Interactive History Lessons with Mission US

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[00:00:00] Shanna Martin: Thanks for listening to the Tech Tools for Teachers podcast, where each week we talk about a free. These are two of technology that you can use in your classroom. I'm your host Shanna Martin. I'm a middle school teacher, technology and instructional coach for my district,

[00:00:32] Fuzz Martin: and I'm her husband, Fuzz Martin.

[00:00:34] Fuzz Martin: And my mission is to produce this podcast for us.

[00:00:40] Shanna Martin: I'm glad you practiced out in the car in the later. Yeah, I did. I did.

[00:00:43] Fuzz Martin: Oops. It's a, it's a good Hi. Hi. Welcome to our Lives and our show.

[00:00:51] Shanna Martin: Yes. It's

[00:00:51] Fuzz Martin: really your show. I'm just here. To push the buttons

[00:00:54] Shanna Martin: to hang out.

[00:00:56] Fuzz Martin: Yeah.

[00:00:57] Shanna Martin: Yay. So we are in season seven, episode 2 0 9.

[00:01:03] Shanna Martin: It is April, and the sun is finally shining and it's super deceptive because it's actually like cold out.

[00:01:12] Fuzz Martin: Yeah, yeah.

[00:01:14] Shanna Martin: It was like roll down the windows. Wear a T-shirt. Yeah, it's like 49 degrees outside. But I guess in Wisconsin that is T-shirt weather, isn't it?

[00:01:22] Fuzz Martin: I mean, yeah. For me,

[00:01:23] Shanna Martin: yeah.

[00:01:24] Fuzz Martin: Ellie Shorts and a hoodie

[00:01:25] Shanna Martin: short, I just say shorts and a hoodie.

[00:01:26] Shanna Martin: Yeah. And knee socks. It's classy with my slippers in the house. Yeah, that's a classy one. And

[00:01:32] Fuzz Martin: now you have a picture into our life.

[00:01:36] Shanna Martin: Uh, yes. Well, it is April and we're talking about fun things. Um, so I have. I obviously, I've talked about this before, but I teach social studies along with like technology and instructional coaching and stuff.

[00:01:50] Shanna Martin: And I have been using a very cool site that it was like linked through PBS is kind of how I found it. And for those that teach social studies or just different things in history, it doesn't even have to be a social studies teacher really. There's a really cool site that I ran across and use in my classroom now, and it's called Mission Us Mission

[00:02:18] Fuzz Martin: Us

[00:02:18] Shanna Martin: Mission us.

[00:02:19] Shanna Martin: So it's literally M-I-S-S-I-O n-us.org. And its whole goal is to teach about some major events in US History, which, I mean, there's a lot of resources out there, but this is the first one that I found where my kids are. Interested in it and it's interactive, but it teaches topics that like, that encourage like a lot of discussion, so, okay.

[00:02:45] Shanna Martin: Anyway, like my, like my top five things. Why I really like this website is it's super engaging and thought provoking. So it doesn't just like skim over information. It actually, it's like a simulator. It puts kids into the situation and gives them kind of a storyline to follow, which has sparked really good discussion for my students.

[00:03:05] Shanna Martin: And it can be done in small increments. Like you don't have to assign the whole thing at once. You can actually break down the mission. Into like the prologue and then there's like different sections and each one, as it's teaching about like US history and different things that are like challenging, like the discussion points are there.

[00:03:23] Shanna Martin: But as a teacher it also has, a. Lesson plan guides and, we will break it down like this whole, if they do the whole simulator, it would take like two and a half hours if they did it in one sitting and nobody has to do it in two and a half hours ever. You can just break it down and then it gives you like exit tickets for your classroom and discussion points.

[00:03:42] Shanna Martin: Oh, sure. And questions. And then it has like PD for teachers as to how to teach these things. Like there's all these cool elements that go with it, and I'll talk about that with a site in a second. But like, it's just very. It's well done. It's very clearly explained and like has support for teachers when you're teaching the information.

[00:04:01] Shanna Martin: Mm-hmm. It engages like critical discussions and I've been using it with my students and they've been talking about parts of it where I only assigned like one portion. I am assigned one of the prologues to go with some and they like, well, can we go forward if we want to? I'm like, sure. Like we will get there eventually.

[00:04:18] Shanna Martin: And like, oh, well I really wanna complete this 'cause I wanna know like more about, or I wanna engage in more information about the topic. 'cause we're talking about the topics in class that I'm teaching about them. And then they also have like vocabulary supports in there where as you're going through the game, like you pull the vocabulary and you add it to little dictionaries.

