Reader for the AP(r) English Language and Composition exam, and he recently completed a six year term on the AP(r) English Language and Composition Test Development Committee. A national and international College Board consultant for AP(r) and Pre-AP(r) English, Heller has also served as the College Board Adviser while on the Development Committee. Heller is also a contributing item writer for the revised SAT exam, and he also serves as a reader for the International Baccalaureate exam.

Heller's publications include co-authorship of two textbooks for pre-AP(r) and AP(r) English: AP(r) English Bound (2009) and Entering the Conversation (2010), both with Peoples Publishing. Heller also was the editor in chief and served as a contributing author to the College Board's 2007 and 2013 workshop materials--"Using Sources" and "Expanding Definitions of Argument," respectively, as well as serving as a contributing author to the College Board's English Vertical Teams workshop. Heller's additional publications have appeared in English Journal, Social Education (a piece co-authored with Jason Stacy) and the Illinois Bulletin of English.

Since 2007, Heller has teamed with Jason Stacy to teach American Themes in the AP(r) Classroom, a course that examines the skills common to both AP(r) English Language and AP(r) US History, and for many years this course has been offered at Carleton College, Northfield, MN. In 2006 Heller was recognized as an outstanding teacher by the US Department of Education as part of the Presidential Scholars program. Heller also serves on NCTE's Secondary Section Steering Committee."