Social Studies Content Area Introduction

When teaching social studies it is absolutely vital to contextualize concepts to students and at all costs avoid "text book teaching". This means that students sitting and silently reading a text book and then answering summative questions, or reading aloud as a class out of a text book are not adequate or appropriate manners of teaching social studies. The most important thing is to make history truly come alive for students and to provide them with the backround knowledge and understanding necessary for them to truly grasp and be able to relate to history.

Wampanoag Harvest 1600 Unit Introdution Lesson Plan

Social Studies: Introduction to Wampanoag Harvest 1600 Unit

Grade Level and Unit: 1^st and 2^nd grade, Introduction to Wampanoag Harvest 1600

Session and Description of Lesson Tasks: The students will be hearing about this unit for the first time. We will read a story, have a discussion, complete a worksheet, and look at pictures of Wampanoag people.

Materials needed: Indian artifacts, worksheet, pictures, “Wampanoag Clambake” story book, crayons, colored pencils, markers.

Grouping Decisions:  This activity will be completed as a whole group.

Learning goals/Objective(s) What are your core ideas for this lesson? What do you intend all students to know and understand? I want students to understand the different resources that were available 400 years ago and how life was different for the Wampanoag Indians.	Language Objectives? What language will you model during the lesson? What language do you expect to hear during student discourse? Wampanoag Plymouth Indians House Food Transportation Clothing
Standards: How do the learning goals relate to the standards? Massachusetts History and Social Studies Framework: 1.8 After reading or listening to stories about famous Americans of different ethnic groups, faiths, and historical periods (e.g., Neil Armstrong, Cesar Chavez, Roberto Clemente, Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Daniel Inouye, Thurgood Marshall, Rosa Parks, Colin Powell, Sacagawea, Jonas Salk, Harriett Beecher Stowe, Clarence Thomas, Booker T. Washington, and the Wright Brothers) describe their qualities or distinctive traits. (H, C)
Connect and Anticipate: In what ways does this lesson build on students’ previous knowledge? What student strategies and responses do you anticipate? What misconceptions and struggles might students have? This unit will build on the student’s previous unit, Neighborhood Nature. We will be discussing how the Wampanoag Indians lived near this area 400 years ago and how the environment affected them. Students will be reflecting on their own lives and how things may have been similar or different 400 years ago. Students may struggle relating to the Wampanoag Indians but we will be reading many different books about them, looking at artifacts, and other resources will be available for student research.
Focus Questions: Consider what questions you will use to focus on students’ thinking to encourage sense-making and discourse. Launch: To introduce the activity/motivate students. Have you ever heard of the Wampanoag Indians? What do you think it was like 400 years ago? Explore: To assess students’ understanding and to advance their thinking as they work independently, in partners or small group What kind of clothing, house, food, and transportation did the Wampanoag use 400 years ago? Summary: To facilitate the analysis and synthesis of ideas shared at the end of the lesson What do the Wampanoag people look like now? How are they similar and different to 400 years ago? How are they similar and different from you?

Evidence: How will you know what students understand? What evidence will you collect? (If there is an exit task, what will be its focus to inform you instructional next steps?) I will know if students understand based on their responses on the worksheet. They will be given a blank worksheet with four boxes labeled house, food, clothing, and transportation. I will also be able to judge their understanding based on their comments and questions in whole group discussion.

Pitfalls and Solutions:

ELL: These students may have a difficult time understanding vocabulary. I will help them overcome this by spending extra time with them with the story books we read and the pictures and artifacts.

Special Ed.: These students will need extra support and may have a difficult time grasping the concept.

Wampanoag Harvest 1600 Student Work Example

Mapping Lesson Plan

Mapping Activity

Grade Level and Unit: First and Second Grade, Immigration…Coming to America

Session and Description of Lesson Tasks: Students will be given a large world map and asked to find a list of countries. The countries will be countries that students’ families in the class have immigrated from. They will work in pairs of three. I will also introduce the concept of continents. Students will attempt to identify what countries are in which continents.

