Social Studies in a New Light

Blogging is a great way to reflect upon ones thoughts. In this course blogging has helped me to have my own voice and express my thoughts about our readings and my personal experiences. I have enjoyed taking the time to reflect about what I have read and learned and be able to put my own spin on what I have read. After all as a teacher that is exactly what we are going to do. We take all the knowledge and experiences and when we get into the classroom, put our own personal touch on what we have learned. I think that blogging helps an educator to reflect and make their own thoughts clear. It also helps to share your thoughts with others, maybe someone will read something that was not as clear the way they originally heard it. Perhaps your blog will help someone gain a new understanding. My experience in this course has been enhanced from blogging. It has made me think more as an educator not just as these are my thoughts. As an educator it is your job to share your thoughts, knowledge, and understanding with others. Blogging has been a great practice for this.

As far as how blogging may have hindered my experience, I can only say that, I am somewhat self conscious about my writing. By having others read my writing, it was more stressful than doing a personal reflection. However, this can also be positive. Through this course and blogging I had to overcome this. This helps to create my writing to become more professional. Which is something that I needed anyways. So really I guess this is not negative anymore, but at the beginning was somewhat of a stress.

When I entered this course, I knew that I personally liked Social Studies. When I tried to remember my experiences in Social Studies I could not recall many meaningful activities other than reading and answering questions, and doing some fun activities. What did I learn from those activities? I do not know, but they were fun. I have learned that this is not the correct approach to SS. When teaching Social Studies the Backwards Design is helpful. It is important to pick a goal and objective for a lesson, and the purpose. Then start to work backwards to plan a lesson. What do you want a student to learn from this? What should they take out of it? How will you teach them this? Then start to plan your lesson accordingly. To often students are asked to read from the textbook and not do anything meaningful in terms of learning. Then when a teacher does plan a different lesson they find an awesome activity that is fun, and try to fit in an objective. It should be the other way around. It is great to do fun interactive things with students, but you HAVE to have a purpose. Fun for the sake of fun does not give our students lasting knowledge. It does not creators students who think on their own. I guess that is the biggest thing I have taken from this class. I want to create meaningful lessons in which my students leave learning new information, and becoming thinkers of their own.

Biases in History

As a learner I am very intrigued with History and Social Studies. At this point in my life as I look back upon my educational career I am beginning to question just how valid textbooks are. As a student I was never taught to question what I learn, I was just taught to treat whatever is in a book as 100% truth. Now that I think about it, I truly wonder just how much I have been taught that is biased and perhaps inaccurate. I want to always remember as an educator to teach my students to not just except everything they are told. Questioning, unless done disrespectfully is a great way for students to learn new things. If we teach students this way, they will end up thinking for themselves, and not believing everything they are told.
I am baffled that it took me so long to realize this, and cannot even think about how many other people my age still do not have this mind set.

As I begin to teach Social Studies I will have numerous examples of biases and be able to teach students about this. Students need to know that there are two sides to every story, perspectives. I often times wonder what a child in Japan learns in school about Pearl Harbor and Atomic Bombings. Does anyone ever stop and think of the impact we have on our children when we allow biases to become 'fact'? History is a fascinating piece of life that students can use to understand the world around them. It is something that they can learn from, and grow from.

There is a growing number of English Language Learners in our school systems. With them they bring rich cultural experiences, that can bring diversity and new ideas into our classrooms. I think it is important to embrace every culture in our classrooms and use them it to learn from. By teaching students about biases in textbooks it will allow students to not see their culture and themselves as 'rigth and the only culture' or the center of the world. There is so much culture and diversity around the world, and the idea of perspectives and biases is a great way to both embrace ELL's and to teach all students of new perspectives, beliefs, opinions, lifestyles and ideas different from their own.

Textbooks...not the answer the everything

"If the textbook contains the answers, then what are the questions?" Wiggins & McTighe (p. 125)

When considering textbooks and their validity, I do not think they contain all the answers. I do not even think they contain all of the right answers. Textbooks can be biased and information portrayed in them can be inaccurate. Therefore perhaps according to the makers own agenda it can contain the right answers to the questions they asked. As far as teaching students solely from the textbook, which I do not recommend, the questions within the textbook may have the answers within. Does this mean that students are learning from them?.....No it does not. I really do not think that students answering these questions teaching anyone, anything.

As we have been learning about Backwards Design in planning for Social Studies lessons, I think that what is more valid is asking questions based on your goals for the students learning. Creating Essential questions and preparing questions to get students thinking about them will result in more than just using a textbook. Students need to learn to think analytically and explore their own learning. If a textbook 'contains' all the answers, then why should students think for themselves? They not provide all the questions students should be asking themselves, but they can possible be a good supplement to lessons. (sometimes) More often than textbooks being used students should learn to do their own research, ask their own questions, and find answers to questions in this manner.
We want our children to think for themselves and learn throughout all situations not just sitting down and reading a textbook.

Annual Plans

Before last week I had never heard or even thought of annual plans. I was well aware of pacing guides and following the Standard Course of Study. However, creating an annual plan seems to make complete sense to me. Creating annual plans seems very self explanatory and I am excited to create one with my classmates.


