Here is a valuable portal to online resources for teaching social studies. The information might be useful to others. The list of resources was compiled by a librarian with the middle school social studies teacher in mind. The list is extensive, and chock full of resources for helping teachers design lesson plans, and find useful online resources for students. The resource is also listed as useful to parents. Check it out, and enjoy exploring:http://www.sldirectory.com/teachf/socsci.html
Image on left from http://www.stjoanofarc.org/; image on right from http://www.hcbe.net/
Let us know what you think. Post comments.
5 comments:
Simple WOW! I found this site more comprehensive than the math link listed on the same site. I like the fact that Ms. Bertland, the site creator was able to break it down to various social studies topics. It provides a rich resource of lesson plans, government sites and news sources. Social studies is an area that is always changing. News is being made every day. With the upcoming elections, students may use this site to learn about the election process as an example.
Another source that this site in the general site section is the CIA website. It contains current information of the worlds leaders and a kids page relevant to their grade. In addition, young leaners can go to this particular link and do a word search or break a code. It reminds me a little of the game, "where is Carmen Santiago?"
Wow is right! As a future social studies teacher, I have hit the jackpot with this link...and the timing couldn't be better as I was able to incorporate several sites into my webquest. I love the government sites in particular because students can read the actual documents that were crafted by our legislators, from the Constitution and all its amendments to the Social Security Act. The latter was the subject of my webquest. I think that it is invaluable to see the actual document, even if it is more difficult to read than a textbook summary because it is the real thing. For the purposes of reading across the curriculum, students need to see the legal jargon used in government documents and to be in awe of how the words are "crafted". Every word has power and is used deliberately and judiciously in these documents. Textbook summaries don't do these documents justice. With links like the ones here, I don't think I'll ever use a textbook. Thank you so much!
I had to stop myself from investigating too far into this website because it has such a scope of information I was getting lost! But lost in a great way! Thank you for posting about this site-this will be on my annotated list for teachers for sure. I also am browsing through the ancient Rome information and may include sites for my webquest. I just don't want to hand too much to my students and overwhelm them.
I will keep this as a tool for my future teaching--it has rubrics, a TON of lesson plans, photos and a variety of subject areas to investigate historic, economic and civic information. Incorporating what this site has to offer into the classroom will hook students right in and hopefully make thsi content area come alive for my classes. It will allow me to stay up to date with current events and real-time stats and numbers, so it is more then relevant in the classroom. This is great!!!
Why didn't I know about this site sooner! What wonderful resources from linking to standards to planning the day's lesson. I appreciated the PA history links as I just took a day-trip to "Old City" Philadelphia. On a practical note, I will be able to link where I was in Philadelphia to my U.S. History classroom by pulling up the various sites litsed.
It is really impossible to teach Social Studies without accessing the internet...history is a constantly changing field with new ideas and perspectives being added much faster than books are printed. Thanks for posting this valuable resource!
I love the fact that it has a variety of resources in one place. It makes finding specific information so much easier and that is exactly what busy teachers need!!
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