[00:04:34] Shanna Martin: So you have like specific vocabulary that goes with the topics. It's just all very cool and very. Very well done. When you have to have like conversations about topics in history, they're kinda like, where do I start to make this appropriate for students? Mm-hmm. But also talk about it at the same time.

[00:04:50] Shanna Martin: So, if you go to mission us.org, it is created and they say kind of like sixth grade on up.

[00:04:58] Fuzz Martin: Okay.

[00:05:00] Shanna Martin: I will say the child in our house is a fourth grader and she played, um, and she gets parts of it, obviously as a parent of teaching social studies as we talk about these things. So she knows about some of it.

[00:05:11] Shanna Martin: Yeah. But also she just picked, like, she doesn't get the full depth of what the information is at her age, but I would say probably sixth grade on up. For having it in your classroom. And as a teacher you create your own teacher account and you have a teacher dashboard. Mm-hmm. Which is really cool because as a teacher then I assign, like all of my students have a login and then they have a password and I just set the same password for all my kids because it's an assignment and I can manage my classes, but I can go into each assignment.

[00:05:44] Shanna Martin: So let's pick the dust bowl. So the, the game for the Dust Bowl is called, um,

[00:05:55] Fuzz Martin: up from the dust, up

[00:05:56] Shanna Martin: from the dust, 1920 nine's, the Great Depression. It's all about the Great Depression. And when you go in, like my teacher dashboard where I'm assigned to my students, I can see how my students have started the simulator.

[00:06:08] Shanna Martin: And then how many students have completed it by section of the simulator. So like there's a prologue, boomer bust, neighbors in need, riding the rails, a new deal for some California or dust epilogue. So it walks you almost through the story of ev, like everything that's going on. It gives you the background of the characters, the people you're gonna encounter.

[00:06:28] Shanna Martin: Mm-hmm. There's trailer videos, like, again, it's really well. Done where you are. You are one of the done twins growing up on a Texas wheat farm. Yeah. In the next, so it gives you like the background of like what storyline you're gonna jump into. Mm-hmm. And then what you need to decide. And then if I click on prologue, I can see which of my students have started it, which of my students have finished, and then how well they scored.

[00:06:54] Shanna Martin: If there is specific like quiz questions or questions involved. Not every section has that. And then I can see the average class score for each section as well, so I can track all my students as they go through. I had my students go through and write a reflection afterwards, like, wow, I didn't think about this and if I chose this information, then this happened.

[00:07:14] Shanna Martin: And it just, I. We had really good conversations about, and they were all hung up on, you get to name the cow, oh, in the Prologo Dust Bowl. And I can't tell you how many conversations started with, Hey, what did you name the cow? Because there's like three choices. Like, oh yeah, I named her Amelia Earhart too.

[00:07:30] Shanna Martin: And I'm like, okay, what else did we learn? And they're like, oh, well I didn't realize like. When you have to choose between are you keeping cattle or are you keeping crops? And then there was no rainfalls, then they like lost money on the crops. Like then we had real discussions afterwards and I was impressed with how much information they pulled from just the prologue.

[00:07:50] Shanna Martin: And then we did the other pieces as we went through. Mm-hmm. But just starting them off that way, I was like, wow, my eighth graders get so much out of like this. Like the first piece of this, and it was continuing. Then as we continued the unit, then they went to the next part and they learned about riding the rails and what that was like, and it was very cool.

[00:08:09] Fuzz Martin: Yeah,

[00:08:09] Shanna Martin: so it's one of those where students can work independently, but you definitely as a teacher need to guide what. Like you're guiding the conversation along as they're playing. So they're engaged in the simulation, but also having real conversations. But yeah, from American Revolution, I think you read through these immigrant experience, Western expansion, world War ii, civil Rights Movement, fighting for freedom.

[00:08:35] Shanna Martin: Like there's so many, just, it's just very cool. So there are seven missions that they can go on, but each one takes like a large chunk of time. It's not gonna happen instantly. It's not like they can zip through it. And also they just have lots of cool teacher resources. So when you go to the website itself, kids can play, you have to set it up as a teacher.

[00:08:53] Shanna Martin: Again, it's free for them to be able to get into it. Mm-hmm. And then for teaching purposes, they have, um, like teacher meetups, they have additional information about those topics. So maybe you don't even wanna use the full simulator, but you wanna be able to have, uh, resources for your classroom. You can do that.

