The New York City Department of Education's Leadership in American History grant is sponsoring the 2008–2009 American History Film Club, a collaboration between the Education Department and The Paley Center for Media designed to provide teachers with strategies to effectively use mainstream movies in conjunction with the 7th grade American history curriculum.

Participating 7th grade American history teachers will meet for a series of five evening sessions from October 2008 to February 2009 to examine themes, content, and historical accuracies and inaccuracies in some of Hollywood's cinematic interpretations of early American history. Participants will receive and view film selections prior to each session and attend all five American History Film Club meetings. The club's facilitators will lead historical and pedagogical sessions on strategies for utilizing each film in the classroom and will share primary media documents from the Paley Center collection.

American history teachers will be admitted to the Club on a first-come, first-served basis. For more information or to register, email Elise Abegg, project director for Leadership in American History, at eabegg@schools.nyc.gov.

Film Club Meeting Dates

All sessions: 4:30 to 6:30 pm

October 7, 2008
October 28, 2008
November 18, 2008
December 16, 2008
February 3, 2009

Leadership in American History is a federally funded Teaching American History grant. Grant partners include: the NYC Department of Education, the Brooklyn Historical Society, City Lore, the Gotham Center for New York City History, Henry Street Settlement, Historic House Trust, the Paley Center for Media, the New-York Historical Society, and the Scarsdale Group.

Leadership in American History