The Elementary Poster Contest is the newest addition to the National History Day in Colorado program.
The Poster Contest is a scaled-down version of the standard History Day exhibit category, and is specifically designed to prepare students in the upper grades of elementary school to complete History Day projects in middle and high school. Participation is open to 4th and 5th graders, and must be done on a Colorado History topic. Projects are completed based on the year’s theme (2024-2025: Rights and Responsibilites in History), and posters are displayed at museums around the state on Colorado Day, August 1, and served to kick-off each year's contest cycle.
Teachers usually complete posters with their students during the Spring semester, and then hold their own in-school contests, either independently or in conjunction with other building teachers.
Completing a poster allows students to pursue topics that interest them, learn how to write thesis statements regarding those topics, and then demonstrate the significance of their topic in history and its relation to the theme through evidence. Students accomplish this by investigating primary sources of various formats (e.g. photos, interviews, newspaper articles, maps, quotations, etc., as well as secondary sources. Ultimately, when students construct their final posters, they should incorporate their evidence into their own words, while using meaningful quotations and other primary source text in order to support their thesis statement.
Posters are due to the NHDC State office by: June 30, 2025!
It should be noted that the poster is not included in any of the middle and high school Denver National History Day in Colorado Contests.
Please contact Kelly Cvanciger (Kelly.Cvanciger@ucdenver.edu) directly with questions.
2024-2025 Rights & Responsibilities in History
