The Scout Report -- Volume 26, Number 22

A haiku for you / Latitude and longitude / Place-based poems here. Poetry enthusiasts looking for a fun new way to find haikus may enjoy OpenStreetMap Haiku, a resource that "automated making haikus about places." The project "look[s] at every aspect of the surroundings of a point," to create poems that are "fun, often weird," but nonetheless always engaging. To generate a poem about a location of choice, users can scroll through the world map, select a location, and wait patiently for their very own 5/7/5 stanza to appear. From Little Rock, Arkansas ("Rest in peace / feeling good in Arkansas / Good morning") to Bahia, Brazil ("Can you hear the seagulls? / The day going by / A dark rain,") the site offers world-wide wit. Haikus can be generated in English, Spanish, French, and Czech. Users curious about the programming used to create the Haiku Map should check out the About page (following the link in the lower left-hand corner of the site's home page), which provides a detailed walk-through of the software and coding involved in creating the database on OpenStreetMap. [EMB]

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Readers interested in the natural sciences may like to explore the online home of the United States Geological Survey's Wetland and Aquatic Research Center (WARC). Based in the southeastern U.S., WARC was formed in 2015 through the merger of two science centers, the National Wetlands Research Center in Louisiana and the Southeast Ecological Science Center in Florida. Here, readers can access a vast array of information about WARC's work with wetlands and coastal ecosystems. While the main page highlights the Center's most recent news and publications, visitors can navigate WARC's website via the menu on the left to examine it further. A good place for all visitors to start is the Science section, which provides an overview of WARC's work and is organized into themes such as Species Biology, Priority Landscapes, and Invasive Species. Choosing a theme leads to summaries of WARC's relevant research projects and links to each project's scientific publications. Visitors can also browse the Data and Tools section, where they will find more than 1,000 scientific datasets, APIs, and other resources available to download. Under Publications, readers will find WARC's more than 2,200 scientific articles, reports, books, and other publications, many of which can be downloaded for free. [AL]

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Between 1935 and 1946, Helen Balfour Morrison went on at least three photography expeditions from Chicago's North Shore to the Inner Bluegrass region of Kentucky, where she photographed African Americans living in rural freetowns or hamlets in the area. Her photographs and personal papers were donated to the Newberry Library in 2016 and are encapsulated in the online exhibition Photographing Freetowns: African American Kentucky through the Lens of Helen Balfour Morrison. Visitors will want to begin by reading the exhibition's introduction, which speculates about the reasons behind Morrison's choice of subjects. Was she "engaging in a common rite of passage for artists in the era?" Was she trying to "romanticize life in the segregated South?" Some of her photography titles, such as "Masters Got Company" and "Looking Over the Old Plantation," suggest the latter. The web exhibition includes sections with biographical information about Morrison and the Bluegrass region of Kentucky as well as the photography collection, categorized in sections such as Sugar Hill, Zion Hill, or Working Women. Readers can jump to the Browse Images section to see all of the 100 or so images in the exhibition, as well as letters, documents, maps and postcards. [DS]

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Online learning is a growing field, providing unique opportunities and requiring unique preparation. Set yourself up for success in an online learning environment with these Online Student Readiness Tutorials. Under Interactive Tutorials, users will find a collection of lessons and tips (all under 15 minutes in length) that cover a range of topics relevant to online learners, from "Getting Tech Ready" to "Financial Planning." These tutorials can be accessed in three formats: multimedia presentations, text scripts, or audio recordings. Under Interactive Tools, readers will find four personalized tools that demonstrate the benefits of online learning and further prepare students for this unique educational environment. For example, the Computer Readiness Test ensures that your computer is up-to-date with the proper technology and plug-ins to make your online learning experience go smoothly. The Daily Schedule Calculator helps students devise a schedule that makes time for various commitments (such as class, studying, sleep, exercise, and working). The tool updates in real time, allowing individuals to adjust, plan, and prioritize their time. These resources are curated by California Community Colleges Online Education Initiative, dedicated to providing "interactive, helpful, and easily accessible," tools for online students. Readers should note that their user experience will be best when the resources are accessed on a computer or tablet, rather than a phone. [EMB]

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Whether you're looking for science fair inspiration or assistance with your research, Science Bob ("teacher, author, maker, and presenter" Bob Pflugfelder) has you covered. His site encourages users to delve into the world of science. From hovercrafts to homemade ice cream, the Experiments section provides "a list of great science experiments with instructions that you can do right at home or at school." Young scientists looking for a burst of inspiration may want to check out the Science Fair Ideas section to find a list of possible science fair topics, including: "Does the color of a room affect human behavior?" and "Does having worms in soil help plants grow faster?" On the Science Q&A page, life's burning questions are addressed, from converting temperatures between Farenheight and Celcius, to why the sky is blue, to what differentiates moths from butterflies. Looking for an answer to a question that is unavailable on the site? The "Still Need an Answer?" button at the bottom-right of the page welcomes user submissions. The Videos and Experiments Blog pages provide additional content from Science Bob. If your science wonder is still not satisfied, the Research Help page links to various other resources and websites, divided into six different themes including, for example, Space/Planets and Animals/Nature. [EMB]

