 Historical Archives |  Contributors and Resources |
 Lesson Plans and Ideas |  About Taney and Beyond |
 Samples of Student Work |  Share Your Ideas |
| Search Taney and Beyond |  Complete Site Directory |
Get ready for an exhilarating stroll through Taney County, Missouri. But before you go, let us tell you a little about this website.
Taney and Beyond has been prepared for the ThinkQuest for Tomorrow's Teachers Competition, 1999. The site is supportive of the aims of Project Taney, Inc., a not-for-profit collaborative regional history project just getting started in our county. The Project hopes to link educators and students from various schools in an attempt to create and sustain accessible educational resources relevant to the study of the county and surrounding areas. We are trying to help them do that.
There are several good reasons for such a venture: the most obvious is that we think people living in a region should know about the region's history, both to help preserve the past and to actively engage in the present and future. That is, those who begin seeing themselves as a part of something larger than the present moment are much more likely to become active, involved citizens in their local communities. In order to help teachers and students learn more about the community, then, we have put together this regional studies forum to share lesson ideas, facilitate research, publish student work, and promote self-awareness for those in Taney County.
Of course, Taney County residents are not the only ones who will benefit from this site: teachers and students from other areas--whether it be Defiance, Missouri, or Sydney, Australia--should also benefit. In the first place, they will be able to get some ideas to embark upon their own regional studies projects. Second, they will learn a little more about southwest Missouri. Perhaps they will even be willing to share some of their history in a similar format. Though we are focusing on this small geographic region, we see Taney County as part of a global community.
And community is an extremely important concept in understanding how this forum got started and how it will be maintained. Our initial web site team consists of two students training to become teachers, two public school teachers, two college faculty, and one college media specialist. We have relied upon the contributions of many teachers and students in Taney County, other regional studies projects outside this area, business owners and residents in the area, and many other well-meaning folks who continue to contribute time, resources, and advice. Now that we have constructed the original site, it will be made available to Project Taney, Inc.
The site is arranged to be user friendly. There are three main branches:
