This author is an avid consumer of history and has a desire to open students to the endless supply of the riveting stories of men and women struggling to cope with a changing world. The fascination toward the people of the past is enthralling history, and students need to feel that same sense of wonder and love of history. To accomplish this goal, the author developed and used assignments that helped students to understand how history affects and is affected by individuals like themselves. These assignments gave students a sense of how social, political, and economic changes affect the individual, how choices made on the individual level can shape history, and how diverse Americans' experiences have been. The author believes that these teaching projects help students to connect the personal, professional, and political decisions that they are making today with the decisions of their forebears, allowing them to understand the consequences of action and inaction. Historical trends are not just impersonal chapter headings in a textbook, but are life-changing forces that have affected students and their families, and that still resonate today. Student assignments help them in understanding how historical forces continue to act upon their own lives and stimulate their curiosity to learn more about the people of the past.