Visiting the archives allows students to examine original sources as material artifacts. First, direct students to notice physical characteristics which may convey important clues to understanding the documents before them.¹ For example, students may be able to estimate roughly when a document was created by noting the type of paper, style of handwriting, or methods of printing used. Students may be able to determine an item’s intended purpose by looking at its size, or to discern whether it was meant to be treasured or thrown away by assessing the quality of its materials.

These observations can also lead to more complex inferences. A wax seal on a slave bill of sale can reveal important information about how legal documents were authenticated in colonial New York. A jam-packed but neatly indexed scrapbook of hate mail to a well-known abolitionist tells students about how he was viewed by the scrapbook compiler, not just by the correspondents.

It’s obvious to us. But students need to be explicitly instructed to stop and read a document closely, from start to finish – especially when they are first asked to make observations about physical characteristics.

Most primary sources do not lend themselves to the type of superficial scanning we all increasingly do online.² It’s particularly important to instruct students to read handwritten documents. Deciphering 18th- and 19th-century handwriting requires slow, focused reading. Having small groups work collaboratively to transcribe brief manuscripts forces students to read word by word and prepares them to effectively analyze the source.

In exercises using visual documents, teachers should likewise model the process of looking for students unprepared to “read” visual materials. Directed prompts which do this are especially helpful in courses that do not explicitly practice formal analysis.³

In our experience, students find summarization extremely challenging, but the archives is a great place to hone this skill. Guided questions in a handout should help students identify important points in the document they are studying. Prompts such as “in your own words” can help students learn to paraphrase.

Visits to the archives ideally end with a wrap-up exercise in which students articulate what they observed, read, and discussed. One way to do this is to have students give an impromptu speech summarizing their experience. The exercise’s time limit pushes students to prioritize important information and set aside less central details.

Students new to archives should, with the right guidance, be able to make initial interpretations of documents. Prompts and wrap ups should guide students to question assumptions, recognize bias, and discern audience. Instead of simply asking generic questions like “what biases are present?,” create a step-by-step experience for students which shows them how to locate that bias. When necessary, provide them with contextual information that they might need to make interpretations, or help them connect secondary materials that they have already read to the documents in front of them.

Students should identify questions they need to answer in order to more fully understand and use their source. These questions may be as simple as looking up a new vocabulary word or as complicated as trying to understand social norms of a previous era. Consider requiring students to keep a running list of such questions, having students conduct research between visits, or providing illustrative secondary sources alongside archival documents.

Effective primary source analysis requires synthesizing observations and inferences with contextual knowledge. Instructors must determine ahead of time what information to provide before, during, or after visits to the archives so that students can make meaning of primary source documents.

Of course, students will realize that primary sources often raise more questions than they answer. Faculty with whom we work have observed that visiting the archives makes students more motivated to conduct secondary research than with traditional term paper assignments and that, because of this engagement, students seem more apt to retain the newly-acquired contextual knowledge.

Intermediate Analysis Skills

With effective pedagogical design, some early college students may be able to:

• compare and contrast groups of primary sources
• use primary sources alongside a secondary source
• cite primary sources as evidence in an argument

Advanced Archival Research Skills

Only after much practice with document analysis will students be able to:

• pose research questions which can be answered by primary sources
• search finding aids and catalogs
• identify and select archival material to use
• independently request collections and make appointments
• look through whole folders or boxes of materials
• properly cite archival collections without assistance