Materials needed: World maps, colored pencils, student survey’s with countries immigrated from, and lists of countries to find.

Grouping Decisions:  Students will work in heterogeneous groups of 3.

Learning goals/Objective(s) What are your core ideas for this lesson? What do you intend all students to know and understand? I would like students to have a better understanding of where the countries their families have immigrated from are located. I also want them to be able to work in their groups well.	Language Objectives? What language will you model during the lesson? What language do you expect to hear during student discourse? North America South America Asia Europe Antarctica Australia Africa Continenties Various country names
Standards: How do the learning goals relate to the standards?
Connect and Anticipate: In what ways does this lesson build on students’ previous knowledge? What student strategies and responses do you anticipate? What misconceptions and struggles might students have? Students will have previous knowledge of where the countries are their own families are from. They may have difficulty finding other students countries. I am also anticipating students having difficulty finding countries in Europe because they are so small and close together. I am hoping they are able to work well in a group and help each other.
Focus Questions Consider what questions you will use to focus on students’ thinking to encourage sense-making and discourse. Launch: To introduce the activity/motivate students. Where are countries located? What are the seven continents? Where are they located? Explore: To assess students’ understanding and to advance their thinking as they work independently, in partners or small group What are the countries you have found? What strategies are you using to find countries? What continents are the countries located on? Summary: To facilitate the analysis and synthesis of ideas shared at the end of the lesson What countries were you able to find? What countries were hard or you were unable to find? Did you work well within your group? Where are the countries you found located? How would someone immigrate from that country to America today? In 1600?

Evidence: How will you know what students understand? What evidence will you collect? (If there is an exit task, what will be its focus to inform you instructional next steps?) The evidence I will collect are their maps and list of countries where they should have indicated the continent it was located on if possible. I will be able to tell if students understood the task if they were able to find some countries and color them in.

Pitfalls and Solutions:

                ELL: I do not anticipate ELL students to have difficulty with this task.

Special Ed.: These students will be paired in groups with children who are more capable of completing this task. This way they are able to accomplish the task and not feel discouraged by not being able to find the countries. I will also have them specifically look for the country their family is from so they may be able to find this easier.

Reflection: I learned a lot from implementing this lesson. I think that students really enjoyed doing this and liked finding the countries they were from as well as where other students were from. However, I realized that I should have given an even number of countries for each group to look for. The lists I gave each group of three students have seven countries so they had difficulty dividing the numbers equally. Also, students had a lot of difficulty finding countries in Europe because the map I used had abbreviations for the countries. Next time I will fill out a map first and be able to tell students what the abbreviations are they should be looking for. I also did not consider that England would be labeled United Kingdom on the map and Holland, Netherlands.

Social Studies Content Area Reflection

During this semester I have learned a lot about how to improve my lesson plans when teaching Social Studies. I learned that it is really important to take time and introduce students to subjects so that they have enough background information to fully appreciate it. Also, I think it is really important to allow students to ask questions and be knowledgeable about the subjects. Children have lots of questions and theories about what has happened in the past and by allowing them to share provides meaningful learning experiences.

The two lesson plans I wrote for Social Studies were about the Wampanoag Indians and an introduction to an immigration unit. Both of this subjects have a really rich history and provide valuable insight to 1st and 2nd graders about the world. When planning I learned how important it is to provide books on all different levels for students to explore. This way they will have the oppertunity to delve further into subjects we cover in class, as well as learn about some things we may not cover. I also think it is important to present the information to students in a way that they can find their own meaning and connect history with their own lives. For example, teaching children the Pilgrims and Indians were best friends isn't factual and doesn't prepare the students for learning in the future.

When I implemented both these lessons I learned to provide lots of pictures and stories because that's what interests the kids the most. For my Wamapnoag lesson I passed around some fur pelts for the students to touch when I explained that is what Indians used as clothing. Teaching social studies is so much more than reading from a textbook. Providing hands on activities and really experiencing the history is the best way to teach it to students.

