If you haven’t thanked a teacher this week, there’s still time. As Teacher Appreciation Week winds down and students and teachers alike turn to appreciation of summer, we offer just the slimmest sample of links to articles in Perspectives on History by committed, engaged, and innovative history teachers over the past few years.

The articles below are just a taste of what’s appeared in Perspectives on History. We welcome other links and resources in the comments section. We also recommend our Resources for Teachers page.

AHA members can read this month’s roundtable on “The Current State of History Education,” which tackles the challenges of teaching good history in systems that seem to devalue the discipline. Not yet a member? Check back on June 1, when all the articles in the May 2012 Perspectives on History become available to all, and please note that all the articles mentioned below are now available to everyone.

Several past articles deal with connecting research to teaching and academia to the K–12 classroom. In “Active Learning in the University Classroom,” Professor Edward Berenson discusses “What I Learned from Elementary School Teachers” and how their innovations desperately needed to be brought to the university lecture hall. Wilson J. Warren writes about the need for “Bridging the Gap between K–12 Teachers and Postsecondary Historians” and how the two sides often differ on what history education is for. Bruce VanSledright asks, “Why Should Historians Care about History Teaching?” and reminds professors that they are part of a cycle. If they are disappointed with the products of high schools, they have to partially blame themselves. Also on the topic of connections is Barbara A. Mathews and Marilyn McArthur’s article on “The Museum in the Middle,” which presents the museum as the “third partner” and a facilitator between the research university and the K–12 school.

For several years now, Perspectives on History has been highlighting the use of technology in the history classroom with articles by several innovative teachers. Among these are Russell Olwell’s take on connecting students to the world through blogging, Krista Sigler’s innovative approach to Twitter as a way to teach the “history of the present,” Jeremy Brown and Benedicte Melanie Olsen’s recent description of a Wikipedia project in an undergraduate classroom, and David Voelker’s “Clicking for Clio,” which demonstrates how to use student response systems for real-time classroom feedback.

One of our most popular recent teaching forums was on “Controversy in the Classroom,” which introduced readers to some particularly brave teachers willing to tackle subjects like sexuality in history (by Christopher L. Doyle), LGBTQ history (by Vicki L. Eaklor), the Middle East (by Omnia El-Shakry), and the Galileo affair, as a way to set the tone for discussing controversy (by Oscar Chamberlain and Anthony Millevolte).

To these teachers and all the others who have contributed stories, articles, ideas, and letters to our magazine and website over the years, we extend our many thanks, and best wishes for the summer.

This post first appeared on AHA Today.