Use photographs, videos, artifacts and books to learn about the past

Learning goal: Children learn that photographs, videos, artifacts and books can be used to learn about the past, and they practise asking "What does this show me about long ago?" 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: what the statement asks. The past is everything that happened before now. Kindergarten children cannot visit the past, so they learn about it from things that were made or recorded back then, or from people who wrote about it later. The statement names four kinds: photographs, videos, artifacts and books. Each one is taught below with what it can show and what it cannot. Keep the language concrete: "long ago", "before you were born", "when Grandma was little", "last year". Children do not need the words primary or secondary yet.

Photographs. A photograph is a picture made with a camera. It shows what was in front of the camera at one moment. An old photograph of a classroom can show the desks, the clothes the children wore and what was on the wall. It cannot show what happened just before or just after, and it cannot show things outside the edge of the picture. Say to children: "A photo is like one blink of an eye from long ago."

Videos. A video is a set of pictures that move, often with sound. A video recorded at a school event years ago can show people walking, talking and singing, so it can tell us things a photograph cannot, such as how a song sounded. It still shows only what the camera pointed at and only for the minutes it was recording. Some videos are made up for fun, like a cartoon about talking dinosaurs; a made-up story is not a record of something that really happened. Some cartoons do teach true things, such as a cartoon that explains how people made candles long ago, because the people who made it used real evidence; the adult can check where it came from. Ask: "Is this a real recording, a true explanation, or a pretend story?"

Artifacts. An artifact is an object that people made or used. A wooden toy, a metal lunch pail, a washboard or a slate for writing are artifacts. Children can look at an artifact, and when it is safe, touch it: how heavy is it, what is it made of, how might it have been used? An artifact without a label can be a puzzle. A washboard does not tell you by itself who used it or in which year. An adult, a museum label or a book may supply that information.

Books. Books can tell about the past in words and pictures. Some books were written long ago and show what people then wrote and drew. Many children's books about the past are written today by authors who studied older sources. A book about the past is different from a make-believe storybook; ask whether the book says it is true (information, or nonfiction) or invented (a story, or fiction). A true book can still leave things out.

One fully worked model (read-aloud with the adult). The adult shows an old photograph of children in a classroom, a short video clip of a parade recorded years ago, a real or pictured slate and a nonfiction picture book about school long ago. For each, the class answers three questions. What is it? (a photograph; a video; an artifact; a book). What does it show about the past? (children sat in rows; people marched and a band played; children once wrote on small slates with chalk; the book says some schools had one room for all ages). What can it not tell us? (the photograph does not tell us the children's names; the video does not show what happened after the parade; the slate does not tell us who owned it; the book may not be about our town). The class then says one thing that was different long ago and one thing that is the same today: children still go to school and still learn to write.

The misconception to watch for. Young children often think that anything old-looking tells the whole truth, or that a picture shows "how everyone lived". One photograph of one family does not show every family. Another common error is treating a cartoon or a make-believe book as a record of the past. Correct both by asking "How do we know?" and "Is this real or pretend?"

Why use more than one kind. Each kind shows different things. A photograph shows what something looked like; a video can show movement and sound; an artifact can be held and examined; a book can explain and put things in order. When two of them agree, for example a photograph and a book both show one-room schools, we can be more sure. When one is missing information, another may fill it in.

Keeping it comfortable. Children may bring a family photograph or object only if their family chooses. Nobody needs one to take part; the adult supplies shared examples. Handle old artifacts gently or use pictures of them, and never use anything sharp or fragile.

Worked example 1 — a photograph. The adult shows an old photograph of a street with horses pulling wagons. Question: What does it show about the past? Answer: Long ago, on this street, people used horses and wagons to move things. What can it not tell us? It does not show where the wagons were going or whether every street looked like this. So the careful sentence is: "This photograph shows horses and wagons on one street long ago."

Worked example 2 — an artifact. The adult passes a picture of a washboard and, if available, a safe real one. Children notice the ridges and the wooden frame. The adult explains that people rubbed wet clothes on the ridges to clean them before most homes had washing machines. Question: How did this help us learn about the past? Answer: It shows one way people washed clothes long ago. What it cannot tell: who used this one or when. A label or a book is needed for that.

Worked example 3 — a book and a video together. The adult reads two pages of a nonfiction book that says families long ago often made music at home by singing and playing instruments. Then the class watches a short video that the adult has checked: an old recording, made many years ago, of a family singing and playing instruments together at home. Together they show the same idea two ways: the book tells it, and the video lets us see and hear one family doing it. Because the two sources agree, the class can say, "Long ago, many people made music together at home," and add, "Our sources show some families, not every family."

Sorting record (representation task): Give each child four picture cards: a photograph, a video screen, an artifact and a book. With the adult, children glue or place each card under the right label on a four-column chart titled "Ways we learn about the past". Under each card, the adult writes the child's dictated answer to "What can this show us?"

Independent performance: The child chooses one source the adult provides (an old photograph, a short video clip, an artifact or its picture, or a nonfiction book page) and tells an adult: (1) what kind of source it is, (2) one thing it shows about the past, and (3) one thing that was different long ago or one thing that is the same today. Success criteria: the child names the correct kind of source; the child's "shows" statement matches something actually visible or read in the source; the child makes one real then-and-now comparison. Extension: the child names one thing the source cannot tell us. The adult records answers; drawing or pointing counts as a response.