Social Education articles from September 2007

Social Education archives from September 2007

Editor's notebook.
September 1, 2007... As the authors in this back-to-school issue of Social Education point out, there is an enormous payoff for engaging students in social studies projects that make them truly eager to learn. In the opening article, Lee Ann Potter describes...

The constitution in action.(Teaching with Documents)
September 1, 2007... Question: What do the following historical documents have in common? * An 1847 credential certificate naming Sam Houston as an elected Senator from Texas; * A 1904 patent drawing for a game board; and * A 1958 letter to...

9/11 and terrorism: "the ultimate teachable moment" in textbooks and supplemental curricula.(Democracy Education)
September 1, 2007... A recent poll asked American adults to identify "the single most significant event that has happened in your lifetime, in terms of its importance to the U.S. and the world." Two percent of respondents pointed to the collapse of communism; three...

Out of range: an interview with Mark Tushnet on the Second Amendment.(Looking at the Law)(Interview)
September 1, 2007... This September, Oxford University Press is publishing Out of Range: Why the Constitution Can't End the Battle Over Guns. Written by Mark Tushnet, the William Nelson Cromwell Professor of Law at Harvard Law School, Out of Range explores...

Understanding individual and collective rights interpretations of the Second Amendment.(TEACHING ACTIVITY)
September 1, 2007... 1. Identify and share a recent news story about gun violence with the class. Ask the students what they think should be done about gun violence. Elicit and discuss a range of options. 2. Share the text of the Second Amendment to the U.S....

An idea called America.
September 1, 2007... Democracy degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves therefore are its only safe depositories. --Thomas Jefferson (1782, Notes on the State of Virginia) Our citizenship is based on an idea we call...

What I learned at the NCSS annual meeting.(Surfing the Net)(National Council for the Social Studies)
September 1, 2007... I went to my first NCSS annual meeting in 1970, and I've only missed two since then. I was a 30-year-old classroom teacher on leave from my high school to work with the Social Science Education Consortium in Boulder, Colorado. I welcomed the...

High-stakes testing: how are social studies teachers responding?(Research and Practice)
September 1, 2007... "Research & Practice, "established early in 2001,features educational research that is directly relevant to the work of classroom teachers. In this, the 19th article in the series, I invited S.G. Grant to examine the ways social studies...

Advocating for social studies: documenting the decline and doing something about it.
September 1, 2007... This article illustrates the efforts of educators in North Carolina to advocate for the social studies in an age of high-stakes assessment and tight budgets. Although this story begins with one state, the marginalization of social studies in...

A school-wide effort for learning history via a time capsule.(Elementary Education)(Ridgedale Elementary School)
September 1, 2007... The time is early fall of 2004. For thousands of elementary school students throughout the country, routines for beginning a new school year are similar. Students are getting to know their teachers and anticipating the activities ahead in...

Connections to the past: creating time detectives with archaeology.
September 1, 2007... The fascination with buried treasures and lost civilizations transcends all ages and serves as an effective magnet for drawing students toward the study of archaeology. Connecting students to the past gives them a better understanding of their...

Archaeology in the classroom: using a dig box to understand the past.
September 1, 2007... Mock excavations, or "dig boxes," offer students a hands-on opportunity to explore artifacts and their importance and to learn the principles of context and stratigraphic association. The dig box can be central to discussing differences...

Intelligent design: a position statement of National Council for the Social Studies.(NCSS Position Statement)
September 1, 2007... Introduction There have been efforts for many decades to introduce religious beliefs about the beginning of life on Earth into the science curriculum of the public schools. Most recently, these efforts have included "creation science" and...

Academic freedom and the social studies teacher: a position statement of National Council for the Social Studies.(NCSS Position Statement)
September 1, 2007... 1. Academic Freedom for Teachers and Students Academic freedom for social studies teachers includes the right and responsibility to study, investigate, present, interpret, discuss, and debate relevant facts, issues, and ideas in fields of...

Social studies in the era of No Child Left Behind: a position statement of National Council for the Social Studies.(NCSS Position Statement)
September 1, 2007... "A primary object... should be the education of our youth in the science of government. In a republic, what species of knowledge can be equally important? And what duty more pressing... than... communicating it to those who are to be the...

"All history is local": researching the place where you live.
September 1, 2007... The Honorable Thomas "Tip" O'Neil, former Speaker of the House, often proclaimed, "All politics is local." O'Neil knew whereof he spoke, having arisen from the political atmosphere described so well in Edwin O'Connor's The Last Hurrah (a book...

Online interactive mapping: using the panoramic maps collection.(how to do it)
September 1, 2007... "Remember where the train station used to be? Turn left at that corner." Often, when giving directions, we assume familiarity with historical landscapes. We expect that the listener can adjust "layers of mental maps" from the past and...

"What's in a name?" Investigating whom to memorialize.
September 1, 2007... Peter Jennings Way, Willa Cather Memorial Prairie, and the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts have a common denominator: each of these places was named after a person whose work was important to society. But what makes a person worthy of...

A picture is worth 20 questions.(the back page)
September 1, 2007... Teachers routinely pose questions to the class, but asking students to formulate good questions is a teaching tool that we often overlook. The questioning game discussed below not only helps students review lesson content, but improves critical...