Elem Social Studies 15 (Sophia)

From this class period about teaching hard topics, I learned about the different levels of teaching hard topics and what decisions teachers have to make. Level one begins with the decision of telling students the truth or dancing around the truth, also depending upon the grade level. For example, what we talked about in class about the First Thanksgiving and the Native Americans and the Pilgrims. Starting in Kindergarten, should the teacher tell the truth right off the bat or let future teachers do that? I think even starting in Kindergarten the teacher should start to say how the Pilgrims did not “treat the Native Americans with respect.” I think the next level of teaching hard topics refers to whether the teacher will allow discourse and discussion in their class. I think a contained and respectful discussion of certain hard topics should be encouraged. But how does a teacher facilitate this? And what does the teacher do if it gets out of hand? Another important consideration that teachers need to make note of is the student’s upbringing and their parents. Like what was reiterated in class, it is important to send a note home with the students ANY time that there may be something controversial discussed. It is better to involve parents beforehand than face criticism and frustration after the fact. There are many different steps to take into consideration when teaching hard topics, which was brought to my attention during class this week.

Todays class allowed me to realize some of the tough aspects to teaching social studies. When teaching history and analyzing events that happened decades ago, like the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church, it’s hard to comprehend how similar acts like the burning of churches in Louisiana are happening today. My history teachers would always say to me and their other students that the reason why we are learning about these things that are in the past is so that we can see how our nation and world has formed and even learn from the nation’s past mistakes. But when I am a teacher, how can I tell my students that things that happened so long ago in the 1960s are still happening today in 2019? How will I be able to teach my students that history is studied so we can learn from our mistakes when the same mistakes are still being made around 60 years later – that is more than half a century! How are these events still happening?! It disheartens me that I will have to be the one who has to relay these revelations to my students. But, that also ties into next classes’ lesson on how to teach tough content to students, so maybe I will be able to gain some insight from that. But for right now, leaving class today, I was feeling curious and interested from the different techniques we learned about questioning but also feeling very frustrated and defeated.

I really enjoyed the jigsaw activity. It allows students to learn a variety of information through other mediums than PowerPoint. Students are given the opportunity to master the primary source they are given and then relay and teach the information back to their group. Along the lines of what Dr. Stohr said about her son and his hatred during social studies, that was exactly me in middle and high school. I do not remember any fun activity we did in class. I only remember PowerPoints including dates, names, and places. I think it is important to point out that activities like the jigsaw activity or even read aloud picture books should be utilized in middle school and even high school. High school students would be able to glean ample amounts of information from these activities that go beyond reading their textbook and regurgitating that information on a monthly test. I am excited to use activities like the jigsaw in my future classrooms to turn around the stigma of education being boring and not worth students’ time. My question is how often should you implement the jigsaw activity in your classroom? I understand that it takes ample time to organize so is it something you do once each unit?

Something that was reinforced for me today in class is that students learn by doing. I also learned how important it is for a teacher to take their lessons a step further to allow students the application of critical thinking. Students learn better and remember more by finding the answers to their own questions and wonderings. The activity we did today with the two different maps, old and newer, is something that will stick with me. Being able to give a map to students and give them ample time to look at it, ask questions, write down what they notice, and make sense of it is important. But, going even further than that, giving students a different version of the map whether it is a version of the same place but at a different time period, or a version made by a different person of the same location at the same time period, takes it a step further. This allows students to apply their critical thinking skills and compare and contrast. Students are able to see the maps through different lenses and learn information about one map through the other. It is important for teachers to go the extra mile so that students can infer on their own. Instead of just looking at one map and gleaning information from that one, have students look at two and compare and contrast. Instead of looking at one primary source, have students look at a range of different sources from different perspectives. Allow students the opportunity to extract their own information and revelations. When obtaining their own revelations, this will allow students to feel in charge of their learning and feel proud of what they discovered.

Kindergarteners need to be scaffolded too. When teaching Kindergarteners, some teachers stick with the minimum of the state standards because they think, “this is their first formal year of schooling. They just need to learn the minimum that they can build upon later.” However, after hearing the Kindergarten teachers talk today about their DBQ lesson and their use of the words “artifacts” and the introduction of the topic “cause-and-effect,” it really demonstrates how Kindergarteners have such a capacity to learn and be challenged. Using harder words with them, or introducing harder concepts like DBQs in the classroom is so important even for Kindergarteners because it allows them to instill a self-fulfilling prophecy where if they think they can or have the opportunity to do something more challenging, they succeed with it. Like the teachers said, these students took this opportunity and ran with it. They spent ample time trying to recreate the pictures and even compared drawings with their peers. I think it is especially important for students of that age to be given opportunities to stretch their knowledge in the way that a DBQ provides.

