|
The following standards have been adopted to enhance Social Studies instruction:
Higher Order Thinking
- Students manipulate information and ideas by synthesizing, generalizing, explaining, hypothesizing, or arriving at conclusions that produce new meaning and understanding for them.
Deep Knowledge
- Instruction explores connections and relationships among disciplines and topics to produce relatively complex understandings.
Substantive Conversation
- Students engage in extended conversational exchanges with the teacher and/or their peers about subject matter in a way that builds an improved and shared understanding of ideas or topics.
Connections Beyond the Classroom
- Students make connections between substantive knowledge and personal experience, social problems or public policy.
Ethical Valuing
- Students consider ethical dimensions of a topic and apply democratic values when making judgments regarding matters of public concern or personal conduct.
Integration
- Instruction links social studies to other subject areas, integrates knowledge and skills, and includes effective use of technology in order to build social understanding and civic competence.
Core Democratic Values (Constitutional Principles)
- Examples are religious liberty, free expression, property rights, privacy, due process of law and equality are used to reinforce the skills and attitudes necessary to be responsible citizens in a constitutional democracy.
Course Abstract
Sixth Grade Social Studies
The sixth grade social studies curriculum introduces students to cultures of the West. Emphasis is placed on the contemporary geography of Europe, Canada, and Latin America. Students study the geography of each of these world regions; explore cultural and natural features that characterize each region; trace the movement of people, ideas, and products within the regions; and discover ways that each can be divided into sub-regions. Historical background is provided to enable students to understand how these regions developed from the past to the present. Differences in governments and economies are examined. The economy of each region and its role in the global economy is explored; special attention is paid to economic ties with the United States. Students study public issues of global significance in these regions and work to resolve them through analysis, discussion, and writing. Using a variety of media, students compile, analyze, and present geographic and economic data pertaining to the regions. They also consider what actions they and their country should pursue to promote the well-being of people who live in these regions. Students are assessed through daily homework, projects, essays, oral presentations, tests and participation.
Units of Study
Five Themes of Geography
Core Democratic Values
Exploring
Latin America
Exploring
Canada
Exploring Europe and
Russia
Elements of Fiction
Historical Biographies
Course Abstract
Seventh Grade Social Studies
The seventh grade social studies curriculum introduces students to cultures of the East, with emphasis on the contemporary geography of Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Oceania. Through the study of geography students learn the locations of significant places in each of these world regions; explore cultural and natural features that characterize each region; trace movement of people, ideas, and products within the regions; and discover ways that regions can be divided into sub-regions. Historical background is provided to enable students to understand how a region developed from the past to the present. Differences in governments and economies are examined. The economy of each region and its role in the global economy is explored with special attention paid to economic ties with the United States. Students examine public issues of global significance in these regions and work to resolve them through study, discussion, and writing. Using a variety of media, students compile, analyze, and present geographic and economic data pertaining to the regions. They also consider what actions they and their country should pursue to promote the well-being of people who live in these regions.
In addition to using media, teachers will use a variety of teaching and learning methods to produce a climate where students can discover and excel however they learn best. Assessments will include daily notes, journal writing, study of current events, written reports, presentations, role-playing, hands-on projects and traditional quizzes and tests.
Units of Study
The Five Themes of Geography
Core Democratic Values
East, West and South Africa
Japan
China (Since Mao)
India
Middle East
Course Abstract
Eighth Grade American History/Civics
This course introduces students to the history of the United States from the ratification of the Constitution to the beginning of the twentieth century. The course is divided chronologically into eras. Students learn to place major events on a timeline and to analyze their causes and effects. Using primary and secondary sources, they explore time and place in nineteenth century America. They compare conflicting accounts of the past and, both orally and in writing, express informed judgments about significant events that shaped the nation. Using a variety of media, they compile, analyze, and present historical data. Within their historical study of nineteenth century America, students deepen their understanding of major geographical themes and basic economic concepts. They also build their understanding of American government from in-depth study of the United States Constitution and the evolution of the government it created during its first century. Students are assessed through daily homework, projects, essays, oral presentations, tests, and participation.
Units of Study
Five Themes of Geography/Core Democratic Values
The United States Constitution as a Living Document
The New Nation
Expansion and Reform
The Civil War
Reconstruction
Industrial America
Emergence of the United States as a World Power
|