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Philippa Rappoport

Lead, Education and Engagement
Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology
Smithsonian Staff

I work in education and engagement, teacher professional development, and outreach at the Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology (OET), and have a particular interest in developing and producing trainings, programs, teaching techniques, and platforms that foster deep learning and contribute knowledge to improve practices in museum and preK-16 education and engagement. At OET over the last decade+, I created digital assets for schools, families, and new immigrant English Language learners to complement teacher professional development and pan-Smithsonian programming, including Learning Lab teaching collections, YouTube videos with tradition bearers, a handmade family stories book-making website, and online heritage tours.

Philippa Rappoport's collections

 

The Search for an American Identity: Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship 2019 Opening Panel Resources

<p>This collection serves as an introduction to the opening panel of the 2019 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “The Search for an American Identity: Building a Nation Together.” Three Smithsonian staff members will present at the opening panel, including David Penney (Associate Director of Research and Scholarship at the National Museum of the American Indian), Ranald Woodaman (Director of Exhibitions and Public Programs at the Smithsonian Latino Center), and Paula Johnson (Curator at the National Museum of American History). Their bios, presentation descriptions, and other resources are included inside.</p><p>As you explore the resources be sure to jot down any questions you may have for the presenters. </p><p>It's going to be a great seminar series!<br /><br /><br />#MCteach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
17
 

The William Steinway Diary, 1861-1896: A Unique Perspective on post-Civil War New York

<p>This teaching collection asks students to explore William Steinway’s Diary—which includes diary passages, Steinway family photographs, maps, and advertisements that bring alive the fear and chaos of the 1863 Civil War Draft Riots and his hands-on role in the creation of the New York City subway and the company town of Steinway in modern-day Astoria, Queens - as a jumping off point to understand the second half of the 19th century. Included are two Project Zero Thinking Routines and an Analysis Sheet to help students analyse these primary documents. Students can also expand the activity by researching other historical writings (newspapers, journals, city maps, etc.) from the time period, to gain a deeper understanding of this dynamic period in American history. </p><p>The online exhibition describes: "Over 36 years, nine volumes, and more than 2,500 pages, entries record a newlywed’s exuberance, his observations of a country at war, and his emergence as a leader in the cultural, political, financial, and physical development of New York City. In near-daily entries until his death in 1896, William details the period’s financial panics and labor turmoil, rise of the German immigrant class, growing sophistication of transportation, and fierce piano manufacturing wars in which his family firm, Steinway &amp; Sons, was a major player. A proud member of New York’s German American community, William was at once an immigrant success story and an ambitious industrialist whose development of the company town of Steinway left a lasting imprint on modern-day Queens."</p><p><br /><br /></p>
Philippa Rappoport
14
 

Women's History Month Family Festival

<p>Here is a collection of videos from a Women's History Month family festival, that includes interviews and performance footage with Kathak dancer Prachi Dalal, Native American singing group Ulali, mother-daughter storyteller and artist Yona Zeldis McDonough and Malcah Zeldis, and the Georgia Tech Glee Club paying tribute to the women in the audience for Women's History Month. </p>
Philippa Rappoport
5
 

Eye to I: Self-Portraiture as an Exploration of Identity

This collection serves as a preview for the final of six seminar sessions in the 2019 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “The Search for an American Identity: Building a Nation Together.”<br /><br /> National Portrait Gallery colleagues Wendy Wick Reaves and Briana Zavadil White will discuss the exhibition, "Eye to I: Self-Portraits from 1900 to Today." They maintain that, as people are confronted each day with “selfies” via social media and as they continue to examine the fluidity of contemporary identity, this is an opportune time to reassess the significance of self-portraiture in relation to the country’s history and culture.<br /><br /> Resources included in this collection have been chosen by the presenters for participants to explore before the seminar itself.<br /><br /> #MCteach
Philippa Rappoport
7
 

The Social Power of Music

<p>This collection serves as a preview for the fourth of six seminar sessions in the 2018 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “We the People: America’s Grand and Radical Experiment with Democracy.” </p> <p>James Deutsch and Atesh Sonneborn of the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage (CFCH) will explore with Fellows the social relevance of music, and how music conveys meaning in our lives. They will also take Fellows on a guided tour of the CFCH collections.</p> <p>#MCteach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
9
 

The Democratization of Portraiture: Prints and Drawings of all the People by the People

<p>This collection serves as a preview for the first seminar session of the 2018 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “We the People: America’s Grand and Radical Experiment with Democracy.” </p> <p>National Portrait Gallery curator Asma Naeem and educator Briana Zavadil White will present an engaging and interactive examination of the democratization of portraiture in the United States, and model close looking techniques that Fellows can use with their students. Included within are a presentation description, participant bios, a "reading portraiture" guide, and images and articles for participants to consider in advance of the session.</p> <p>#MCteach</p> <p>Christopher Columbus, Yarrow Mamout, Charles Mingus, Lena Horne, Leonard Roy Harmon, Bill Viola</p> <p><br /></p>
Philippa Rappoport
10
 

We the People: Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship 2018 Opening Panel Resources

