I'll be bringing my kids to the Vermont History Expo this year, because I can't think of a better way to show them that history can be fun and meaningful. That it isn't what I grew up thinking it was. If someone had helped me understand earlier on that history was really a fascinating, ongoing story about interesting people and the events in their lives and communities, then I probably wouldn't have hated it so much.

But for me, history class was always such a bore. It was nothing more than names, dates, and battleships. I felt so disconnected from the information that I was memorizing. I had no idea that history was really about people - the way they lived and the decisions they made. And that, in a nutshell, we are who we are today because of those who came before us. So history matters.

I'll never forget my first trip to Williamsburg or Washington D.C.  or Charleston, S.C. Suddenly, history meant something else entirely. It was a story. And I've always loved stories!

So give your kids the best history lesson of their lives --- by showing them that history lives and breathes outside of a classroom or textbook … and that they're a part of the story, too.