This resource guide aims to bring local history alive. Students can use tools of history to explore their school's neighborhood and where they live; as they learn more about areas they know and those they haven't yet explored, the city itself becomes a classroom.
Provided are background resources, aimed for adult learners. In addition to resources that address the city as a whole, there are neighborhood-specific guides that help prepare educators to teach the varied and often complicated histories of DC's communities. Each neighborhood's page is organized by thematic questions, the answers to which are found in primary and secondary resources from the DC History Center, DC Public Library, the Library of Congress, and other institutions.
New addition: Lesson plans and activities aligned to the District of Columbia Social Studies Standards, as revised and approved in June 2023, for grades 1-3 and grades 4-5.
This guide will be updated and additional neighborhoods periodically added. The DC History Center especially thanks Claire Bents, Philip Warfield, and Cody Norton for their contributions. This guide and accompanying curriculum was developed with support from the Clarice Smith Neighborhood History Program at the DC History Center.