[00:09:13] Shanna Martin: This media project they've put together in the About section explains the background. Like, why do you use Mission Us? Where like they're coming from the awards they've won with this setup. And then the teacher dashboard. And I love that I can see where my students are. And it's not just the whole thing, like this kid's finished it, it's like this kid is on this question.

[00:09:35] Shanna Martin: Sure. And I can go walk over and talk to a kid and be like, all right, where you at? Or what's in your group? Like, what are you doing? Or what have you? Problem solved. Mm-hmm. Yeah. There's just a lot of really cool pieces to it.

[00:09:44] Fuzz Martin: Yeah. For instance, on the teacher meetups that you mentioned. Mm-hmm. So if you're listening to this on the day that it drops, which is on, Monday, April 7th, 2025, they've got one on Tuesday the eighth from seven to 8:00 PM Eastern Time.

[00:10:01] Fuzz Martin: On history and the environment, and they're going to, talk about, it's Earth Month. So they're talking about history and the environment with a look at the mission, US Interactive Games, a Cheyenne Odyssey and Up from the Dust, which we just discussed, and then they have a guest on, I. Who is a sustainability science manager and tribal liaison at the South Central Climate Adaptation Science Center.

[00:10:23] Fuzz Martin: So,

[00:10:24] Shanna Martin: yeah.

[00:10:24] Fuzz Martin: Pretty cool. And it looks like it's, there's just a Zoom link, so I assume it's just for you to join and you can Yep. And jump

[00:10:29] Shanna Martin: on in and there's like a little registration link and then you can jump on in. Yeah. Um, but yeah, just a really great collection of resources for educators. Mm-hmm. And topics that it's not.

[00:10:44] Shanna Martin: It's not always the topics that you would like. I mean, there are things that we talk about in history, I guess, but sometimes there's just so overwhelming. You're like, okay, we're gonna this briefly. We only have, you know, three days to cover this in class. So that way, 'cause trying to teach history, obviously history is always happening, so, mm-hmm.

[00:11:02] Shanna Martin: There's so much to always cover and this is a great way to like zone in on some very specific conversations with your students and engage them with like, feeling the content a little bit more, which I thought was very cool. So Mission Us teaches some very cool, interesting pieces of US history along with engaging your students in like simulation games and.

[00:11:28] Shanna Martin: Having them learn and discuss and reflect about these times in history. And I think it's just super cool. So even if you are not a socialized teacher, I would suggest checking it out. As a teacher, I'm always learning things, even if I don't teach the content area. And it's one of those like, wow, like playing, this is gonna teach you some background of things you just might wanna know.

[00:11:46] Shanna Martin: And also it would be something you could expose your kids to or share with ESE teachers that are. Around you if you don't teach social studies. So it's just something to check out. I suggest it's a very cool site and a very cool way to engage your kids in some social studies conversations.

[00:12:00] Fuzz Martin: Yep. It's put together by the W Net Group, which is a nonprofit group that runs, New York, 13, the PBS station and a bunch of other.

[00:12:10] Fuzz Martin: PBS stations and NPR stations on the East Coast. So Cool. Pretty cool. Yeah. Funded by the Center for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Humanities. Kind of a, a neat setup.

[00:12:21] Shanna Martin: Yeah. So Mission us. Check it out. It's fun to engage your kids in and hey, they get to name a cow, so there you go.

[00:12:30] Shanna Martin: Thanks for tuning in. This has been the Tech Tools for Teachers Podcast. If you ever have any questions, you can find me on Blue Sky Threads. Facebook, Instagram, smart nwi. And if you wanna get more information on the links to the technology discuss in this episode, you can visit smartin wi.com. If you'd like to support the show, please consider buying me a coffee or two.

[00:12:49] Shanna Martin: Visit. Buy me a coffee.com/spart or visit spartan wi.com and click on that cute little purple coffee cup. Your donations help keep the show going. New episodes each week. Thanks for listening. Go educate and innovate

[00:13:01] Fuzz Martin: the ideas and. Opinions expressed on this podcast and the smartinwi Web website are are those of the author Shanna Martin and not of her employer.

[00:13:09] Fuzz Martin: Prior to using any of the technologies discussed on this podcast, please consult with your employer regulations. This podcast offers no guarantee that these tools will work for you as described, but we sure hope they do and we will talk to you next. Week right here on the Tech Tools for Teachers Podcast.