Tools for Teaching Social Studies

Jim Parsons, Mariah Schroder

• Publisher: Brush Education
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN:
  9781550595802
• eBook ISBN:
  9781550595833
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Professional Development

Engage your students AND keep your sanity with classroom-tested tools. Tools for Teaching Social Studies delivers a wealth of practical solutions for classroom success — all grounded in solid educational philosophy. A lifeline for new social studies teachers and a source of inspiration and ideas for experienced teachers, this book offers you a boost at every stage of your career. Based on a master teacher's four decades of experience, this top-notch toolkit is packed with strategies:

• Learn five key teaching principles that put you and your students on the path to success.
• Discover your unique style.
• Connect with your students.
• Set and achieve realistic professional and personal goals.
• Stay organized and manage your time effectively.
• Empower yourself as a teacher.
• Avoid burn-out.
• Facilitate effective group work.
• Create engaging learning plans.
• Make the right use of social media. And much more!

Section 1

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Being a Teacher

Linking It Together: Thinking about Teaching

Jim stumbled into teaching when he saw a poster on the bulletin board at the University of Kentucky in 1969 that outlined the need for teachers in the racially “dynamic” city of Louisville, Kentucky. During this time, the United States was desegregating schools in response to Brown v. Board of Education (1954). Although some Canadians may not be aware of this Supreme Court decision, it is considered one of the greatest of the twentieth century because it unanimously ruled that the racial segregation of children in public schools violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment in the Constitution of the United States. It aligned the US Constitution on the side of racial equality and gave legal status to the civil rights movement.

Interestingly, Jim never did an undergraduate degree in education, never did student teaching or a practicum, and didn’t prepare for teaching by taking courses that would allow him to consider his profession before engaging in it. But, perhaps for Jim and his students, that background was a good thing. Jim’s struggle to learn the skills and attitudes that would help him grow to become a teacher became the source of much of the teaching he does in his undergraduate social studies classes. Jim became a storyteller—mostly, as he calls them, “stupid Jim stories.” These stories often have a similar theme: Jim makes a mistake, learns from it, and reshapes his goals and practices. Still, Jim had inherent “gifts” that helped him become a good teacher, such as the gift of loving other people’s children.

The point is that we all bring our own gifts to teaching. However, there are things we have not yet learned and goals we must still strive for if we are to be good teachers. In this first section, we explore the concept of thinking of yourself as a teacher. We believe such considerations are seldom learned from reading a book, and praxis—acting and reflecting at the same time—is key. However, making decisions about how and what we focus on is the beginning of a journey.

Tool 1.1

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Finding Your Teaching Identity

How do I discover my own unique style as a teacher? How do I put it to work for me in the classroom?

Our Philosophy: Start with Who You Are

• “Mr. W. never cracks a smile, but he’s really fair.”

• “Mrs. P. lets us do lots of group work.”

• “Mr. A is always talking about movies he’s seen about wars and politics and stuff. It makes social more interesting.”

• “It’s weird that Miss H. totally loves biology . . . but at least it makes class more fun.”

• “Mrs. V. tells us stories about her students all the time.”

Students are always making comments like these about their teachers. Their observations—good, bad, or indifferent—reflect all the variances in methods, attitudes, expressions, and emphases that make up each teacher’s own unique style. Over time, you will develop your own identity as a teacher. You may choose to leave this process up to chance (with an equally chancy outcome), or you can work consciously to find a style that is both comfortable for you and successful in the classroom.

True Confessions: I Tried to Be My Cooperating Teacher

I was very fortunate to have Mr. Arnold as my cooperating teacher (practicum supervisor). With 12 years of experience, 8 of them at St. Pat’s, Mr. A. had a great reputation with the students. All the students wanted him for math; he was funny and had a knack for making the subject approachable for everyone. I admired the friendly ease with which he handled our unruly mob of Grade 9 students, and I longed to feel as confident as he did in front of the classroom.

Being a new teacher is like being a teenager again. You try on different teaching “roles” and attempt to figure out which one is right for you. Mr. A. was a great role model, so I tried being him for a while. Guess what? I didn’t have his sense of humour, and my lame jokes fell flat. At first I felt horrible and self-conscious. But, over the course of my practicum, I slowly began to discover that I had my own unique strengths. Mr. A. tended to leave the weaker students behind; I found out I was great at drawing these students out. Mr. A. relied on (and was very successful at) lectures. I discovered that I loved moving around the classroom and facilitating group work.

I still think that Mr. A. is a great teacher, but I’ve come to realize that I can be a great teacher too—in my own way.

Strategy: Determine Your Identity

When teachers leave university to “set up shop” in their own classrooms, they are usually equipped with a full toolbox of content area knowledge, methodology, and educational theory. Though all of these are critical to the profession of teaching, they are not enough in and of themselves. Recent research in teacher preparedness and curriculum theory emphasizes the importance of a teacher’s sense of personal identity.

Your identity as a teacher shapes how you teach and, more importantly, has a lot to do with how successful and happy you will be in your chosen career. Yet no textbook (not even this one) can tell you who you are. The journey toward your teacher identity is long, subtle, and ultimately yours alone to take. Teachers—especially new teachers—are busy people. In the rush of lesson planning, marking, and daily mini-emergencies, time to reflect is easily lost in the shuffle. The challenge is to make time for this important process. If you really want to become a teacher—as opposed to being little more than an educational technician—you need to take the time to shape an identity. Your identity includes the confidence, joy, and sense of purpose that comes with bringing your authentic self to the classroom.

The idea that you can, or should, divide your professional self from your personal self will have two consequences, both of which seem tragic. First, your teaching will become soulless and mechanical, and neither your students nor you will gain any excitement or joy from what you are doing. Second, because neither you nor your students are enjoying themselves, it will be astonishingly easy for you to become cynical about education. Over the long term, you will come to care little for what you do, and generations of students will have been done a significant disservice. You will quit being a teacher, whether you leave the classroom or not.

The best teachers are authentic. In other words, they do not draw hard lines between their professional and personal selves. Teaching is not a role, but an identity. It is not a job, but a vocation. Great teachers merge their professional education with a strongly developed sense of beliefs and values, and bring their whole selves to class with them. To bring “yourself” to the classroom, you must find your identity as a teacher. Yet, finding yourself is a career-long process; it is not a quick snapshot. Who you are, personally and professionally, will change over the years, so you must consciously discover and rediscover yourself through your tenure.

Tips for Using Journals, Diaries, and Scrapbooks

• Use timed writing by setting a timer or checking your watch. Commit as much time as you feel comfortable with (even as little as 5 minutes) to write about your day.

• Use the computer, if this is more comfortable for you (remember to protect this private document).

• Write on your old lesson plans about what worked and didn’t, where you could make changes, or simply how your students reacted.

• Use a full-page-per-day scheduler as a combi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Introduction
• Section 1: Being a Teacher
• Section 2 The Practice of Teaching
• Section 3 Engaging Students
• Section 4 Teaching Literacy Skills
• Section 5 Assessment
• Section 6 Technology
• Section 7 Research and Experiential Learning
• Conclusion: Wrapping Up a Philosophy of Teaching
• Notes
• About the authors