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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

 

Educating to Create Change: Let’s Talk About Race (National Museum of African American History and Culture)

<p>This collection complements Unit 2 of the EdX course, <em><a href="https://www.edx.org/course/teaching-with-the-smithsonian-addressing-21st-century-challenges-in-the-community-college-classroom" target="_blank">Teaching with the Smithsonian: Addressing 21st-Century Challenges in the College Classroom</a>. </em>It includes resources recommended by presenters Candra Flanagan and Anna Hindley of the National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC) - links to:</p> <ul><li>the museum's website (3rd tile),</li><li>the <em>Let's Talk About Race </em>portal (4th tile),</li><li>the Learning Lab profile page of the National Museum of African American History and Culture (5th tile), and</li><li>recommended reading (6th tile).</li></ul> <p>Click on these tiles to open up content in a new window. In each case, you'll find information, objects, resources, and strategies that will help you think about how to incorporate these ideas in your classroom. </p> <p>The Learning Lab profile page (from the 5th tile) is split into multiple content sections, and within sections, each tile leads you to a curated collection of content, with objects and strategies, from the NMAAHC Education team.</p> <p><br></p> <p>#MCTeach #EdXTeach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
6
 

Outbreak: Epidemics in a Connected World (National Museum of Natural History)

<p>This collection complements Unit 8 of the EdX course, <em><a href="https://www.edx.org/course/teaching-with-the-smithsonian-addressing-21st-century-challenges-in-the-community-college-classroom" target="_blank">Teaching with the Smithsonian: Addressing 21st-Century Challenges in the College Classroom</a>. </em>It includes resources to support the session presentation by Ashley Peery of the National Museum of Natural History.</p> <p>#MCTeach #EdXTeach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
12
 

Are Parasites Always Bad? (Smithsonian Environmental Research Center)

<p>This collection complements Unit 4 of the EdX course, <em><a href="https://www.edx.org/course/teaching-with-the-smithsonian-addressing-21st-century-challenges-in-the-community-college-classroom">Teaching with the Smithsonian: Addressing 21st-Century Challenges in the College Classroom</a></em><em>. </em>It includes resources to support the session presentation by Katrina Lohan of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center. </p> <p></p> <p>#MCTeach #EdXTeach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
19
 

Hung Liu: Portraits of Promised Lands (National Portrait Gallery)

<p>This collection complements Unit 5 of the EdX course, <em><a href="https://www.edx.org/course/teaching-with-the-smithsonian-addressing-21st-century-challenges-in-the-community-college-classroom" target="_blank">Teaching with the Smithsonian: Addressing 21st-Century Challenges in the College Classroom</a></em><em>. </em>It includes resources to support the session presentations by artist Hung Liu and curator Dorothy Moss of the National Portrait Gallery, discussing the exhibition, <em>Portraits of Promised Lands.</em></p> <p>#MCTeach #EdXTeach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
17
 

Luis Cruz Azaceta's "Shifting States: Iraq"

<p>This teaching collection helps students to think critically and globally by using two Thinking Routines to explore the painting, "Shifting States: Iraq," by Cuban American artist Luis Cruz Azaceta. The work is a metaphorical representation of the unrest taking place in Iraq, and more broadly, an exploration of the human condition during times of crisis.</p> <p>Included here are the work itself from the Smithsonian American Art Museum, a video with curator E. Carmen Ramos, another video from Articulateshow.org, three suggested Thinking Routines - ""See, Think Wonder," Colors, Shapes, Lines" and "The 3 Y's" - from Harvard's Project Zero Artful Thinking and Global Thinking materials, and three other works by Azaceta in the Smithsonian collections.</p> <p>For use in Social Studies, Spanish, English, American History, Art History classes</p> <p>#LatinoHAC</p>
Philippa Rappoport
12
 

Using Biography and Portraiture to Learn about Asian Pacific American History | Cultivating Learning