Benefits of annual planning

I see several benefits to annual planning in the classroom. First I think that knowing what you are going to teach before you start the school year will not only benefit the teacher but the students. As a teacher it is great to see the big picture. The more organized the better. If an annual plan was used for each subject being taught, then it would be easier to integrate subjects. Using interdisciplinary teaching students will gain more connections academic disciplines. With all of the plans for the year laid out, it will be much easier to implement this method of teaching. I hope to one day be organized enough to create one for each subject I teach.

Annual planning also helps the teacher to gain better understanding of units and what is to come. When lessons are solely in the form of a pacing guide and objective it may be harder to lead into new topics. Ideally using annual planning you will know what you are teaching next and will be able to make connections and better prepare students for lessons to come. It also creates a more concrete understanding of what you are teaching. Lesson plans and pacing guides do not convey time in a calendar sense. Putting your annual plan into your current school calendar helps the teacher to know when important days are, holidays, early release days, etc. This is important because it is critical that the teacher knows how much instructional time they will have. As it is there never seems to be enough hours in the day to teach everything teachers need to, but knowing ahead of time allows teachers to better prepare.


Disadvantages of annual planning

In my mind I see one of the disadvantages the initial time and effort it takes to create a well written and thought out annual plan. This task may seem very daunting at first, as it does with me now, but after some experience teaching I think it will become easier. Going along with the time and effort annual planning may take, it may also cause over thinking and overwhelming. It is important to remember that the annual plan is not set in stone. It is guidelines or the back bone of what you plan to teach. It is not feasible to always follow it exactly as planned, but it may cause teachers to be overwhelmed and try to stay up-to-date. Thus it is important to be flexible and use annual plans as a the outline for your lessons.


I have not seen annual plans in the schools during my observations, but I have seen a couple of similar ideas. In my second grade classroom my teacher was extremely organized. She had a filing cabinet full of resources that were aligned for every NCSCOS objective. If she had a student that needed reteaching, extensions, differentiation, or ideas she would be able to quickly find something. I love this idea and I think that this would go along with annual planning. One issue I see with annual planning is planning for students whom you do not know, which means you do not know there interests. However, when adding this piece to annual planning I think it would be a great addition. Depending on your class you could have tons of resources at your finger tips. The resource could be placed within your annual plan and it provides tons of lesson possibilities for all different learners.

I also saw the in another one of my field placement classrooms my teacher had a notebook with all of her students planned, rough lesson outlines, how it related to NCSCOS objectives, and student resources. This is similar to an annual plan, however it did not have the broader main topics as an annual plan does. I think that an annual plan would still be more beneficial in helping to see the big picture, but this is still a great start.

Meaningful Well-Planned Social Studies Lessons

Social Studies lessons encompass numerous contents/subjects in which students learn about the world around them. Social Studies lessons should be powerful and meaningful learning experiences for students. During this time students venture into learning about different cultures, history, geography, civilizations, and more. However, most often Social Studies is not seen as the most important subject. With teacher's being pressed for time, Social Studies ends up becoming a quick 20 minute lesson thrown in once or twice a week. In order to flourish in the world around them students need to be offered all subject areas. There is an unmeasurable value that Social Studies has to offer our students. It is our jobs as teachers to ensure that all students are given meaningful and well-planned lessons.

Social Studies like the Arts, Science, and other subjects can easily be integrated into core subject areas of Math and Language Arts. As a teacher one should constantly be evaluating their lessons to see how they can integrate the subjects. When planning a Social Studies lesson it is important to integrate other subjects so that it does not stand alone. One great way to integrate LA is to read books, complete research projects, write essays, student notebooks, all of this relating to whatever Social Studies topic you may be covering. Social Studies can also be integrated to Science. Throughout history natural disasters and phenomenons have occurred, history of cultures and the way their beliefs about planets, stars, and the world around them; and how it affected their everyday lives. There are many ways that Social Studies can be integrated into other subjects! To create a meaningful well-planned Social Studies lesson you must integrate into other subjects.

As with any other lesson, it is important to have a clear concise lesson in which you have specific goals and objectives you want to meet. Teachers must be organized, prepared with materials ready, and clearly able to articulate the lesson. When students are given moments where the teacher is unorganized and has not created a well planned lesson, it leaves the students unengaged and room for misbehavior. Teachers need to be ready with all materials and know how they plan to implement the lesson.

One of the most important attributes of a well-planned Social Studies lessons should be creating a lesson that is hands on allowing students to become a part of their learning. Often times students are instructed to read chapters out of a book and not given a chance to learn through exploration. I still remember in 5th grade making a cookie of the United States and decorating specific aspects. Students are not going to remember or learn from merely reading a textbook and answering questions. Provide them with movement, a game, skit, or hands on activities that allow them to flourish. Through Social Studies students are able to learn more about where the world has been and where its going. Students need to understand the past of our country and others in order to better understand the future. Social Studies encompasses such a rich and meaningful part of life, and it is the the teachers job to find out what interests they have and motivate your students to become engaged in your lessons.

Welcome to my blog! I am very excited to start my first blog!