Effective Social Studies

High Quality Social Studies Instruction for Elementary

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Courtney Tuck Director of Social Studies ctuck@wsfcs.k12.nc.us

Nathan Tulburt (pictured on the right) Middle School Social Studies Instructional Coach nwtulburt@wsfcs.k12.nc.us

Nick Sebesta Elementary Social Studies Instructional Coach Inspire 340, West, South, North ndsebesta@wsfcs.k12.nc.us

Melissa McGready High School Social Studies Instructional Coach mmmcgready@wsfcs.k12.nc.us

Shannon Eshleman Elementary and MS Social Studies Instructional Coach East sceshleman@wsfcs.k12.nc.us

Stay up-to-date on announcements!

Agenda

What should you expect to take away by the end of the day?

• UPOs and Canvas Courses
• Where the resources are
• Updates to curriculum and new resources
• Course overviews and key ideas
• Model lessons
• Canvas Master Course
• Inquiry and Historical Thinking Skills
• Compelling questions
• Historical thinking skills
• Assessments
• Standards-Based Grading and rubrics
• Aligning assignments and assessments to the standards

• Knowledge of the social studies curriculum and content for the coming school year.
• Know how to access the curriculum and best utilize the resources.
• Know what a good social studies lesson looks like.
• Understand the basics of an inquiry lesson.
• Know what historical thinking skills are and how to implement them in your classroom.
• Best practices for assessing standards.

1. Why social studies?

Roadblocks to Social Studies Instruction

Concerning trends in both the United States and around the world, such as truth decay, declining trust in institutions, increased political polarization, and abuses of political power, have only underscored the need to reinvest in the civic mission of schools.(Kavanagh and Rich, 2018; Jones, 2022; Kaufman et al., 2022; Boxell, Gentzkow, and Shapiro, 2020).

• Time
• Not a "tested subject"
• External and internal pressures/demands
• Resources
• Planning time

Source

Pick one takeaway from this graphic

Use this data to compare and contrast from the chart

1. Elementary school students in the U.S. spend much more time on ELA than on any other subject.

3.Increased instructional time in social studies—but not in ELA— is associated with improved reading ability.

4. The students who benefit the most from additional social studies time are girls and those from lower-income and/or non-English speaking homes.

2. Students from less-affluent backgrounds, Hispanic students, and those attending public schools spend more classroom time on ELA than do other students.

Source

"Supporting students’ knowledge of social studies content may serve not only to help schools achieve their goal of developing civically engaged citizens but also to help them achieve the academic goals they have increasingly prioritized, such as improving literacy."

Research has shown that it is possible to make room for social studies instruction without sacrificing other goals.

Source

So What?

Now What?

• What stood out to you?
• What questions do you have?
• What do you take from this?

• What do we do with this information?
• How do we use it to guide us?

What our students are doing in summer school!

Break Time

2. Standards and Objectives

Revised Bloom's Taxonomy

• Social studies standards and objectives are created with Revised Bloom's Taxonomy (RBT)
• Each LEQ is meant to hit the standard(s). Pay attention to the verbs to make sure your focus is correct.

Why should I care?

The standard and objective gives us overall framework in how we deliver the lesson. We can approach the content several different ways depending on the standard/verb. The LEQ gives a student-friendly question to guide learning while the objective informs our instruction. RBT is not DOK!

What do these verbs ask students to do?

Summarize

Explain

Compare

Analyze

Exemplify

Explain

Analyze

Exemplify

Summarize

Compare

3. UPOs and Canvas Master Courses

1st Grade

Kindergarten

Continue learning about citizens around the community and the world. Learning about economics, geography, culture, and history of different countries.

Roles in the community and the world. Students will learn about other cultures in the classroom, school, community, and world.

3rd Grade

2nd Grade

A look at the history of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County. This is the only time students will get local history in-depth in their K-12 curriculum.

Basics of U.S. history with a brief chronological overview. First three units focus on basics of social studies while last three units are a timeline of events that shaped America. Fifth grade looks at U.S. history from a thematic approach.

5th Grade

4th Grade

A thematic look at U.S. history. Broken down into themes like "movement" and "conflict". Middle school social studies is thematic. Second grade forms the chronological background for 5th grade.

Fourth grade students study the state of North Carolina through different eras stretching from American Indians to present-day. Much of this content lays the foundation for 8th-grade social studies.

Use of UPOs

Unit Planning Organizers

Introducing the Social Studies Canvas Master Courses!

Kindergarten

• Each grade level has a Canvas course built out by WS/FCS Social Studies using the resources, activities, and material from the UPOs.
• The first quarter of content is in Canvas Commons RIGHT NOW!
• Each unit will be a module.
• The modules will have LEQs, standard/objective, vocab, warm-up, instruction, and student response.
• Link to Standards-Based Grading Rubric (K-2 only).
• It is not required to use this but it is available to anyone.
• UPOs will still be updated and added to on a regular basis!

