Louisiana101 is not a major scholarly website put together by a staff of technology junkies, but rather a working document collected by a practicing middle school teacher. The lesson ideas presented here are nothing fancy and many of them are not complete lessons – for that you can go to dozens of other websites. All that I offer here is a collection of bits and pieces that might help a teacher of Louisiana history to fill in the gaps.

What I really need is for teachers to stop thinking that their lessons are not good enough. Many fellow teachers are looking for one "bright idea" to use in class. No one really needs a “full blown, GLE-encoded, state mandated lesson”. Most of us have those, we just need that one little worksheet or activity to round out our own lessons. So please take the time to send an email and attach that word document that you put together last week. Make it a habit. When you create something for your class, it to me so that other teachers don't have to "re-invent the wheel". It's also a great place for you to store your work sheets for later use. Help us all help the kids.

Not a day goes by that a Louisiana history teacher somewhere in the state isn’t looking for a short, simple idea to use in class. At Louisiana101 I strive to have just the right filler that has been field tested by other teachers in the state. If every teacher in the state would send in just one small idea this site would be overflowing with tried-and-true solutions to that "What do I do for this lesson?"

One of my own lessons was taken from a great elemetary idea called "Flat Stanley" Stanley is a story about a young student flattened by a bullentin board and being able to be mailed off to other parts of the country or world. I liked the idea but wanted ours to visit Louisiana parish schools and students, thus T-Flat Boudreaux was born.

I hope that you find the site useful. I have provided facts about Louisiana listed by the day (Fact-of-the-Day), resource material if you are doing research, links to other inportnat information, and many, many lesson plans. You can also find out information about the Louisiana Voices workshops held in Lafayette and around the state.  I go to as many workshops as I can during my 'spare time', what little I seem to have these days.

Need photos for your antebellum PowerPoint or class project? Then check here. During a recent trip to the LSU Rural Life Museum I shot lots of photos for my own students to use as reference material for projects they were doing. Now you too can use them. 

On a recent Saturday photographic trip I came across the Madonna Chapel, the smallest church in the world. Click on the sign to the left and take a look yourself. I am always out and about shooting pictures and now that this site has even more webspace I hope to post the more than 5,000 slides that I have taken from around our great state. 

There have been numerous lesson recently added with more being typed daily. Feel free to exchange ideas anytime. All I ask is that you "exchange" - one of mine for one of yours. I have added many Louisiana Indian links. I also added photos of a recent trip to Evergreen Plantation and Baton Rouge's State Capitals. I also collect old Louisiana post cards so you will find a gallery of views here also. I am trying to update this site with all of my own lesson plans and with the help of student observers from McNeese and my students teachers I will add even more questions, maps, graphs, and charts. They are designed for either block or regular schedule. Posting all of them for your use is now my new goal. 

Louisiana101 will only work if YOU help make it happen. If you get only one idea for your class here, please return the favor by sending in a lesson idea of yours. Other teachers are always interested in finding new material, so please email me some of yours. 

Never knowing just what someone will be researching lead me to put together a page on "Louisiana License Plates. I was interested in seeing just how often the state has changed styles of plates. As I gather additional photos I will add them to the page. You can purchase many of these plates through ebay. Lousiana101 searches about our state's flags prompted me to add a page on the "Brief History of Louisiana's Flags, and the links to more history.. I will continue to watch what people are looking for and add it to the site. A great place to find research information is in the READING ROOM where I am always adding more research materials and great links. Understand that this site is an on-going project of a working Louisiana history teacher, not some full-time webmaster. If you have any comments, tips, suggestions, or just want to help, please do so at the email link above. Teaching this subject each day drives me to want to make it as user-friendly as possible. Also I ask that you spread the word about the site. The more people  who visit, the ideas we all will get. It would be nice to get a couple of ideas from every parish in the state. 

Understand that this site is an on-going project of a working Louisiana history teacher, not some full-time webmaster. If you have any comments, tips, suggestions, or just want to help, please do so at the email link above. Teaching this subject each day drives me to want to make it as user-friendly as possible. Also I ask that you spread the word about the site. The more people who visit, the more ideas we all will get. It would be nice to get a couple of ideas from every parish in the state.

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Everywhere you see "Shrimpy", click and he will play you some Louisiana music to surf by. Right now he and his band of Bayou Mudbugs are ready to play "The House of the Rising Sun". A New Orleans favorite.
 

Copyright © 1999-2003 by Greg English
Calcasieu Parish Schools

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The last major update of this site was November 2003 ~ Minor updates and new materials are added almost daily.