social studies scope and sequence

[dramacentral]

Hey everyone,

After five years of classroom teaching, I am now our school's new Social Studies curriculum coordinator. My experience teaching social studies at our school has been rather discombobulated, as we do not have a set scope and sequence that specifies what skills and content knowledge kids will have acquired by the time they leave. (We are a 1st-5th special ed program.)

I have started to make sense of it all by downloading our state's curriculum standards and am now realizing just how much our 'program' deviates from what public schools are doing. I'm led to understand that this is somewhat typical for schools in the private sector, but it makes me very uncomfortable.

So as I'm gathering material together and making decisions about what the scope and sequence for our school is going to be, I am going to put these questions to you guys:

-Does your school follow state/national standards for skills and content?
-What units of study does your school do in first, second, third, fourth, and fifth grades?
-Do you do anything differently during Presidential election years? If so, how do you fit it in?
-To what extent is your social studies curriculum integrated with other subjects? (reading, writing, science, etc.)

Thanks in advance! Answers to any/all of these questions would be much appreciated.

 

[wig]

-Does your school follow state/national standards for skills and content?
Yes we do

-What units of study does your school do in first, second, third, fourth, and fifth grades?
Families, Communities, Regions, State, US History through the Constitution

-Do you do anything differently during Presidential election years? If so, how do you fit it in?
With difficulty, but it is important. so I usually teach a unit on the constitution the three/four weeks before the election in fifth and in the lower grades we have a mock election.

-To what extent is your social studies curriculum integrated with other subjects? (reading, writing, science, etc.)

Depends on the teacher, but usually the lower grades connect economics and core democratic values with read-alouds. Three/four/five integrate writing into the units of studies.


Although we are a parochial school, we follow state standards, because eventually these kids will be in public school and we want them to be on the same page (or further_) as their counterparts.

 

[troysbride]

I teach 5th LA/SS. Our SS is a survey course of Columbus through 9-11. This year we taught the info differently...Instead of teaching it chronologically, we briefly introduced 30 "Post-hole" events and constructed a timeline. Then we taught the major SS themes of geography, history, economics, government, civil rights, war, and culture. For each theme, we revisited the events, looking at the event in light of that six week's SS theme emphasis. For example, our second event on the 30-event timeline is "Jamestown was the first successful colony."

Geography--Explore maps of Jamestown. Discuss pros and cons for settling in this location.

The next six week's SS theme was history. We focused on biographies during this unit, and some children chose to read biographies of famous people associated with the colonial time.

The following six weeks' theme was economics, so we revisited the Jamestown event by determining importance of cash crop, etc.

The next six week's SS theme, gov., had a natural way to revisit the Jamestown/colonial event with self-government beginning with the Mayflower Compact and the House of Burgesses.


Of course war related to the colonists due to the taxation by the British, and culture relates to the colonists by examining how crafts, music, religion, etc., changed and differed between different colonies.

Throughout the six weeks, we immersed the students in the theme, but did not "camp out" for six weeks on colonists or the Am. Revolution or the Westward Movement, etc. By the end of the year, I felt my students had a deeper understanding of the 30 posthole events, as well as a deeper understanding of the major themes of SS than when I taught the same info chronologically.

Our district is pretty big into essential understandings and guiding questions focusing on "timeless", or "big" ideas, rather than simply facts-based curriculum. The idea is to encourage the students to grasp the concept of freedom or civil rights or culture and how these concepts relate to their own lives and current events. I enjoyed teaching SS this way.

I would love to hear from others who have taught a US history "survey" course in a similar manner, varying from the usual chronological method.

 

[brownj]

third grade classroom teacher

I would love an easy unit on teaching colonial life to my third grade students, some easy reading and coloring sheets.

 

[wig]

Here are a few links

http://www.emints.org/ethemes/resources/S00000526.shtml

http://www.picadome.fcps.net/lab/currl/colonial/default.htm

http://www.proteacher.com/090169.shtml