Think back to your elementary and middle school years. What memories surface when you think of social studies?
Some teacher candidates and in-service teachers have said these things:
- Units on a Country. Every month, we studied a different country, arranging our desks in the shape of that country and being responsible for learning all about the part of the country where our desk was located, its culture, occupations, natural resources, and so on. At the end of the month, we shared what we had found out. During the month, we sampled food from our country, sang songs, and listened to stories. I loved it and was always excited about which country would be next.
- Memorizing States and Their Capitals. I don't remember ever looking at a map to try to find a state capital, although I probably did. I found this easy because I'm good at memorization, but for many, memorizing those state capitals was a chore because we kept taking quizzes until we got 100 percent.
- Field Trips. I can remember two really great field trips. One was to a local doughnut store. The kitchen smelled wonderful. We were impressed at how mechanized doughnut making was. At the end of the field trip, we each got to pick out six doughnuts and take them with us. The other field trip was to a state park with mounds built by Native Americans long ago. They were huge. I wanted so much to know what had happened to the people who built these mounds. Why were there no villages around these mounds now? After the trip, I read everything I could find about these people.
- Writing Reports. We had to write a report on somebody or something related to each unit we studied. At first, I enjoyed it, but after a while, I got so tired of them. It was really boring listening to each student read his or her report.
- Worksheets and Questions. There were always so many questions to answer at the end of the chapters. We would also be given worksheets to fill in. The teacher called them "fun sheets," but we knew they were no fun.
- Discussions. One year my teacher really encouraged us to say what we thought about things. We brought up a lot of issues that were important to us, such as why we were the last stop on the school bus route and got home later than anyone at the other schools. We had not considered the fact that we also started school later. After some discussion, we decided that this fact did not make up for our long afternoons and petitioned the school board for a change.
- Role Playing. I was shy but I did enjoy role playing. Because I could think of it as a school assignment, I put aside my shyness and really got involved. It seemed to make me understand situations much better. My teacher did some economics-related role playing that I enjoyed most of all.
Some of these memories are positive, and some are negative. What term best describes your social studies memories: mostly positive, mostly negative, or a mixture of both?
Social studies is capable of engaging students so deeply that in 10, 20, or 30 years, they will reminisce fondly about social studies activities. Notice that the most positive memories occurred when students' minds were actively involved in constructing new knowledge or revising knowledge they already had.