<p><span dir="auto">This collection serves as a digital companion to a <em>Cultivating Learning</em> professional development session with Andrea Kim Neighbors, Head of Education at the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center (APAC), exploring </span>how biographies and portraits can be used to learn about Asian Pacific American history, art, culture, lived experiences, and more. In the session, participants practice techniques to analyze a portrait from APAC's book, "We Are Here: 30 Inspiring Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Who Have Shaped the United States," emphasizing the story of tennis star and activist Naomi Osaka. This session focuses on close looking and reflection on how Osaka spoke up about social injustice, the Black Lives Matter movement, and her experiences as a mixed-race woman of Japanese and Haitian descent. Included here are 30 classroom-ready digital activities that can be used with middle and high school students, and strategies to use with portraiture and biography.<br><br>This interactive webinar is part of “Cultivating Learning,” a professional development webinar series focusing on techniques to use digital museum resources for learning. Check out “Cultivating Learning” and other Smithsonian Learning Lab webinars:<a href="https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbW0tbkVMdEJJcVd0QzRxcEU0QzYyZjh5VEY2d3xBQ3Jtc0trUFVObFlPY0hsWXZxX3c2RWNRVklOdnlrenNrVERXQXZnSTVSQ28tZVVuLU9rSjhLTkdyN3doT2s0RlN0eURHV1lYclB2R0hvNDlUdnU3Zi1xdTdXWnRGajAySzFianJZYUtOY0Qzc3dfSV9GMXZmZw&q=https%3A%2F%2Flearninglab.si.edu%2Fhelp&v=s6WrXnRH2Iw"></a><a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/help">https://learninglab.si.edu/help</a><br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
7
 

Topical collection for State Education Agency Directors of Arts Education (SEADAE)

<p>This topical collection is designed to introduce SEADAE educators to the Smithsonian Learning Lab and to help them consider a variety of ways to incorporate digital museum content - images, video footage, and learning activities -  into their new toolkit for arts educators.</p> <p>#SEADAE</p>
Philippa Rappoport
36
 

Learning Lab Training Collection on the Theme: “Social Justice in the Time of Pandemic"

<p>This collection is designed to help educators bridge the classroom experience to a museum visit. It is intended as a preview activity to our upcoming workshop demonstrating various ways to use the Learning Lab and its tools, while offering specific, replicable, pre-engagement activities that can simply be copied to a new collection and used to help students engage with museum resources. </p> <p>Included here is a set of flashcards, a template document so that teachers can create and print their own specific sets, and strategies for their use in their classrooms, and some questions to guide users in exploring the objects.</p> <p>In the following activity, explore the objects in this collection and choose one you might want to use in your classroom. Be prepared to share at the workshop the object you selected, why you selected it, and how you might use it in your classroom.<br></p> <ul></ul> <p>Keywords: #MCteach</p> <p><br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
64
 

Digital Storytelling as a Tool for Participatory Research and Audience Engagement

<p>This Learning Lab collection was made to complement the presentation "Digital Storytelling as a Tool for Participatory Research and Audience Engagement." During the workshop,  co-facilitators <a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/profile/24977">Dr. Antonia Liguori</a> (Loughborough University, UK) and <a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/profile/212">Dr. Philippa Rappoport</a> (Smithsonian Office of Educational Technology) will demonstrate a variety of techniques to incorporate personal experiences in the exploration and use of museum resources. They will share how the Smithsonian Learning Lab and Digital Storytelling (DS) can be used together to access digital resources, build learning experiences, and cultivate collaboration and community over distance.</p> <p>We will explore artwork from an exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, DC, <em><a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/IgLygJNprGf3JA%20and%20https:/npg.si.edu/exhibition/eye-i-self-portraits-1900-today">Eye to I: Self-Portraiture as an Exploration of Identity</a></em>), which compels viewers to consider how self-portraits reflect an artist’s identity through what is revealed and concealed. </p> <p><br><br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
42
 

DCPS Arts Innovation Leadership Institute: Incorporating Arts and Technology in the Classroom with the Smithsonian Learning Lab

