PBS
Pbs: Technology at Home
Travel back in time to find out when everyday items such as a computer, radio, or telephone first appeared in homes. You can also connect to links about the people who invented these items.
US National Archives
Nara: Teaching With Documents: Telephone and Light Patent Drawings
A lesson plan about Alexander Graham Bell's patent for the telephone and Thomas Edison's patent for the electric lamp. Contains good background information and historically pertinent documents. It also discusses the role corporations...
Other
Federal Communications Commission: Major Initiatives
This site from the FCC gives information on the main focus of the Federal Communication Commission. They are responsible for most forms of communication.
PBS
Pbs: American Experience: The Telephone Goes National
This site provides information about the birth of the telephone. The site also discusses AT&T, the first long distance phone call, and the people involved.
PBS
Pbs: American Experience: People and Events: Alexander Graham Bell
This PBS American Experience page provides a biographical survey of Alexander Graham Bell's life and inventions.
Then Again
Then Again: Web Chron: Alexander Graham Bell Invents the Telephone
This site describes how Bell started out by seeking to help the deaf and ended up with a telephone. It gives brief information about his family and how he came to invent the telephone.
PBS
Pbs: American Experience: The Telephone
The home page to the PBS feature film on the invention of the telephone. The People and Events section has biographies and commentary on the invention of the telephone and its subsequent success. Be sure to click on Gallery for pictures...
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University
De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Today's Telephone [Pdf]
"Today's Telephone" is a one page, nonfiction, reading passage about the history of telephones from the telegraph, to land-lines, to cell phones. It is followed by questions which require students to provide evidence from the story; it...
Polk Brothers Foundation Center for Urban Education at DePaul University
De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Today's Telephone [Pdf]
"Today's Telephone" is a one page, nonfiction, reading passage about the history of the telephone from the telegraph to land-lines, to cell phones. It is followed by questions which require students to provide evidence from the story; it...
PBS
Pbs: Technology Slider
This site provides a view into the American home over the past 100 years and illustrates the role technology played in daily life.
PBS
Who Made America? Alexander Graham Bell
From a PBS series, They Made America, comes this biography of Alexander Graham Bell and his invention of the telephone. Read about his development of the telephone and research into the sound.
Other
How to Create a Great First Impression
This site describes how to make good initial immpressions by developing adequate telephone skills. Students who practice these skills will be more prepared for job interviews and careers.
Other
Consumer Action
Consumer Action serves consumers nationwide by advancing consumer rights, referring consumers to complaint-handling agencies through their free hotline, publishing educational materials in Chinese, English, Korean, Spanish, Vietnamese...
Other
History of Telephone Sets: Graham Bell Invents the Telephone
A short summary of how Alexander Graham Bell (1847-1922) came to invent the telephone.
Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History
Gilder Lehrman Institute: History Now: Technology of the 1800s
[Free Registration/Login Required] Article considers the inventions and innovations in communication, transportation, and manufacturing that drove America forward in the nineteenth century. Includes a link to an interactive history of...
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Mit: Invention of the Week: Lee De Forest
This website provides information on the life and inventions of Lee DeForest, the man who invented the audion tube, which made commercial radio broadcasting practical.
National High Magnetic Field Laboratory
Magnet Academy: Timeline of Electricity and Magnetism: 1870 1879
The telephone and first practical incandescent light bulb are invented while the word "electron" enters the scientific lexicon.
Famous Scientists
Famous Scientists: Alexander Graham Bell
Get to know Alexander Graham Bell, the scientist, inventor, engineer, and innovator who is credited with patenting the first telephone.
Famous Scientists
Famous Scientists: Antonio Meucci
A short biography about Antonio Meucci, best known for developing a voice communication apparatus that several sources credit as the first telephone.
TeachEngineering
Teach Engineering: Sound Extenders
In this lesson, students are introduced to communications engineers as people who enable long-range communication. In the lesson demonstration, students discuss the tendency of sound to diminish with distance and model this phenomenon...
Other
Alexander Graham Bell
This biographical site includes a link to a United States House of Representatives resolution recognizing Antonio Meucci as the inventor of the telephone. It also includes information on Bell's (1847-1922) later scientific work.
Other
Federal Communications Commission: Organizational Charts of the Fcc
Federal Communications Commission provides a chart to show how the FCC is organized.
Read Works
Read Works: Famous Inventors Alexander Graham Bell: You Rang?
[Free Registration/Login Required] This passage shares brief biographical information about Alexander Graham Bell and his role in inventing the telephone. This passage is a stand-alone curricular piece that reinforces essential reading...
Read Works
Read Works: Alexander Graham Bell
[Free Registration/Login Required] This site includes a biography of Alexander Graham Bell. This passage is a stand-alone curricular piece that reinforces essential reading skills and strategies and establishes scaffolding for vocabulary...