Professionally studying the Social Studies
April 3, 2008Any well informed elementary school teacher feels an obligation to connect the social studies of history, sociology, anthropology, psychology, archaeology, geography, politics, and economics through daily reinforcing lessons that promote learning. Competent students should be encouraged to make independent, well thought out decisions as they mature into citizens of a very culturally integrated and global society.
My particular strength may lie in the Johnson & Johnson’s small group “hands on” method of Cooperative Learning. This method of teaching appeals to me because it encourages cooperative settings whereby students learn interactively and independently. It does not foster competition, but encourages each student to maximize his or her own abilities. I find it gratifying when the competition is removed from a classroom and all students can become superstars. This cooperative method fits in the teaching of all areas of the social studies. However, I would not exclude other teaching methods or accommodations or learning styles if students were struggling. I understand that academics connect to standards and assessments, but a well educated teacher can utilize many approaches when teaching diverse learners. Students are not “one size fits all”, so one method may not fit all. With that understanding, my primary method of teaching would remain cooperative learning.
The application of this method is especially important in approaching geographical concepts, maps, and orienteering students to scope and scale and map reading. Following my “hands-on” approach, I would encourage the students to research countries, states, and other locations using maps and charts. I would teach the students about map making and understanding the symbols used. Once the concepts are understood, various maps need to be utilized in the classroom by groups of students in an exploration format. I would encourage students to take their map and present a travelogue. By the end of the year, our hallway would be filled with student created maps and representations of various areas of the world.
An obvious tangent to our geographical study would be to encourage the students to familiarize themselves with the economic, political, and social customs of each area. Culture and heritage are difficult concepts for young students to grasp in isolation, but when integrated thematically students can better understand the varying governmental structures in those areas. When studying culture, a classroom food festival would certainly immerse the class in different ethnic delicacies. Other valuable activities would come in opportunities to cooperatively create a mock trial, enhance a current political system, or create money.
While it is important to learn about current events, the study of history is just as important. I will use the history text as a basis for learning, but I hope to also embed the standards in creative lessons which grasp the attention of the students. It is vital that the students learn history in a sequence, however there may be certain events in time where I would make more learning choices available for the students to choose a project. Individual accountability through project ownership is paramount. In every mainstream classroom there will be special needs students, but they will always need to be incorporated into my classroom activities without using ability grouping. I want to foster high class moral, teamwork, and ownership motivating my class to contribute. Not only will I use the textbook to teach history, but I will also use technology which includes the internet, audio and visual devices, and also digital cameras and video recorders which will enable kinesthetic as well as cognitively advanced learn.
I would especially enjoy incorporating anthropology and archaeological concepts into my classroom. Frequent virtual field trips to the
A healthy study of psychology is directly related to cooperative learning because it is centered in relationships. As students are no longer competitive for grades, they learn to develop their own self-esteem through positive group relationships. All students are accountable to themselves and their group. Classroom achievement will be less centered on objective test assessments and more centered on projects and presentations of learned material. My goal is to have students encourage, congratulate, and self assess each other’s contributions. By teaching with this method, it will create academic friendships and positive feelings to motivate students to continue additional study.
The pervasive attitude I want my students to exit with would be that the study of social studies is historic, social, political, economic, and personal. It is not a subject that never touches a life, and my students will be able to show what they’ve learned as they mature into responsible citizens able to work within a group for a common cause. It is important for me that I teach children to become respectable and contributing members of a society which supports democracy and acceptance of diverse individuals. Thus, I look forward to professionally teaching the social studies as my students grow from these activities and experiences.