1st Grade

2nd Grade

3rd Grade

4th Grade

5th Grade

UPO = Build Your Own BurritoCanvas Course = Grab-and-Go

Break Time

4. Inquiry

What is inquiry?

Inquiry

"Inquiry is a process - one that’s hardwired into our brains. It’s activated whenever we seek to solve a problem or respond to a challenge. The inquiry process launches when we ask a question that sparks our curiosity. We then move through a sustained investigation to build knowledge and test our ideas. Finally, we use that learning to take informed action that impacts the world."

• Students learn through investigation
• Investigations start with a compelling question
• Gather evidence from sources
• Develop conclusions

Traditional Social Studies

• Teacher lecture
• One source (textbook)
• Recall information

Source

Why should I care?

Traditional social studies instruction of facts and recall does not match the needs of a 21st-Century learner.

Which of the following examples fit the criteria for a compelling question?

1. Why do we need rules?
2. What are the five largest sources of oil for U.S. markets?
3. Why is Albany the capital of New York?
4. Who are our community helpers?
5. Can Canada and the U.S. be friends forever?
6. Who won the Cold War?

Compelling Questions

Inquiries begin with a compelling question - to spark interest. Compelling questions need to fit two criteria.

1. Intellectually strong. Needs to reflect an enduring issue, concern, or debate in social studies often drawing on multiple disciplines.
2. Student-friendly. A question that is approachable for students.

Why should I care?

Compelling questions are at the heart of inquiry - which is the teaching model we are striving for. Not every lesson will be an inquiry - but rather incorporate inquiry skills. The goal is for students to drive their own learning and be active participants, rather than passive. Our units and LEQs are formatted this way.

• When did World War II start?
• How did World War II shape the United States and the American Identity?
• How many states are there in the United States?
• Can the movement of people change a country?
• Who are the people that have contributed to communities in Kenya?
• When was the Declaration of Independence signed?
• How have historic events shaped the country of Canada?
• How many provinces are there in Canada?
• Who was the first president of the United States?
• What is life like in Winston-Salem?
• Who founded Salem, North Carolina?
• How did Forsyth County change from the 1950s to the 1990s?
• Who was RJ Reynolds?
• How did entrepreneurship change our region after the Civil War?

Compelling or not compelling?

5. Assessments

K-2 Standards-Based Grading

K SBG Rubric

1st SBG Rubric

2nd SBG Rubric

Who worked to create equity in Forsyth County during this era?

3.H.1.1 Explain how the experiences and achievements of women, indigenous, religious, and racial groups have contributed to the development of the local community. 3.H.1.3 Use primary and secondary sources to compare multiple interpretations of various historical symbols and events in local communities.

What is an exit ticket we can make for this lesson?

Pick an LEQ from your applicable grade level and develop a standards-aligned exit ticket.

6. What makes a good social studies lesson?

• Teachers are using the unit planning organizers, resources, and tools provided by WS/FCS.
• Social Studies vocabulary is displayed in the classroom.
• Teachers are ensuring equity in the classroom by using resources that share a wide variety of perspectives and cultures.
• Students are "doing" social studies using historical thinking skills.
• A variety of sources (photographs, maps, timelines, charts, graphs, primary/secondary sources) are incorporated into lessons.

• Social Studies instruction is intentional and tightly aligned to Social Studies Standards.
• Social Studies standards are explicitly taught if integrated
• Evidence of multicultural resources and instructional resources?

Kick-Up Look Fors

What makes a good social studies lesson?

Share out (1 minute)

Video 1

Evaluating Social Studies Lessons

Video 3

Video 2

7. Closing

• Demonstrate social-emotional well-being and practice self-care• Take ownership of their learning • Utilize strong literacy skills to access information, stretch their thinking, and read for enjoyment • Actively engage in their community and our democratic society • Demonstrate effective communication skills • Seek and respect diverse perspectives and ideas • Solve various complex problems • Think critically about the world around them • Practice responsible decision-making • Manage their money wisely • Persevere in adversity • Successfully enter postsecondary education or the 21st Century Global Marketplace • Effectively utilize technology and discern credible sources of information on social media

WS/FCS GRADUATES WILL BE ABLE TO:

How many of these are rooted in social studies?

Expected Takeaways

Actionable Next Steps

• Knowledge of the social studies curriculum and content for the coming school year.
• Know how to access the curriculum and best utilize the resources.
• Know what a good social studies lesson looks like.
• Understand the basics of an inquiry lesson.
• Know what historical thinking skills are and how to implement them in your classroom.
• Best practices for assessing standards.

• Encourage your teammates, PLTs, co-workers, and admin that social studies is worth the time and effort!
• Invite us to your classroom, PLT/grade level meetings!
• Keep up-to-date on our Canvas page including details about the Canvas master courses!
• Our role is not a "gotcha". We are here to help!

ctuck@wsfcs.k12.nc.usndsebesta@wsfcs.k12.nc.us sceshleman@wsfcs.k12.nc.us