Language Arts Content Area Introduction

There are many different key teaching strategies for teaching language arts in the elementary school level. Reading development is a key aspect in elementary language arts. The stages of reading development are: emergent literacy, beginning reading, building fluency, reading to learn & reading for pleasure, mature reading. Focusing on reading there are several ways of teaching each reading development in order to accommodate each child’s specific learning needs. For example, there are many ways to teach comprehension. One includes literature study groups, which entails all group members selecting a book to read together and begin by reading the book independently then coming back together as a group to discuss what they had just read. A teacher is often present during this study group. Other comprehension strategies include, partner reading, independent reading, read alouds, and guided reading groups.

There are two essential milestones for children to reach to become readers: phonological and phonemic awareness. Strategies for teaching phonological awareness include syllable-matching games including pictures of several different objects on cards and finding the objects with the same amount of syllables. Another teaching approach for syllables is simply clapping out the syllables for children to hear. Similarly, a teaching tactic for identifying a rhyme includes a matching game with several pictures of objects that rhyme in pairs. A strategy for teaching phonemic awareness is using Elkonin boxes, where each box represents a sound and teaches children how to segment and hear individual sounds.

Concepts about print is another important factor for children to learn in order to begin reading. Teaching approaches for concepts about print include creating a sight word wall, sight word songs, and sight word bingo. Using name cards for children’s names is another good way to help children recognize words that are important to them, which also supports concepts about print. In addition to teaching concepts about print, there are five big components to teach children in language arts: phonemic awareness, phonics, fluency, vocabulary, and comprehension. There are several different teaching strategies for each and several different ways for children to learn each.

Friendly Letter Writing Unit

Friendly Letter Writing Unit

GRADE LEVEL:      5^th Grade

DATE and TIME ALLOTMENT:  April 9, 11 and 30, 1 hour each day

SUBJECT AREA(S):          Language Arts: Friendly Letter Writing

GOALS (in relation to MA ELA Curriculum Frameworks)

• Students will write with a clear focus, coherent organization, and sufficient detail. (Composition Strand, Standard 19:Writing)
• Students will organize ideas in writing in a way that makes sense for their purpose. (Composition Strand, Standard 23: Organizing Ideas in Writing)
• Students will demonstrate improvement in organization, content, paragraph development, level of detail, style, tone, and word choice (diction) in their compositions after revising them. (Composition Strand, Standard 21: Revising)
• Write formal letters to correspondents such as authors, newspapers, businesses, or government officials (19.18)

WHERETO

E- Equip, Experience, and Explore

·         By looking at problems within their own community they will explore and experience it in a new way

H-Hook and Hold

·         Before writing, students will brainstorm the meaning of social change and as a class we will come up with a definition and examples.

R-Rethink and Revise

·         Students will revise their drafts and make sure their solution is appropriate to their problem.

T-Tailored

·         Students are able to pick their own problem within their community that is meaningful to them.

WHEELOCK COLLEGE TEACHING STANDARDS

• Observe and listen to children as they work, learn, and play in a variety of settings to gain insights into what their students know, how they think, what they value, who they are, where they come from, and what motivates them. WCS2
• Educators should be adept at using and teaching the fundamentals of the English Language Arts. They should model effective use of English, including its syntax and lexicon, history and varieties, literary and oral traditions, and written composing process. WCS3

UNDERSTANDING

Facet 1: Explanation and Bloom’s Taxonomy: Knowledge-Students will be able to explain and recognize the parts of a friendly letter.

Facet 2: Interpretation and Bloom’s Taxonomy: Comprehension- Students will be able to understand and describe several instances of social change within history.

Facet 4: Perspective and Bloom’s Taxonomy: Evaluation- Students will be able to apply  their knowledge of what social change is to finding a meaningful problem within their own community to write about.

ESSENTIAL QUESTION

• How can I advocate for change?
• What are ways I can impact my community?
• What needs to be changed in my community?
• What is a friendly letter?

