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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

 

Learning Lab Introduction and Training for DC Embassy Adoption Program Teachers: Exploring Luis Cruz Azaceta's "Shifting States: Iraq"

<p>This student activity explores Luis Cruz Azaceta's "Shifting States: Iraq" using Project Zero Thinking Routines to help students think critically and globally.  The work is a metaphorical representation of political unrest in Iraq, and more broadly, an exploration of the human condition during times of crisis.</p> <p>Included here are an image of the work from the Smithsonian American Art Museum, an explanatory video with curator E. Carmen Ramos, several  Thinking Routines from Harvard's Project Zero Visible Thinking and Global Thinking materials, an array of prompts and Learning Lab tools and support, as well as a sample training assignment. <br><br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
19
 

Joseph Stella in the Smithsonian collections

<p>Joseph Stella (1877-1946) was an Italian born American Futurist painter. He is best known for his renditions of industrial America.</p><p>Included in this collection are some his works from the collections of the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, the National Portrait Gallery, and the Smithsonian American Art Museum, with oral history interviews from the Smithsonian Institution Library and the Smithsonian Archives of American Art. You can find other works by searching the collections. </p><p><br /></p>
Philippa Rappoport
32
 

6 Jewish American objects for Jewish American Heritage Month

<p>This is a collection of six objects, from the National Museum of American History, that were selected by museum staff for what they reveal about the Jewish American experience.</p><p>I've created this collection from the blog post by Tory Alrman. <em>Tory Altman has also blogged about <a href="http://americanhistory.si.edu/blog/patriotic-anthems">patriotic songs beyond the national anthem</a> and <a href="http://americanhistory.si.edu/blog/new-project-explores-what-it-means-be-american">what it means to be American</a>.</em></p>
Philippa Rappoport
6
 

Interpreting Content from the Smithsonian Transcription Center: Oral Interviews from the Faris and Yamma Naff Arab American Collection

<p>This collection is a topical collection guiding students to a fascinating trove of content from the Faris and Yamma Naff Arab American Collection at the National Museum of American History, with discussion questions from Project Zero's Global Thinking routine, "Step In, Step Out, Step Back," to help them explore the content. Also included is additional content from the Smithsonian Transcription Center that students can explore and volunteer to transcribe. By volunteering with the Transcription Center , students would help transcribe these stories of early Arab-America immigration, and contribute to our collective knowledge of Arab American History.</p> <p>The Faris and Yamma Naff Arab American documents the immigration and assimilation of mostly Christian Syrian-Lebanese who came to America at the turn of the twentieth century. The immigrants were predominately-small land-owning peasants and artisans from the village of Syria and Lebanon. It was in these Syrian communities created by Arab immigrants that Dr. Naff sought interviews, photographs and personal papers.<br></p>
Philippa Rappoport
6
 

Intangible Heritage through Material Culture: The Journey of an Ecuadorian Boat Seat

<p>This teaching collection helps students to look closely and think critically by exploring an Ecuadorian boat seat, the first object donated to the National Museum of African History and Culture, and how this tangible object represents the survival and transmission of intangible cultural heritage in the African diaspora. The seat belonged to Débora Nazareno, a descendant of enslaved Africans in Ecuador, and is engraved with Anansi, a popular spider figure in West African folklore. The boat seat was gifted to the museum by her grandson, Juan Garcia Salazar, a renowned Esmeraldan historian. </p> <p>Included here are the objects itself, a bilingual video with curator Ariana Curtis, two suggested Thinking Routines - "See, Think, Wonder" and "Unveiling Stories" - from Harvard's Project Zero Thinking and Global Thinking materials, and supporting digital content about the museum display, Maroon communities, Anansi, the oral tradition.</p> <p>For use in Social Studies, Spanish, English, and American History classes<br /></p> <p>#LatinoHAC </p>
Philippa Rappoport
21
 

Inquiry-Based Learning at Its Best Using Digital Museum Resources: A Presentation for NCSS2020 Conference "Advancing Social Justice"

