Materials

• A display copy of one or more Who’s Who books from the media center or other source (or information from a Web site such as the following: <http://www.marquiswhoswho.com/>

Instructional Activities

1. Begin by asking students if they are familiar with a Who’s Who book. Show them (or describe) the contents of a real Who’s Who publication. Explain that these publications can be general (e.g., Who’s Who in the World) or specialized (e.g., Who’s Who in American Education). Ask them to name some reasons that such a book might be useful.
   
   
2. Divide the class into three groups to prepare a “Who’s Who” list of the Italian Renaissance. Assign artists to one group, humanists and other writers to another, and political leaders of the time to another. Have the groups select the figures for their category and write a descriptive annotation about each figure.
   
   
3. Bring the groups together to report on their lists. Ask the class if additional names should be included in any of the categories. (NOTE: This activity could become a more extensive class project in which the information collected during this session could be transformed into an illustrated booklet for display in the classroom, or a copy could be made for each student.)