National History Day

Last Friday, I served as a judge at the Grout Museum for the local level of the National History Day competition. I make no secret of my preference for history lessons sprinkled with some fiction to make them more interesting, but felt that agreeing to judge would be a nice thing to do.

And I'm really glad I did. Over 300 middle-school-aged youth were part of the competition. It was hard to judge, but that was only because the entries in my area were really great. The kids had obviously put their hearts into researching and presenting their individual within a venue designed to capture their audience. According to the website, every day is National History Day, and in addition to encouraging students in "discovering the exciting world of the past," NHD also serves to help develop researching skills, critical and problem-solving skills, builds self-confidence and much more.

Often in my position I hear primarily about the problems with teens. And as a librarian, I do have a particular interest in research. So, it was wonderful to see this age group hand over a multi-page annotated bibliography. They'd done the research! It was mostly internet-based, and not necessarily sources I might have chosen, but I was also given the opportunity to make suggestions. There are thousands of students out there who are interested in excelling at more than their MySpace profile (not that there's anything wrong with MySpace....)! And I was handed a great opportunity to reach out and humbly contributed to their research skills. I was impressed, and I enjoyed my history lessons.