<p>This Learning Lab collection complements an introductory Learning Lab training for DCPS educators in the Arts Innovation Leadership Institute (AILI). We will explore artwork and resources from the Smithsonian digital collections, including the National Portrait Gallery's exhibition, <em><a href="https://artsandculture.google.com/exhibit/IgLygJNprGf3JA%20and%20https:/npg.si.edu/exhibition/eye-i-self-portraits-1900-today">Eye to I: Self-Portraiture as an Exploration of Identity</a></em>, as a way to consider the functionality of the Learning Lab and help AILI educators understand how they can use the Learning Lab to enhance their students' learning and classroom experience. </p>
Philippa Rappoport
34
 

Replicable Activities to Become Conversant using Digital Museum Resources in the Classroom: Flashcards

<p>This collection is designed to help educators think about how to incorporate museum content into the classroom experience. Along with its <a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/collections/replicable-activities-to-become-conversant-using-digital-museum-resources-in-the-classroom-close-looking-global-thinking/PSwYlJyjKTWfGxXE" target="_blank">companion collection of close-looking activities</a>, it is intended to demonstrate various ways to use the Learning Lab and its tools, while offering specific, replicable, pre-engagement activities that can be used directly, or copied to a new collection and then edited, to help students engage with museum resources. </p> <p>Included here is a set of resources, connected to the theme of 21st-century challenges, that can be used as flashcards in both a virtual or in-person classroom. The benefit of this type of activity is that students begin to make a personal connection to the objects and issues they are exploring. They take ownership and, as a result, the conversation, sense of community, and any further activity become deeper and more meaningful. As you explore the resources yourself, be sure to click on the paper clips to see additional instructions and information. At the end of the collection, you'll see a template document that can be used to create and print your own specific set of flashcards. </p> <p>This collection complements the opening unit, "Introduction to the Learning Lab and Museum Resources," of the EdX course, <em><a href="https://www.edx.org/course/teaching-with-the-smithsonian-addressing-21st-century-challenges-in-the-community-college-classroom" target="_blank">Teaching with the Smithsonian: Addressing 21st-Century Challenges in the College Classroom</a></em><em>. </em></p> <p>#MCTeach #EdXTeach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
43
 

Teaching African American History: Acts of Resistance | Cultivating Learning

<p><span dir="auto">This collection is a digital companion to a <em>Cultivating Learning</em> professional development session with Candra Flanagan, Lead for Teaching and Learning at the National Museum of African American History and Culture. </span>The session explores an expanding set of free digital materials on African American history, “North Star: A Digital Journey.” </p> <p>Designed for grades 6–12, the set features stories and throughlines from the museum’s permanent exhibitions. Using images, documents, videos, and checks for understanding, students and their adults can investigate and think critically about history. </p> <p>The session focuses on individual and community resistance. Participants will gain content knowledge applicable to teaching about slavery in the U.S. context as well as familiarity with the free online resources of “North Star: A Digital Journey.”<br></p> <p>This interactive webinar is part of “Cultivating Learning,” a professional development webinar series focusing on techniques to use digital museum resources for learning. Check out “Cultivating Learning” and other Smithsonian Learning Lab webinars: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/redirect?event=video_description&redir_token=QUFFLUhqbW0tbkVMdEJJcVd0QzRxcEU0QzYyZjh5VEY2d3xBQ3Jtc0trUFVObFlPY0hsWXZxX3c2RWNRVklOdnlrenNrVERXQXZnSTVSQ28tZVVuLU9rSjhLTkdyN3doT2s0RlN0eURHV1lYclB2R0hvNDlUdnU3Zi1xdTdXWnRGajAySzFianJZYUtOY0Qzc3dfSV9GMXZmZw&q=https%3A%2F%2Flearninglab.si.edu%2Fhelp&v=s6WrXnRH2Iw"></a><a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/help">https://learninglab.si.edu/help</a>.</p>
Philippa Rappoport
14