Mr. Lamb Goes To Washington    posted 7/8/2005    

Middle school history teacher Travis Lamb traveled to College Park, Maryland, just outside Washington, with Topeka Collegiate’s six National History Day qualifiers in mid-June. Mr. Lamb was there in part because three of his seventh grade students - Quentin Chediak, David Gast and Daniel Mandel  donated scholarship money they won at the state competition to help insure their teacher could make the trip to nationals with them.

At the contest site, Mr. Lamb described the eagerness and pride with which the boys reassembled their exhibit after it had been disassembled for shipping. “It was touching to see them care so much,” he says. One of the highlights for Mr. Lamb was the moment just before the three boys were set to begin answering judges’ questions about their group exhibit on Native American Code Talkers. He straightened their ties, brushed off the lapels of their matching navy blazers and sent them on their way. “It was one of those moments,” he remembers, “that makes you realize why you teach.”

Mr. Lamb was student as well as teacher in College Park. He attended a professional development workshop for history teachers led by Harvard historian Dr. Susan

O’ Donovan. Particularly helpful was the session on analyzing primary source material. “She gave us several prompt questions for students to use as they examine sources,” says Mr. Lamb, “things like ‘Who was the audience?’ ‘What are the assumptions being made in the document?’ and ‘What else was going on at the time?’”

For a teacher who has just finished his first year of shepherding students through the History Day process, Mr. Lamb says it was invaluable to him to see “how high the bar is set” at the national competition, and to learn “details that go into making a project spectacular.”

Seventh graders Anna Hamilton and Sjobor Hammer won second place in the group documentary category at National History Day competition, with their examination of William Allen white’s battle against the KKK in Kansas, titled “Walking the Path of Duty: William Allen white and the Ku Klux Klan. Topeka Collegiate eighth grader Robert Hamilton finished 14^th in the individual performance category at National History Day with his depiction of a Kansas public health crusader, “Dr. Samuel J. Crumbine: Communicating Public Health Reform in Kansas.” 

National History Day is a year-long education program that engages students in the process of discovery and interpretation of historical topics. Students produce dramatic performances, imaginative exhibits, multimedia documentaries and research papers based on research related to an annual theme. These projects are then evaluated at local, state, and national competitions.