My name is Peter Paccone and I am a San Marino (CA) High School AP US History teacher who annually calls upon his students to produce various US History-related "resemblance videos."
A "student-produced US History-related resemblance video" corresponds in appearance or qualities to a video produced by a highly acclaimed professional educator with my students' resemblance videos corresponding in appearance or qualities to any of the following:
The Reading Through History videos
The Adam Norris videos
The TED-Ed Lesson animated videos
The Tom Richey videos
The Sound Smart History Channel videos
The AP Daily videos
In the ABOUT section of this site, I raise and answer a number of questions related to this work, and below I provide many examples of my students' resemblance videos.
Until recently, I would refer to my students videos as "knockoff videos", with that name changed to "resemblance videos" for a number of good reasons, all put forward by my friend and SMHS school newspaper (Titan Shield) advisor Mr. Jose Caire.
The Reading Through History website was set up several years ago by a group of western Oklahoma social studies teachers seeking to create meaningful content that combines the subjects of reading and history.
Below, some Reading Through History resemblance videos produced by my students over the course of the past few years, with each video between 3:00-8:00 minutes in length.
The North American Fur Trade (Natali Impellezzeri, Alison Norton)
The Mississippi River Steamboat (Aidan Ye, Corey Sy, Randy Cai)
Native Americans and the Smallpox Epidemic (Rachel Li; Hetty Chen)
The Pueblo Revolt of 1680 (Lucas Levy, Ethan Foong, Christian Liao)
Smallpox and the Native American (Megan Klusman; Ashley Salim; Alina Champon)
The Golden Age of American Whaling (Sutton Spindler, Ethan Yeh)
The Chinese Railroad Worker (Dharma Avelar; Jonathan Fan)
The Indentured Servant (Anita Anand and Maddie Emmons)
The Transatlantic Slave Trade (Carolyn Tao; Glenda Chen; Kaitlyn Ng)
The Chinese in America in the 1800s (Anika Kesavalu; Lauren Lim; Alexander Chuang)
The Search for Gold in America from 1492-1877 (Amanda Lopez; Madison Ly)
The Cotton Gin (Camdyn Wu; Natalie Wu)
The Hudson River School of Art (Daniel Lin; Tiffany Yu)
The Hudson River School of Art (Lucas Chen; Mark MacDermott; Srini Arumugham)
Metacom's War (Damien Chang; Lawrence Cheung; Trystan Shen)
The Chinese in America (Lily Wang; Jessica Wong)
Adam Norris is a Maryvale (NY) High School, AP US History teacher who is especially known for having produced, since 2013, an ever-increasing number of high quality, 3-5 minute Adam Norris Videos, with all of these videos designed to teach AP US History students everywhere what they need to know to pass the annual exam.
Below, some Adam Norris resemblance videos produced by my students over the course of the past few years. Each video lasts approximately 3:00 minutes
Japanese Immigration to America in the 1800's (Justin Chan; Joshua Hom; Neven Husson)
Herbert Spencer and the Survival of the Fittest (Kourosh Hassibi; Grace Cater)
Jewish Immigration to America (1880-1945) (Olivia Marquez; Jourdan Marquez; Lucy Liao)
Pueblo Revolt (Irene Chen)
At its core, a TED-Ed Lesson is a three-to five-minute animated video that focuses on topics ranging from chemistry to Shakespeare to origami, and is often created by a teacher working collaboratively with a TED-Ed scriptwriter, a professional animator and a professional voice over actor.
Below, some TED-Ed Lesson resemblance videos produced by my students over the course of the past few years.
The L.A. Chinatown Massacre of 1872 (Lily Tong: Karen Lee; Charis Cheung)
The Exodusters and Their 1879 Migration to Kansas (Carolyn Holt; Lilianne Fisher)
The Rise and Fall of Boss Tweed (Aristotle Zeng; Jaxon Wang)
Tom Richey is a Seneca (SC) High School AP teacher who for many years has not only produced numerous high quality, 3-5 minute Tom Richey Videos, with all of these videos designed to teach AP US History students everywhere what they need to know to pass the annual exam.
He's recently also produced a number of APUSH-related videos for Marco Learning (a community of AP teachers and tutors committed to providing the best, most complete resources for AP® students, their parents, and teachers.)
Below, some Tom Richey resemblance videos produced by my students over the course of the past few years. Tom's videos typically last 6:00-8:00 minutes.
The Sears Mail Order Catalogue (Olivia Kuhn)
Women in the Gilded Age (Lauren Eriksen; Katherine Norton; Colin Eriksen)
Rise and Fall of Boss Tweed (Calvin Ryan)
The Barbary Wars (Jacob Brassard)
Sound Smart is a series of 3:00-4:00 minute, content rich HISTORY channel videos hosted by historians Yohuru Williams and Matthew Pensker.
Civil War Hospitals (Omar Kahled)
The term "AP Daily" refers to a series of relatively short, on demand, content-rich "only available on AP Classroom" videos that have been produced by a "dream-team" of AP US History teachers during the fall of 2020, with these AP Daily videos designed to be assigned to students, thus saving the teachers' limited, direct class time to focus on the areas where his/her students need help the most.
Below, some of the AP Daily resemblance videos that my students produced a few months after having viewed the work of the "dream-team", with each video lasting between 6:00-12:00 minutes.
The Mexican American War (Lawrence Chao; Evan Kuo; Dennis Ru)
Taxation Without Representation (Stanley Wong; Irikaa Mehrotra; Charis Tang)
Reconstruction (Jeremy Yoo; Marcus Chua; Elaina Lee)
Compromise of 1850 (Paniz Adli)
The American Revolution (Zihao Wang; Brandon Hang; Rachael Wen)
The Market Revolution (Alexa Hu; Aurelia Lau;, Jocelyn Tang)
The French and Indian War (Victor Yao; Sophia Yao)
The Columbian Exchange (Jayden Vien; Donovan Phan; Julia Beredo)
Now and then, some of my students have expressed a desire to go off on their own, explore some new territory rather than explore further, via a resemblance video, some already known territory. Below, some examples.
The Sultana Steamboat Disaster (Brandon Tran; Stanley Pan; Taylor Shen)
The Battle of Little Bighorn (Allain Phung; Enzo Repetto)
American Surgical Innovations (Jennifer Marinez)
The Barnum and Bailey Circus (Nicole Chen, Isabella Chou, and Karina Lee)
Military Conflict in the Civil War (Ethan Chang, Sebastian; Moggio; Karen Huynh)
Some of my students, rather than produce a video, choose to produce what I call an Exploration into America's Past (aka a modern-day term paper.) Below, several good examples.
Life in the California Gold Fields for the Chinese Immigrant (Ethan Mo; Jaylin Hsu; Ben Guo; Wesley Hung)
The Atomic Bombing of Japan: Necessary Decision or War Crime (William Keefer)
Native Americans of the Yosemite Valley (Nathan Deng)
An Exploration into America's Past was not the only video-alternative that my students on occasion would choose to produce. A few students would also choose to produce what I call a Local History Blog Post. For details and a template, click here:
Some of my students would also produce another kind of video alternative, what I call a Historical Fiction Letter. Click here for details and a template: