During the summer, I am sharing thematic posts bringing together responses on similar topics from the past 10 years. You can see all those collections from the first nine years here.
Here are the ones I鈥檝e published so far:
The 11 Most Popular Classroom Q&A Posts of the Year
School Closures & the Coronavirus Crisis
Best Ways to Begin the School Year
Best Ways to End the School Year
Student Motivation & Social-Emotional Learning
Challenging Normative Gender Culture in Education
Today鈥檚 theme is on Teaching Social Studies. You can see the list of posts following this excerpt from one of them:
*Introducing Primary Sources to Students
Five educators share strategies for introducing primary sources to students, including English-language learners.
* Eight Ways to Teach With Primary Sources
Four educators share ways they use primary sources with students, including a strategy called 鈥淶oom鈥� and I don鈥檛 mean the meeting platform.
* 鈥楽tanding Up for What Is Right': Teaching in the Aftermath of the Presidential Election
Four teachers explain how they are handling this year鈥檚鈥�2020鈥攑residential election in their classrooms.
* Post-Election Teaching Strategies
Four teachers share suggestions for lessons following the 2020 election, including focusing on local issues and practicing media literacy.
* Readers Respond: Should Politics Be Kept Out of the Classroom?
Many readers share their responses to the question of politics in the classroom, ranging from the importance of separating it from 鈥減artisanship鈥� to stating that 鈥渢eaching is political.鈥�
* 鈥楰eeping Politics Out of the Classroom Is Like Keeping the Water Out of Rain鈥�
Four educators consider how to explore politics in the classroom, including by incorporating multiple perspectives and ensuring all student voices are heard.
* Politics Belongs in the Classroom
Four educators discuss the importance of bringing politics into the classroom, including to help students develop skills in discourse and information literacy.
Four educators push back against the admonition to 鈥渒eep politics out of the classroom鈥� by, among other things, explaining that schools are part of a broader political system.
Three educators share ways to connect their students to community engagement, including through project-based learning and community-service projects.
Four teachers share their strategies to help students improve their communities, including through 鈥淪tructured Academic Controversies鈥� and 鈥淕enius Hours.鈥�
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Three social studies teachers share the instructional strategies they are using in distance learning, including project-based learning and various online tools.
Five social studies teachers discuss their online instructional strategies, including emphasizing relevancy and maintaining high standards.
Seven educators discuss multiple ways to bridge current events with their classroom lessons, including applying learning-transfer and information-literacy strategies.
Project-based learning and student-created podcasts are among the techniques six educators employ to bring current events into the classroom and engage students.
Carina Whiteside, Denise Fawcett Facey, Deborah Gatrell, and Mark Honeyman discuss what they think were their best social studies lessons that connected with their students.
This two-part series on best social studies lessons is 鈥渨rapped up鈥� today by commentaries from Rachel Johnson, Dawn Mitchell, Julie Stern, Cynthia W. Resor, Andrew Sharos, Lori Oczkus, and Keisha Rembert.
A series on teaching information literacy to students finishes up with suggestions from Elliott Rebhun, Laura Greenstein, Michael Fisher, Barbara R. Blackburn, and Douglas Reeves.
Carla Truttman, Josh Perlman, Jennifer Casa-Todd, Bryan Goodwin, and Frank W. Baker share their suggestions for information-literacy lessons.
Big mistakes are made in social studies instruction. What can teachers do to avoid them? Annie Brown, Amy Okimoto, Amy Fast, Lynette Yorgason, Mike Kaechele, and Rebecca Testa-Ryan weigh in.
Sarah Cooper and Ken Halla share suggestions on how to use tech in social studies classes.
Martha Sevetson Rush, Andrew Miller, Melissa Miles, Donna L. Shrum, and Richard Byrne contribute their thoughts on writing in social studies classes.
Stan Pesick, Ben Alvord, Dawn Mitchell, Rachel Johnson, and Rebecca Testa-Ryan share their suggestions on integrating writing into social studies classes.
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Diana Laufenberg, Sarah Cooper, Chris Hulleman, Suzie Boss, and Erin Brandvold discuss how we can make social studies lessons more exciting!
Andrew Kozlowsky, Stephanie Smith, Greg Milo, Donna Wilson, Marcus Conyers, Andrew Miller, and Tamara Fyke contribute their ideas on how to make social studies lessons more engaging.
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Sarah Cooper, Michael Fisher, Ruchi Agarwal-Rangnath, Jody Passanisi, and Eugenia Mora-Flores share their thoughts on the impact of the Common Core State Standards on social studies classrooms.
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Jennifer Hesseltine, Kenny McKee, Erik M. Francis, Wayne Journell, and Dave Stuart Jr. contribute their ideas about the social studies connection to the Common Core State Standards.
Lorena Germ谩n, Adeyemi Stembridge, Stephen Lazar, Jen Schwanke, and Aubrie Rojee share their ideas on how to handle so-called 鈥渃ontroversial鈥� topics in the classroom.
Gabriella Corales, Tom Rademacher, Martha Caldwell, Oman Frame, Danny Woo, Paul Barnwell, and Kathleen Neagle Sokolowski share their responses to the question: 鈥淗ow do you handle controversial issues in the classroom?鈥�
Dominique Williams, Matthew Homrich-Knieling, Meg White, Kristina J. Doubet, Jessica A. Hockett, Vance Austin, and Stephanie Smith contribute to Part Three in a series on handling 鈥渃ontroversial鈥� issues in the classroom.
Today鈥檚 answers on dealing with controversial issues in the classroom are provided by Sara Ahmed, Jennifer Borgioli, Kevin Scott, Erik M. Francis, Phil Hunsberger, Jackie Walsh, Beth Sattes, and Dave Stuart Jr.
A five-part series on handling controversial topics in the classroom is wrapped up with commentaries by Meg Riordan, Lymaris Santana, Sarah Thomas, and Thomas Armstrong, along with many comments from readers.
Troy Hicks, Kristina J. Doubet, David Sherrin, Kirke Olson, and Barbara Blackburn share their thoughts. I鈥檝e also included comments from many readers.
Today鈥檚 guest responses come from Kelly Young, from whom I鈥檝e learned more about teaching than from anyone else; Elisabeth Johnson, who is the best social studies teacher I鈥檝e ever seen; middle school educator Lisa Butler; and Matt Podbury, who teaches geography at an International School in France.
Three educators鈥擜shanti Foster, Melissa Bollow Tempel, and P. L. Thomas鈥攁nd a number of readers share their thoughts on this challenge.
Four educators鈥擩ohn T. Spencer, Diana Laufenberg, Jennifer D. Klein, and Jason Flom鈥攔espond to this issue.
Educators Diana Laufenberg, Sarah Kirby-Gonzalez, and Peter Pappas contributed their responses to this piece.
Bruce Lesh, PJ Caposey, and Dave Orphal share their thoughts in this post, and I鈥檝e also included comments from readers.
Three talented and experienced educators share their thoughts on the topic鈥擲tephen Lazar, ReLeah Cossett Lent, and Bill Bigelow.
Many readers and I contribute our suggestions.
Social studies teachers Eric Langhorst, Beth Sanders, and Russel Tarr all write about what they鈥檝e learned from experience.
This post includes guest responses from three talented and experienced educators: Stephen Lazar, Bill Bigelow, and Sarah Kirby-Gonzalez.
