Our team used its money to pay for conferences that focused on historical thinking skills, document analysis, historical writing skills, or digital technology.  We planned to have the entire team attend the following professional development:

• Summer week-long conferences focused on document-based teaching and learning
• UCLA History/Geography project or UCLA Writers Project in-services designed specifically for our team
• National Council for the Social Studies annual conferences
• California Council for the Social Studies annual conference (to present our findings)

In addition, our team paid for several days out of the classroom to norm Document-Based Essay Questions (DBQs) and to discuss materials and strategies.    

LIBRARY OF CONGRESS TEACHER INSTITUTES

Amy Bisson attended the Library of Congress Teacher Institute in May 2010.  She presented their primary source analysis tool to the department that year as a strategy.

Adrienne Karyadi attended the Library of Congress Teacher Institute in July 2011.  She tied the summer reading to document-based analysis for the team.

LOC partnerships with local institutions make their materials available for teachers who cannot attend summer institutes.

NATIONAL COUNCIL FOR THE SOCIAL STUDIES

Denver 2010:  Vistas, Visions and Voices featured presentations about document-based learning or digital technology and history instruction in every single session. Keynote speakers included Sam Wineburg, Maya Sotero-Ng, and Tom Daccord.  

Washington D.C. 2011:  Dimensions of Diversity included keynote speakers Judy Woodruff (author of works about the digital news age) and Diane Ravitch, creator and critic of No Child Left Behind legislation.

Our team thought NCSS's newsletter with announcements about professional development opportunities was extremely helpful in noticing trends in PD.  We all joined NCSS and enjoyed their magazine Social Education as well.