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Driven by the principle that "oral history recordings provide valuable first-hand testimony of the past," British Library Sounds collects thousands of recordings from across the globe. The recordings are cataloged in various formats, from the interactive Sound Maps (featured in the 08-23-2013 Scout Report) to the Oral History section highlighted here. The Oral History collection seeks to "provide insights into many aspects of UK personal memory, identity, and experience." The collection is organized topically, allowing users to easily gravitate to a subject of interest such as Charity & Social Welfare; Industry: Water, Steel & Energy; and Pioneering Women. After selecting an initial topic, most of the recordings are further sorted by interviewee (alphabetical) or subject (examples include education and medicine). Readers with a particular subject in mind can search the collection using the query bar in the upper-right corner. Users may want to select the "Only recordings everyone can play" option before searching to ensure open-access results are returned. Each record includes an abstract, related transcripts, and embedded recording. [EMB]

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Storytelling: Oral Traditions is perfect for upper-elementary or middle school educators looking to explore the ways stories shape cultures and spark creativity. This lesson plan, part of a four-part curriculum on storytelling from PBS LearningMedia, highlights the "diverse nature and form of narratives." Designed to last one or two class periods, the plan is divided into two parts: What Makes a Good Story? and Stories in the Oral Tradition. Educators are provided with three videos (all of which are under five minutes) that explore the oral traditions of Native Hawaiian and Alaska Native storytellers. In addition to these multimedia examples, teachers are provided with a downloadable "Story Guide Worksheet" that asks students to reflect on one of the stories. The lesson plan satisfies three Common Core Literacy Standards, all while offering an engaging way for students to expand "fundamental literacy skill[s]." Educators will also find three additional lesson plans (covering "Tales of Everyday Life," "Performance and Art," and "Writers' Workshop") at the link above. [EMB]

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From the University of Cambridge's Centre of South Asian Studies comes this audio archive of "oral history sound recordings." The collection, which is currently being digitized by the Centre, features more than 100 recordings available for users to search and enjoy. From political leaders to journalists to educators, the collection houses reflections of individuals who witnessed and shaped history. To explore the included materials, readers will likely want to use the search bar at the top of the page to tailor results to a topic of interest. Users are advised that single-word searches will provide optimal results. For example, a search for "music" reveals more than a dozen results, from music curriculum to music and dance in Nepal. The results include which interviews cover the topic, as well as the exact time in the recording where the topic is discussed. Visitors without particular subject matter in mind can also scroll through the full collection, which provides a summary paragraph of what each interview includes. Navigating to the interview records, users will find an audio stream accompanied by a downloadable transcript of its contents. [EMB]

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On a mission to "preserve, index, and create public access to... precious stories for future generations," the Wexler Oral History Project houses hundreds of interviews, conducted in both Yiddish and English, that celebrate the "life histories" of those featured. The project, launched in 2010, "provide[s] a deeper understanding of the Jewish experience and the legacy and changing nature of Yiddish language and culture." The collection includes complete interviews (usually more than an hour in length) as well excerpts (usually under five minutes in length). Scrolling down the main page, readers will find a Highlights From This Collection section, which features particularly outstanding excerpts. Scrolling even further, readers will find a catalog of all the interviews available, alphabetized by interviewee last name. As of this write-up, there are more than 750 recordings available, inviting visitors into "personal stories about Yiddish culture." Clicking on the "Search all Interviews" button (located just above the alphabetized section) leads users to the full catalog, where results can be sorted by language or length. The project is an extension of the Yiddish Book Center (featured in the 02-13-2009 Scout Report), an organization "working to recover, celebrate and regenerate Yiddish and modern Jewish literature and culture." [EMB]

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As individuals and families immigrated to Chicago, they wanted to establish infrastructure to support their neighbors in Mexico. To do so, they established hometown associations ("clubes de oriundos"), organizations that financed essential services in their communities of origin. The work of these organizations and the stories of the people invested in them are memorialized by the Mexican Hometown Association's Oral History Project. Launched in 2016, the project shares "firsthand accounts of the lives, activities, and achievements of this dynamic group of Chicagoans." The 23 interviews included in the project share stories of faith and family, community and culture, and education and vocation. Interviews were conducted and transcribed in Spanish, and each record includes a summary of the conversation in English. The project was led by professor and author Xochitl Bada (with assistance from Enrique Alvear), who wanted to preserve stories "as a resource for students and the general public seeking to understand the complicated stories of migrants to Chicago who came together to build organizations that have mobilized social reforms in both Chicago and Mexico." On the About This Project page readers can learn more about the scope of the project and find additional resources on Mexican hometown associations. [EMB]

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Last featured in the 08-23-2019 Scout Report, the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program Digital Collection continues to serve as a premiere source of interview collections, preserving conversations on "Florida Queer History" and "Latinx Diaspora in the Americas," among many other sub-collections.

Based at the University of Florida, the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program (SPOHP) has conducted more than 8,000 interviews in the decades after the program's launch in 1967, making its collection "one of the largest oral history archives in the South and one of the top collections in the country." Over 3,600 of those interviews are publicly available online as part of the SPOHP Digital Collection, which contains audio recordings and written transcripts as well as other documents. The interviews in this collection include material dated from 1939 to the present and represent a diverse variety of communities throughout Florida and beyond. Under Collections, readers will find (for example) assorted interviews collected in 26 of Florida's counties, topical collections such as Florida Fisherfolk, and more than 700 interviews with members of several Native American tribes. There are also a number of sub-collections, including the Joel Buchanan Archive of African American Oral History, which was added in March 2019 and contains over 1,000 items. Visitors can search the SPOHP Digital Collection (including the full text of documents) by keyword or use Advanced Search to specify fields such as title, date range, or language.

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