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Using Archival Materials in Languages Courses

Using archival materials in the language classrooms can help students connect to historical events, better understand the present, and think about language and culture through their own disciplinary perspectives. This workshop is for graduate student instructors that would like to use archival materials in their language classrooms, as well as those who already use a variety of archives/repositories to enhance language pedagogies in the classroom.

This workshop was offered as part of the TLC’s 2024 Fall programming. The workshop and materials were developed by Oriana Mejías Martínez.

Materials

All materials on this page and in the linked google folder are licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike (CC-BY-SA) 4.0 International Public License.

This folder contains outreach materials, workshop agenda, slides, and activities used in the workshop.

Materials Folder: Using Archival Materials in Languages Courses [Public Folder]

Workshop slides: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/1Jxio1Gl0zaaqLDh_nftfVtwNEaLbCehilkQiXNHs8cQ/edit?usp=sharing

Detailed agenda: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1FY6bQVwhBx4yJLj9C3ApDEcw94DCBVtWFxjbsttdLIw/edit?usp=sharing

Agenda

2:00-2:10 | Welcome

  • Getting Started
  • Introductions: 
  • Name, program, pronouns
  • Language that you teach

2:10 – 2:35 |  Archive Fever 

ACTIVITY

  • Index cards will be distributed to the participants to write down a free write that responds to:
    • What do you understand by the word archive? (one index card)
    • Which type of experiences have you had with archival materials? (one index card)
  • All index cards with the first question will be left in the center of the table and each person will read one, as a group will comment all the understandings to create a common/shared concept/understanding of what an archive can be
  • Debriefing of the second question sharing experiences

2:35 – 2:50 | Archival materials

  • Archival materials can serve to illustrate slides used in the classroom:
    • Representation of individuals
    • Maps and illustrations
    • Documents that trace and frame historical events
    • Counter narrative documents found in archives

Have the instructors accessed any archive? Where can we find these?

2:50 – 3:20 | Task-based activity/assignment with archival material

ACTIVITY

Create a Task-based assignment using different source materials:

examples:

  • Low stakes assignment
    • Translation work can be particular important if the resource does not have another language of access
  • High stakes assignment
    • Asking the students to develop a lesson plan around an item from the archive; this can range from searching for critical readings to literary pieces that include/mention this object/event.

This lesson plan works as an access point to read the object/event for the student and the class.

3:20 – 3:30 |  Language classes are content classes

Circling back to this discussion

  • What does “cultural content” mean?

dicotomía: clases de contenido vs. clases de lengua – las clases de lengua se consideran clases sin contenido – ¿por qué?

¿Qué es cultura? – entendemos en término en sentido amplio