Premium How to Use the Premium
In addition to the Roadmap, a Premium service is also provided to those users who desire both additional teaching materials and interactive student features. Like the Roadmap, the Premium site is designed by award-winning educators to support Dr. William Bennett’s two volume narrative history, America: The Last Best Hope. It is designed to take advantage of the digital revolution through use of a student mailbag (“Ask Team HOPE”), the ability to post U.S. History related audio, video, images, artwork, and lessons, access to live Webcam conversations with America: The Last Best Hope author Dr. Bennett, full audio versions of America: The Last Best Hope, dozens of plays, mnemonics, debates, and many other highly valuable features. The Premium is designed to grow and have a flexibility to accommodate contributions of users. Truly, Premium membership means access to the innovative ideas of students and teachers across our nation.
Using the Premium Site
The Premium website is a password protected area only accessible by Premium subscribers. When entering the site, across the top toolbar, you will see that the site is divided into the three volumes that create the Last Best Hope package: Volume I, Volume II, and Volume II Enhanced. Clicking on any of these links will direct you to a main page for that volume. However, several features are available for each volume. They include:
Ask Team HOPE
The “Ask Team HOPE” feature was developed to allow student, teachers, or classes to pose Last Best Hope questions to the Team HOPE experts and receive answers online in a blog-type format. Guidelines have been developed to guide users. Team HOPE will choose the best and most relevant questions to answer. This is a great way to get your students thinking beyond the classroom and delving into the fascinating world of questions a serious student of history inevitably asks.
Your Lessons, Projects, Essays, and More
This interactive feature allows students or teachers to submit lessons, essays, paintings, music, projects, and new material for the Roadmap Web site that coincides with LBH chapters. Team HOPE members will review all submissions, and post Roadmap worthy submissions on the Premium web site, allowing access to valuable and innovative content to other users throughout the country! An added bonus is that selected submissions will receive a signed certificate from Team HOPE and Dr. Bennett. Guidelines have been developed to direct users on the expectations and process that will be used to review submissions.
Premium Media
Premium media include three separate segments:
Moments in History with Dr. Bennett includes audio Podcasts, one per month, recorded by Dr. Bennett on various topics throughout American history. Access the “How to Use the Roadmap Podcasts” for ideas on how to make the most of these unique treasures.
Pre-1900 Famous Speeches and Words contains audio-taped excerpts from famous speeches and words presented and interpreted by high school students. These fantastic recordings can be inserted into lessons, downloaded, and/or used as examples of how your students can effectively present historical speeches. See “How to Use Speech in the Classroom.”
Let’s Hear Your Speeches allows students and teachers the opportunity to submit their own audio presentation of historical speeches and words and gain recognition in the process! Team HOPE content specialists will review all submissions and post those of merit on the Premium web site. All selected submissions will receive a signed certificate from Team HOPE and Dr. Bennett. Two resources have been developed to help you with the submission process: “How to Submit Audio,” and “How to Use Speech in the Classroom.”
This Day in American History
This Day in American History is a truly one of a kind feature that can only be found through Team HOPE. Dr. Bennett’s latest book The American Patriot’s Almanac (2008) will be provided on the Premium website on the home page. Thomas Nelson describes the books as follows: “Easily readable and accessible to all ages, The American Patriot’s Almanac is divided into 365 entries, one for each day of the year. Each entry recalls a remarkable event that took place on that day in American history, providing a touch point for knowing what America is and what she represents.” Updated daily, a link will provide access to the corresponding page(s) in The American Patriot’s Almanac covering that day in history. A resource “How to Use This Day in History” has been provided as a guide for its effective use in the classroom. Don’t miss this exciting addition to the Premium!
HOPE Tube
HOPE Tube is the Premium site version of “YouTube,” the place where students and teachers can submit videos that corresponds with chapters in Last Best Hope. Submissions might include speeches, presentations, play performances from Roadmap lessons, original plays written by students, videos from field trips to historic locations (show Premium users locations near where you live!), student newscasts, reenactments, and other possibilities that coincide with American history. An archive of selected submissions will be kept so that relevant material can be used by future Premium users. All selected submissions will receive a signed certificate from Team HOPE and Dr. Bennett. Guidelines have been developed for user submissions.
Live Webcam Discussions with author William J. Bennett
Starting in Spring of 2009, the Premium site will host live webcams with Dr. Bennett. This is a unique opportunity for students to access not only the author of their history textbook, but to also interact with a renowned figure in modern American politics and literature. Participants will be notified via email as to the topic and be given instructions with guidelines on how to submit questions and what preparations need to take place prior to the event.
Mnemonics
Just like the Roadmap, each chapter in the Premium site also provides teachers with a PowerPoint Mnemonic device to help students remember key content using clever acronyms that represent important material. There are over thirty-five additional mnemonic PowerPoint lessons over and above the twenty-five such devices provided on the Roadmap. Please see, “How to Use Mnemonics in the Classroom.”
Last Best Hope for Your eBook Reader
This element provides all users with a downloadable and searchable version of Last Best Hope that can be used with your personal eBook reader. Allowing students access to Last Best Hope in easy to use forms gives further access and ability to enjoy the pageantry of American history.
Original Plays
Similar to the Roadmap, there are original historical plays which can be used to effectively dramatize the important events of an era. Plays are available for every chapter of all LBH volumes and contain student questions to guide discussion after the performance of a play. Students will be highly motivated and excited to participate in this activity and, as a result, will learn the material more effectively.
Debates
All research shows that students learn best when they are active participants in the class so material is provided to truly involve your students in history. The debate section provides interesting topics and controversial issues for student discussion. A detailed guide outlining the background issues of the period and procedures for conducting an effective debate is provided to teachers to help maximize the effectiveness of student presentations.
Audio recordings of Last Best Hope
There is no other textbook that offers such a unique feature: a downloadable unedited professional audio recording of every word in the text. The best part is that this is one textbook audio recording that you and your students will want to download and listen to! This is a great resource for students to access the book, listen on their ipod, or to simply to enjoy a well-done recording.
Read Last Best Hope Online
Simply, this element will allow students to read Last Best Hope online; guaranteeing access to the book anywhere a student has access to the Internet.
Spanish Translations of Last Best Hope
In today’s diverse culture, the need for a Spanish translation of textbooks is a necessity in many schools in the United States. The Spanish translation is offered only to Premium subscribers.
HOPE Archive
A constantly changing feature, the HOPE Archive will provide access to all content that has been submitted and chosen for posting on the Premium site. Included will be past “Ask Team HOPE Q&A,” audio of speeches, HOPE Tube videos, lessons, projects, essays, and much more.
Beyond Last Best Hope, 1989 to the present
America: Last Best Hope, Volume II and Volume II Enhanced ends with the Reagan Presidency mainly because most historians argue that a proper understanding of history typically takes 20-30 years after the events have passed. However, recognizing that some state standards require teachers to cover the post-1989 era, Team HOPE has provided an overview of the three administrations during this period: George H.W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush. Each President is treated as essentially a separate “chapter,” and includes most of the same features that are present in the Roadmap. Such features include a Chapter Summary, Mnemonic, Timeline, Debate, Play, Other Resources, Key Historical Points, Key People You Should Know, Critical Events, Historic Terms and Places, Primary Sources, and Laws & Legislation. All of these resources come with many links to current web-sites and materials that will enhance student learning of this time period.
Future Premium Features to be developed…
The Premium subscription is intended to be an ever-changing resource and Team HOPE is already in the process of planning for and developing added features. To give you a glimpse into the future, we hope to add interactive features such as blogs, discussion threads, and blackboard postings. That is not all however. We plan to develop additional lesson plans, suggestions for project-based learning activities, simulations, web-based review games, and possibly even a type of historical gaming. The possibilities are endless and Team HOPE plans to stay on the cutting edge of digital revolution and bring you the highest quality curriculum.