Exploring the First Week of Classes

Even though it is only the first week, Social Studies Methods has given me great insight into how to teach an elementary level social studies class. Social Studies is, by definition, the "integrated study of the social sciences and humanities to promote civic competence" (according to the U.S. American National Council for the Social Studies). I believe that it is the "civic competence" portion of this definition that most seem to forget. Social Studies is not just facts, it gives us insight into the history of humans and is the basis for how our society runs today. Humans have been developing constantly as time goes on, and social studies helps to reflect this.

The Treasure Hunt Instructions for Social Studies Methods presented as a Prezi Slideshow

In class, we did a multitude of activities that I believe would be great first-day activities to do in my own classroom. One thing that I was fond of in particular was the Treasure Hunt activity, which required my group and I to go on a hunt around the building. The goal was to give us the resources and tools that we would need to do well in class. I think that this activity could easily be modified to fit into an elementary classroom, and would be more fun than just handing students the materials.


Another activity that we did was called Think, Pair, and Share. The point of this activity was to visualize past social studies classrooms, then share our findings first with a partner then a group. Finally, we were given the task to find the similarities and differences in our past social studies experiences. I really enjoyed this activity because it gave me the chance to revert back into a student and look at it from a child's viewpoint. I was able to easily remember my favorite social studies class (5th grade) and some of the activities that we did. I also remembered what activities and subjects my fellow peers and I did not like, which will be helpful when I am running a class of my own. This activity also helped remind me of all the different subjects that can be categorized under Social Studies, such as anthropology, archaeology, economics, geography, history, law, government, philosophy, political science, psychology, religion and sociology. To be able to remember all of this knowledge across such a wide range of subjects will be very difficult, but I am confident that this methods course will help fully prepare me for it!