<p>This collection serves as an introduction to the opening panel of the 2018 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “We the People: America’s Grand and Radical Experiment with Democracy.” The title for the opening panel is "The Smithsonian Institution: “A Community of Learning and the Opener of Doors.” <br /><br />Four Smithsonian staff members will present, including Richard Kurin (SI Distinguished Scholar and Ambassador-at-Large, Office of the Secretary), Jessica Johnson (Digital Engagement Producer, National Museum of African American History and Culture), Lisa Sasaki (Director, Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center), and Chris Wilson (Director, Program in African American Culture, National Museum of American History). Their bios, presentation descriptions, and other resources are included here.<br /><br /><br />#MCteach </p>
Philippa Rappoport
16
 

Looking Past Words: An Exploration of Language, Systems, and Power through Three Case Studies

<p>This teaching collection explores the role of language and power in American and European history through three case studies: the Holocaust, Japanese American incarceration, and Northern Plains treaties. Paired with discussion questions from Project Zero's Global Thinking routines, "Think, Feel, Care" and "The 3 Y's," the collection aims to develop in students a sense of how individuals interact within a particular system, and the significance of these systems and interactions from personal, local, and global contexts.<br></p> <p>#EthnicStudies</p>
Philippa Rappoport
12
 

Facing Genocide: The US Response to the Holocaust

<p>My aunt remembers sitting at the kitchen table as a child while her parents, my grandparents, read the Yiddish newspaper, <em>Der Tag. </em>Often one would cry out, <em>nishta </em>("gone"), <em></em>"this one <em>nishta</em>; that one <em>nishta,</em>" in response to the paper's lists of towns in Europe overrun by the Nazis. </p> <p>This collection examines the US response to the Holocaust, pairing historical documentation with four thinking routines from Harvard's Project Zero Global Thinking and Agency by Design materials - "Unveiling Stories," :Think, Feel, Care," "The 3 Y's," and "Circles of Action," - to prompt students to ask important questions about our individual and collective responsibility to humanity. </p> <p>Included here are photographs, documentation, and resources from the National Museum of American History and the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum (USHMM), including a teaching resource and USHMM's online exhibition, <em>Americans and the Holocaust, </em>which examines "the motives, pressures, and fears that shaped Americans’ responses to Nazism, war, and genocide." Examined with thinking routines from Harvard's Project Zero Global Thinking and Agency by Design materials, students will explore complex and deeply troubling issues that continue to have relevance today. </p> <p>This collection complements chapter 14 ("World War II and America's Ethnic Problem") of Ronald Takaki's <em>A Different Mirror for Young People: A History of Multicultural America, </em>and supports Unit 1: Intersectionality of Economics, Politics, and Policy, and Unit 3: Local History and Current Issues, of the Austin ISD Ethnic Studies Part B course.  </p> <p>#EthnicStudies </p> <p></p>
Philippa Rappoport
19
 

(Re)Imagining Youth Engagement: National Museum of the American Indian

<p>This collection serves as a preview for the sixth of six seminar sessions in the 2021 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “Facing the Complex, Multiple Challenges of the 21st Century."<br><br>Four colleagues from the National Museum of the American Indian - Gaetana DeGennaro, Carrie Gonzales, Adrienne Smith, and Ami Temarantz - will discuss and demonstrate key features of the museum's youth engagement strategy. <br></p> <p>Resources included in this collection have been recommended by the presenters for participants to explore before the seminar session itself. A fuller description and presenter bios are included inside the collection.<br></p> <p>#MCteach<br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
17
 

Central American Traditions Festival: Demonstrations, Interviews, and How-To Videos

<p>This collection comes from a Hispanic Heritage Month family festival celebrating Central American traditions, and in support of an exhibition at the National Museum of the American Indian, "Ceramica de los ancestros: Central America's Past Revealed." Held at the National Museum of American History, the festival featured a sampling of music and dance performances, food demonstrations, and hands-on activities. The museum's terrace featured fair tables that included demonstrations of foods such as papusas and tamales, traditional weaving from Guatemala using a back strap loom, and musical and dance performances, including El Salvadoran chanchona by Los Hermanos Lovo, garifuna by the New York-based group Bodoma, and Latin punk rock by DC-based Machetes. Inside, activities included designing a family "bandera" (flag), making a clay cacao pot, making "alfombras" or carpets, which are temporary artworks made with sawdust based on a 400-year-old Guatemalan tradition, a lecture on Central American ceramics with Alex Benitez, archeologist and George Mason University professor, and engaging in conversations about immigration based on objects in the museum's teaching collections.</p>
Philippa Rappoport
14
 

Raven Steals the Sun: A Celebration of Tlingit Culture

<p>This collections comes from an American Indian Heritage Month family festival focusing on Tlingit culture from the northwest coast of America. Included here are music and dance performances by the Dakhka Kwaan Dancers, storytelling by Gene Tagaban, Shelly Laws, and Maria Williams (of her book, "How Raven Stole the Sun"), a moiety game, and hands-on demonstrations by Shelly Laws of how to weave a two-stranded basket and to make Tlingit-style beaded ear loops .</p>
Philippa Rappoport
10