Choosing a Good Topic for History Day 2010: Innovation in History
Choose something different. An NHD judge may see three or more projects on
the same topic. This is usually a topic that the students are already familiar with,
so it shows that they didn’t spend much time or effort learning about the overall
theme and finding a topic that was new to them. If you do some research to find
a less common topic
 you will learn more,
 the judge will recognize that you’ve gone deeply into the theme, and
 your presentation will have a “wow” element.
One approach:



Explore some biographical reference books or websites about inventors.
Find someone you never heard of before who invented something
interesting.
Then think about that invention and how it fits in with a larger innovation
picture
For example, if you find someone who invented a new machine for digging
coal from coal mines, think about how coal mining technology developed
in that time period and what those developments meant for the economy,
for safety, and for the environment.
Inventions and Inventors. Salem Press, 2002. 2 vols.
Van Dulken, Stephen. Inventing the 20th Century: 100 Inventions that shaped the
world: From the airplane to the zipper. New York University Press, 2000.
Vare, Ethlie Ann. Patently Female: From AZT to TV dinners, stories of women
inventors and their breakthrough ideas. Wiley, 2002.
http://inventors.about.com/od/blackinventors/a/black_inventors.htm
http://www.african-americaninventors.org
http://inventors.about.com/od/womeninventors/Women_Inventors.htm
http://www.women-inventors.com
http://inventors.about.com/od/hispanicinventors/Famous_Hispanic_Inventors.htm
http://www.famous-hispanic-inventors.com
Visit Hennepin County Library’s History Day Projects Subject Guide for
recommended websites and databases related to this year’s National History
Day theme. http://www.hclib.org/teens/SubjectGuides.cfm?Topic=HistoryDay
Another approach:





Think about something we use today or that is common in our society.
Then think about what life was like before we had this thing.
Then think about the person or people who provided innovations that led
to the availability of this thin, or the historical developments that led to it.
For example, we take the phonetic alphabet for granted. Ancient cultures
didn’t have phonetic alphabets. What did that mean for literacy and power
in ancient cultures? How did society change when phonetic alphabets
were developed?
Another example: When you have an operation, the doctors and nurses
are standing by with blood in bottles in case you need a transfusion. Who
developed the technique of blood transfusion? When? How has that
changed the practice of medicine?
Choose something for which good sources are easily available. Judges look
for good, reliable, varied sources that you have used for research and fore
evidence that you have actually read the sources in your bibliography, and may
ask you how you used each source! It’s better to have fewer sources that you
have read and understood than lots of sources you clearly have not read and
used in your project.







Some ancient or foreign topics may be difficult if sources are in foreign
languages, not readily available, or hard to read.
Start with an encyclopedia article to get a broad overview. You may use a
good general encyclopedia such as the Encyclopedia Britannica, or a
specialized encyclopedia as the McGraw-Hill Encyclopedia of Science and
Technology.
Find a book or two in the library using a narrow search term. For example:
alphabet history OR mining history. Always ask your librarian for help – he
or she knows a lot about how to find information!
Find information online from reliable sources. Always check “About us” or
a similar page to see who provided the information on a web site: it may
be a reliable organization or person, or someone unreliable. Try limiting
your search to sites with .org or .gov extensions (use the Advanced
Search option for this).
Never use Wikipedia as a source for serious research: anyone can put
anything in it.
Find some scholarly articles. Use the databases on the library’s web page
or ask the librarian for help in finding an article.
CITE YOUR SOURCES. Encyclopedias, books articles and websites must
be cited correctly in your bibliography.
Taken from Subject Guide compiled by Nancy Hill, UTEP Library