 ACTIVATE PRIOR KNOWLEDGE

• Class Discussion. I plan on beginning the lesson by asking the students what they believe social change is and developing a definition so everyone has an understanding of the concept.
• Past Lessons. I will focus first on the peaceful ways Martin Luther King advocated for social change and how it is possible for the students to use these methods because they have already learned this information during the school year.

 OBJECTIVES

1.            Students will write with a clear focus, coherent organization, and sufficient detail.

Students will identify a problem and write a friendly letter to advocate for change. They will describe their problem using a specific location and other details as well as formulate a solution to their problem.

I know the parts of a friendly letter.

I can identify a problem and generate a solution.

2.            Students will demonstrate improvement in organization, content, paragraph development, level of detail, style, tone, and word choice (diction) in their compositions after revising them.

                Students will begin with a template and be able to peer edit their drafts to create a final draft that shows improvement from their earlier draft(s).

                I know how to re-read and edit my own paper, and my peers.

3.            Write formal letters to correspondents such as authors, newspapers, businesses, or government officials

Student’s final drafts of their friendly letters will be given to their State Senator or State Representative.

                I know who my State Senator and State Representative are.

DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION

• For ELL students: They will have a friendly letter template and rubric translated into Spanish with instructions.
• For students who need more assistance I will have friendly letter templates for them to brainstorm on and use as a rough draft.
• Students can also request to look back at the PowerPoint for directions if necessary.

 ASSESSMENT

• I will know if my objectives have been achieved by the final copies of the friendly letters.
• See attached rubric for assessing student work.
• I will be looking to see if students meet the criteria in the rubric.
• They should be able to have a clear introduction that describes who they are and relates to their problem. Their second paragraph should clearly state their problem with an exact location and description. Their third paragraph should have a plausible solution that is clearly described.

 IMPLEMENTATION PROCEDURES

Materials:

• The Progressive Movement: Advocating Social Change By: Tim McNeese
• Black Ants and Buddhists By: Mary Cowhey
• PowerPoint
• Computer
• Whiteboard
• Markers
• Rubric
• Friendly Letter Template (Spanish and English)
• Chart Paper

 Procedure:

Wednesday, April 4

• The classroom teacher will introduce the topic on so that over the weekend students can look around their neighborhoods for things they would like to see change in. (5 min)
• Teacher will lead  a class discussion on what could be a possible thing changed in their neighborhood.

 Monday, April 9

• Teacher will begin the lesson by having a conversation with the students about what they believe social change is.
• The teacher will then ask what students remember about Martin Luther King Jr. and how he advocated social change through peaceful ways. (5-7 min)
• Teacher will then share another example from The Progressive Movement: Advocating Social Change to show how people have created social change movements throughout history, focusing primarily on the Women’s Sufferage Movement. (7-10 min)
• Teacher will share the example from Black Ants and Buddhists when a student from Mary Cowhey’s class wrote a letter to the Mayor about removing a shopping cart from a stream. Teacher will have a conversation with the class about how writing a letter can be an effective way to create change within their communities. (7-10 min)
• Teacher will have class generate a list of changes they would like to make in their community on the chart paper for future reference later on so that everyone has a meaningful topic to write about. (15 min)
• Teacher will introduce the Friendly Letter Template and explain all parts of a Friendly Letter: address, salutation, three body paragraphs (background, problem, solution), and conclusion. (20 min)
• Students will begin drafting Friendly Letters and if time allows begin editing process. (Time that is left)

Wednesday, April 11

• Teacher will reintroduce topic by asking what they remember about Representative Jeff Sanchez and Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz (Classroom teacher will have had a lesson on this information on the previous day, Tuesday, April 10) (5-7 min)
• Students will continue the editing process and finish letters for Representative Jeff Sanchez and Senator Sonia Chang-Diaz. (45 min)

 Monday, April 30

• Representative Jeff Sanchez and Senator Chang-Diaz will visit the fifth grade to talk about their backgrounds, how they became a State Representative and State Senator, and any current projects they is working on in the student’s district. They will receive the student’s letter and answer their questions. (1 hour)