Use primary and secondary sources to show how a place changed over time

Learning goal: Explain that change over time can be shown with primary and secondary sources, tell the two kinds of sources apart, and use both to describe one change and one thing that stayed the same. This lesson teaches a statement from Ohio's July 2026 K-8 social studies standards, which the Ohio Department of Education and Workforce anticipates districts will begin to implement in the 2027-28 school year.

For the adult: Read this lesson aloud in short parts and stop after each part for children to answer out loud. Where you can, let children look at real sources: two photographs of the school or a street from different years, and a library book or museum page. Second graders are only beginning to use the words primary and secondary; the two questions "When was it made?" and "Was the maker there?" do the work. The Maple Street sources below are pretend, so call them pretend when you read them. Children may dictate their sentences to you.

Change over time. Places, tools and ways of living change. A street that once had one small store may later have three. A school that once had a chalkboard may later have a screen. Some things also stay the same: the street may still follow the same path, and the school may still stand on the same corner. When we study history, we look for both. A change is something that is different at a later time. A continuity is something that stayed the same. To show a change, we need evidence from at least two times, an earlier time and a later time. One picture from one day cannot show change by itself, because it shows only one moment.

Primary sources. A primary source was made at the time we are studying, or by a person who was there. A photograph taken of a street in the past is a primary source for how that street looked that day. A letter written by a child in the past is a primary source for what that child said and saw. An old ticket, a school report card, a store sign or a toy are objects from the time, and they are primary sources too. A primary source is close to the event. That does not make it perfect. A photograph shows only what was inside the camera frame. A letter tells one person's view.

Secondary sources. A secondary source was made later, by someone who was not there, using other sources. A book written today about how your town has changed is a secondary source. So is a museum sign that explains what an old tool was used for, or a chart that a teacher makes from old records. Secondary sources are useful because they put many pieces of evidence together and explain them. A secondary source can also make mistakes, so a careful reader asks what evidence the writer used.

The misconception. Many learners think "old" means "primary" and "new" means "secondary." That is not the rule. The rule is about who made the source and when, compared with the event you are studying. A brand-new photograph of today's playground is a primary source about the playground today. A book printed long ago that describes a war fought one hundred years before it was written is a secondary source about that war, even though the book itself is old. Always ask two questions: When was this made? Was the maker there?

Read this with the children: a worked model. Here is a hypothetical set of sources about a made-up place called Maple Street. Source 1 is a photograph labeled 1950. It shows a dirt road, two houses and a horse-drawn wagon. Source 2 is a photograph labeled 2020. It shows a paved road, six houses, a bus stop and cars. Source 3 is a short book written in 2022 by a town librarian. It says that Maple Street was paved in the 1960s and that more families moved there after a factory opened nearby. These sources are invented for practice; they are not about a real street.

Sources 1 and 2 are primary sources. Each was made at the time it shows. Put them side by side and a change appears: the road went from dirt to pavement, and the number of houses grew from two to six. Six take away two is four, so the later photograph shows four more houses. A continuity also appears: the road runs in the same direction in both pictures. Source 3 is a secondary source. The librarian was writing in 2022 about things that happened decades earlier. The book helps explain why the street changed, which the photographs alone cannot tell us. The photographs show what changed; the secondary source gives a possible reason.

Using both kinds together. Primary sources let us see the past with our own eyes. Secondary sources help us understand what we see. When both agree, our claim is stronger. If the book said the road was never paved but the 2020 photograph clearly shows pavement, we would trust the photograph for that detail and ask where the book got its information.

What sources cannot show. The photographs do not tell us whether people liked the change, how long the paving took, or who lived in each house. When a question cannot be answered from the sources, we say so and look for another source, such as an interview with someone who lived there or an old newspaper story. We do not make up an answer.

Organizing the evidence. The diagram is a table with three rows, one for each source. It lists the year each source was made, whether it is primary or secondary, and what it shows about change. Read across each row. The table helps you see that two sources are primary and one is secondary, and that the change claim comes from comparing the two photographs.

Worked example 1: Sort the sources. A class has three hypothetical sources about its school: a 1985 class photograph, a 2025 class photograph, and a 2024 school history poster made by the parent club. The 1985 and 2025 photographs are primary sources because each was taken at the time it shows. The poster is a secondary source because its makers were writing in 2024 about the school's whole past, including years they did not see. Answer: two primary, one secondary.

Worked example 2: Show a change and a continuity. The 1985 photograph shows 24 students and wooden desks in rows. The 2025 photograph shows 20 students sitting at tables in groups. Change: desks in rows became tables in groups, and the class in the picture is 4 students smaller, because 24 take away 20 is 4. Continuity: both photographs show the same large window on the left wall. The claim uses evidence from two times, which is what change over time needs.

Worked example 3: Use the secondary source for a reason, and check it. The poster says, "In 2010 the school changed to group tables so students could work together." That gives a reason for the change. The photographs cannot confirm the year 2010, because one is from 1985 and one from 2025. So the careful answer is: the photographs show the change happened sometime between 1985 and 2025; the poster says it was 2010, and we could check that with a third source, such as a 2010 school newsletter.

Worked example 4: Fix a mistake. A learner says, "The 1985 photograph is secondary because it is old." Correct it: the photograph was taken in 1985 of a 1985 class, so it is a primary source. Being old does not make a source secondary.

Representation task: Make a three-column source table with the headings Source, Primary or secondary, and What it shows about change. Fill it for the Maple Street sources in the lesson. Then draw a two-box before-and-after picture using only details that appear in the two photographs, and label one change and one continuity.

Independent performance: With an adult, find two primary sources about one real place you know, such as your school, a park or a main street, from two different times (for example, an older photograph from a library or historical society and a new photograph taken today), and one secondary source, such as a web page or book about the place's history. Write or dictate four sentences. Success criteria: (1) you name each source and say whether it is primary or secondary and why; (2) you describe one change using evidence from both primary sources; (3) you describe one thing that stayed the same; (4) you use the secondary source to give a reason or background, or you say that no reason was found. A sentence that says what changed without pointing to a source is not finished yet.