Dennis Moynihan

As an 8th grade Social Studies and U.S. History teacher in Hartford, I proudly used the Zinn Education Project to connect with my students and teach them the history of the U.S. through their own eyes. The eyes of immigrants, workers, and non-paid workers. Each time we used a lesson in class students became more engaged and began to view history through new and different perspectives. They wanted to learn more, to read more, to write more because they connected with the content.

In the Trial of Columbus students learned the real and true story of Columbus’ first landing. Many of my Latino students had heard of the Tainos, the native people of Hispaniola, but they never ever studied about them, now they were into it! During the Cherokee/Seminole Role Play students learned about groups of people that they never knew existed in our country, like the Black Seminoles and the Missionaries and Northern Reformers, and of course Andrew Jackson.

The Zinn Education Project is “what democracy looks like.” It is no surprise that the current Presidential Administration is seeking to destroy it, they are in the process of destroying our democracy and the values which our country was founded on and my students learned about.

Thank you to the Zinn Education Project for helping me reach my students and engage them in learning about the factual history of the United States of America.