When watching the video “Applying Knowledge at a Museum” from TeachingChannel.org, something that the teacher said is “your job in a museum is not to see everything, it is to look closely at the things that you find most interesting.” This reminded me of museum visits with my family. I’ve been to a handful of museums with my family, either for school projects back at home in California or when we visited other states or countries and wanted to go to a museum to learn more about the culture. My, mom, brother, and I always raced through each room, trying to see everything, and feeling accomplished once we felt we had seen it all. However, my dad was the complete opposite. He would read every placard and every small detail; He would spend hours in just one room. He loved renting the headsets where you could press a button and learn everything about one painting or piece of pottery. Looking back at it now, my dad probably had gained much more from these museum experiences than me, my brother, and my mom combined. Like the teacher said from this video, the goal is not to see everything in a museum, it is to look closely at a few select things. Even one of our guides at the VMFA today said that the average person spends 7 seconds looking at one picture, artifact, or sculpture. Instead, the more effective way is to choose a picture, artifact or sculpture that interests you and then dig deep, ask questions, research more, and reflect. Complete certain activities like the “I see, I think, I wonder,” “connect, extend, challenge,” or “perceive, know, care about.” Like what was demonstrated in our class period today at the VMFA, it is easy to spend 20-30 minutes just on one picture. Spending time to actually look at the information and the picture allows for connection and the ability to recall the experience in the future. Thinking back on the museums I have visited, I do not remember much more than seeing Mona Lisa in the Louvre or bits and pieces about the purpose of the Mission San Juan Capistrano in California. I am sure I could call my Dad and he would remember much more than me because he took the time to connect and reflect on what he saw.

Something that stuck with me after last class was what professor Bland said at the end of class, “we actually want our kids to succeed!” This comment was in reference to testing and assessment in schools. When going through my schooling in middle and high school, the grade you got was the grade you got. I never had the opportunity to re-take a test if I got a low score. This ‘you get what you get’ attitude lead students to have a very fixed mindset. Students were able to take one test and this determined if they understood the material or not. If they got a bad grade or ‘did not understand the material’ then there was no opportunity for growth. What students understood, they understood, but what they didn’t, they seldom had an opportunity to expand upon it and show their growth. This comment that professor Bland made stuck me, because yes we do want our students to succeed! But then why is it that teachers would not allow for growth in the classroom when it came to assessment? I think this is changing in classrooms today. Teachers are allowing for re-testing or even allowing students to show their knowledge in individual ways other than mainstream assessments. It is interesting to be able to compare my schooling with what we are learning is best to do in class today.

Something that will stay with me after todays class was the video we watched about the teacher conducting a lesson on Slavery in America and Black History Month. What struck me the most was the continuous formative assessment she did, saying “thumbs up if you’re thinking I kinda get what we’re talking about now.” Reflecting on my elementary education, I do not remember teachers doing as much formative assessment in the classroom. They did not know what we knew or were confused about until it was time to take the test and the student did not do well. My question is, is formative assessment a new strategy instilled in classrooms? Formative assessment has been encouraged when taking my elementary education classes for my minor, but before my career at UR I had not heard of it. Is formative assessment new to the education realm or was it something that teachers just ignored in the past? Something else the teacher in the video did that teachers did not do when I was in elementary school was sharing the learning targets with the students. My teachers would usually say “today we are going to learn about the Civil War.” But this teacher specifically told her students, “after todays lesson you will understand slavery in America and understand Harriet Tubman’s role.” When I have gone into Richmond public schools to complete my observation hours, I have also noticed how teachers write the learning objectives or “I can” statements on the board. Is this a new strategy implemented in elementary schools as well?

What I noticed today is how background knowledge is heavily connected to long term memory. In my other education class, Diverse Learners with Dr. Brenning, we spent last class talking about short term and long term memory. Long term memory allows us to save things we have learned for future use and while memories do not always last forever, they can be revisited and strengthened. Long term memory can be referred to as a library full of printed books. When doing the activities today with George Washington and King George III, I realized how this was true. Even though my memories from learning this information in high school was a little dusty, I was able to remember George Washington and bits and pieces about the Revolutionary War as well as King George the III and his reign during turbulent times. As said by Shoob and Stout, “learning new content is strongly tied to background knowledge about a subject.” And furthermore, background knowledge is tied to the frontloading and information stored in long term memory. Like seen in the Social Sciences Skills Progression chart, skills and learning build off of one another from frontloading, to long term memory, to retrieval as background knowledge when learning more about the topic.

Something that struck me from this class was the quote that Dr. Stohr and Dr. Bland said, “Social Studies is meant to be a slow process.” When thinking about history and social studies, it would make sense that it would be a slow process; Students are learning about centuries of history across several different locations, time zones, and cultures. It should be a slow process! However, teachers speed through all of the information. Students are not given the opportunity to spend a whole class period on the Boston Tea Party or the Montgomery Bus Boycott. Instead the knowledge students receive about the Montgomery Bus Boycott is a sentence or two in their textbooks and that is that. Students need to be given more time to process, ask questions, and see multiple different perspectives.