<p>This collection includes digital museum resources and replicable activities that will serve as a springboard for discussion during the NCSS 2020 Online Conference, <strong><em>Advancing Social Justice </em></strong><strong>on December 5, 2020. </strong>The collection models how digital museum resources can be leveraged to support critical thinking and deeper learning, using promising transferable practices developed in a school/museum pilot program on Ethnic Studies.</p> <p>This power session supports educators in accessing and developing instructional materials relevant to middle/junior high grades 6-12 social studies and Ethnic Studies courses. Participants will explore the Smithsonian Learning Lab and find a wide range of multimedia resources from different times and places. They will have an opportunity to sample and consider several applicable Harvard Project Zero visual thinking and global thinking strategies that can help students access and understand primary sources, deepen their critical thinking skills, and learn to trust and articulate their ideas. Participants will leave with enough information to independently use the Smithsonian Learning Lab and implement new classroom ideas.<br><br>Participants will: <br>•       Try out inquiry-based looking strategies using digital museum resources that are suitable for middle and high school social studies and Ethnic Studies courses but applicable across curricula.<br>•    Learn the basics of Smithsonian Learning Lab, a Webby Award-winning platform for users to create and share digital resources with students and a growing national network of educators.<br>•    Explore instructional materials created by educators for Ethnic Studies courses that include digital museum resources and inquiry-based strategies, and are available on the Smithsonian Learning Lab.<br></p> <p>The collection can be copied and adapted for use in your own classroom. </p><p>To browse published Learning Lab content created from the <em>Supporting the Innovative Teaching of High School Level Ethnic Studies Courses in Texas</em> project, see <a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/search/?f%5B_types%5D%5B%5D=ll_collection&st=%23EthnicStudies&s=&page=1">https://learninglab.si.edu/search/?f%5B_types%5D%5B%5D=ll_collection&st=%23EthnicStudies&s=&page=1</a>.  Click on each individual tile to explore its associated collection.<br></p> <p>This collection was co-created with <a href="https://learninglab.si.edu/profile/8" target="_blank">Ashley Naranjo</a>.  This program received Federal support from the Latino and Asian Pacific American Initiatives Pools, administered by the Smithsonian Latino Center and the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center.</p> <p>#EthnicStudies<br></p> <p></p> <p></p>
Philippa Rappoport
47
 

"Hyphenated Americans": When “Bricklayer Bill” Won the 1917 Boston Marathon, It Was a Victory For All Irish Americans

<p>This collection explores the notion of hyphenated Americans, through the story of one man, William Kennedy, an American of Irish descent, born in New York in the late 19th century, who went on to win the Boston Marathon in 1918. Bill's nephew, in writing about his uncle, said, "When “Bricklayer Bill” Won the 1917 Boston Marathon, It Was a Victory For All Irish Americans." What did he mean?</p> <p>To aid discussion, included in this collection are images, a cartoon, several articles, a story fro WBUR, and one thinking routine from Harvard's Project Zero Global Thinking - "Step In, Step Out, Step Back" - to "encourage learners to take other people’s perspectives, recognize that understanding others is an ongoing process, and understand that our efforts to take perspective can reveal as much about ourselves as they can about the people we are seeking to understand."</p> <p>This collection complements chapter 6 ("The Flight From Ireland") of Ronald Takaki's <em>A Different Mirror for Young People: A History of Multicultural America, </em>and supports Unit 2: What is the history?, and Unit 3: Local History and Current Issues, of the Austin ISD Ethnic Studies Part B course. <br /></p> <p>#EthnicStudies</p> <p><br /></p>
Philippa Rappoport
9
 

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
 

Hung Liu: Portraits of Promised Lands

<p>This collection serves as a preview for the third 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." </p> <p><br>Two Smithsonian staff members, Dorothy Moss and Briana Zavadil White, as well as artist Hung Liu, will discuss the National Portrait Gallery exhibition, <em>Portraits of Promised Lands, </em>and educational strategies for the classroom. </p> <p>Resources included in this collection have been recommended by the presenters for participants to explore before the seminar itself.<br></p> <p>#MCteach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
16
 

From Deer to Dance: How-to Demonstrations and Informational Videos

<p>This collection comes from a family festival at the National Museum of the American Indian that explored uses of leather in Native communities - literally from the hunting and tanning of deer and their hides, to their use in ritual and everyday life. The collection includes demonstrations of deer-hide tanning, moccasin making, bead working, instructions to make a leather pouch and a daisy chain bracelet, and an interview and performance by Lawrence Baker and the White Oak Singers.</p>
Philippa Rappoport
9
 

Facing the Complex, Multiple Challenges of the 21st Century: Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship 2021 Opening Panel Resources

<p>This collection serves as an introduction to the opening panel of the 2021 Smithsonian-Montgomery College Faculty Fellowship Program. This year's theme is “Facing the Complex, Multiple Challenges of the 21st Century." Four Smithsonian staff members will present at the session, including Ashley Peery and Kerri Dean of the National Museum of Natural History, Ellen Lupton of the Cooper Hewitt Smithsonian Design Museum, and Katrina Lohan of the Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute's "Earth Optimism" initiative. Their bios, presentation descriptions, and other resources are included inside.<br><br>As you explore these resources, jot down any questions you have for the presenters. It is sure to be a fascinating and fruitful seminar series!<br><br>#MCteach</p>
Philippa Rappoport
35
 

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