Presence of Social Studies in the Classroom

 

As a student and future educator, ensuring that social studies is present in the classroom, especially in the elementary levels. Personally, I was not introduced to many events in social studies until middle school, and felt behind compared to others who went to different elementary schools. Events in history have shaped the world today, and every grade should be integrating these events into the school day.

In the school I work at, during Black History Month, different students speak about someone who has made a positive impact on the world during the morning announcements. This way, even if the teacher is not teaching about this in her classroom, every student is being exposed to someone who has changed our world. 

In third grade, we also do a Black History calendar. Every day, the class learns about someone who has made a positive impact on the world. They must write a small description on what this person has done, and put it on their calendar. At the end of the month, they have a calendar full of people who have changed the world, and they get to bring it home!

We also have informational text available as an early finisher activity. These texts are about events in history. This is a great way to introduce social studies into the classroom, and students are usually very excited to learn about things the teacher is not necessarily doing a full lesson on. Usually, students will come to a teacher or peer to share something important they learned in their informational text!

Integration of social studies into daily learning is so important at every level. All students should understand how we got to be who we are today as society and world. Students are never too young. We need to create a bigger presence of social studies into the classroom, it is so crucial and beneficial for each and every student!