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Great articles on science phenomena and engaging science topics.

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Science explains and demystifies the world through the objective of gathering and analyzing data. Explore the natural world, engineering, space, military technology, physics and even supernatural phenomena.

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A helpful article about working with students with EBD.

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Science Instruction Guide for Students with EBD

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Incorportating Kinesthetics in the Science Classroom

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Incorportating Kinesthetics in the Science Classroom

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Ways to incorporate movement into the classroom.

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Incorporating Movement in Secondary Science Classes

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There are clear benefits to getting even older students moving throughout the day—here are a few ways to do that in science classes.

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Keeping Secondary Students Interested in Science

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Keeping Secondary Students Interested in Science

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Connecting science to the real world.

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As students move into middle and high school, it becomes increasingly challenging for them to maintain excitement and enthusiasm for subjects like math and science. This difficulty could be because this age group tends to be distracted by their social life and other outside activities, which makes it hard for teachers to capture and hold their student's attention.

Employing innovative strategies to reignite students' interest is essential to address this challenge. Here we'll explore a few key areas to help you make science class more appealing so your older students will get excited about science class again.

Igniting Curiosity: Reframing Science as Relevant and Real

An effective way to ignite curiosity in science class is to connect science to everyday life, current events that are happening right now, and potential career opportunities that they may want to pursue in the future. By showcasing real-world relevance, you are making the subject more relatable and interesting.

Connecting Science to Careers

To help pique the interest and inspire older students, you can discuss the various career opportunities science has to offer. Guest speakers can share their experiences and offer insight into the field of science. Hearing directly from these professionals makes having a career in science more tangible.

Assigning career-themed projects is another way to make a real-world connection to science. For example, a physics engineering challenge like designing a machine or device can help demonstrate the application of physics in engineering. Additionally, arranging a field trip to a science-related workplace like a technology company can help students understand and appreciate how professionals apply their knowledge in real-world settings.

Science in the News

Discussing current scientific events, such as scientific breakthroughs or medical advances, can help demonstrate science's relevance to the world. When students see that these scientific discoveries impact society, it will help to make the connection between what they are learning in the classroom and the outside world. By incorporating these real-world events you are making science more intriguing and relevant.

Hands-on Engagement: Beyond the Textbook and Lecture

To captivate the attention of older students it's essential to look beyond traditional teaching methods like textbooks and lectures. Hands-on, interactive activities can engage students and make science class more exciting.

Hands-on Experiments

Conducting more hands-on experiments is a great way to make science class more fun, and it will help reinforce science concepts as well as help students develop essential skills like critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration. For example, try connecting chemistry to real life by simply demonstrating the reaction of baking soda and vinegar, which produces carbon dioxide, causing a volcano eruption. This experiment will help make science more relatable and foster a deeper understanding of chemical reactions in everyday life.

Project-Based Learning

Project-based learning involves actively involving students in real-world scenarios and challenges. Having students choose a science project that requires research and experimentation empowers them to take ownership of their learning. For example, students may create an eco-friendly greenhouse requiring research, design, prototype, analysis, reflection, and so on. This type of project fosters student's creativity and curiosity all while getting them excited about science.

Bringing Science to Life: Creative and Immersive Experiences

Creating more captivating learning experiences will make your science class more interesting and enjoyable. You can do this by incorporating technology. Here are a few ideas.

Virtual Lab Simulations

Virtual Lab simulations that offer interactive experiments allow students to explore science concepts digitally. Websites such as Labster, Gizmos, and LabXchange, allow students to interact with lab materials in a virtual lab without the constraints of physical equipment they may not have access to in the classroom. For example, students can learn how to fly an airplane through a computer simulation. These simulations can help to enhance a student's learning experience.

Augmented Reality

AR technology can enhance student learning by providing them with an immersive learning experience. What augmented reality apps do is enhance real-world objects by adding an interactive layer to what you are already seeing. For example, science teachers can use an AR app like Brainapse to explore human anatomy or use an AR app like Plant ID to help identify plants. This can help improve student's learning experience and understanding of complex concepts by applying knowledge to a real-world experience.

Science-Related Podcasts

Podcasts are increasingly popular among older students mostly because they provide a hands-free way to listen, so students can multitask. Since podcasts are easily accessible and offer a diverse range of topics, you can have students listen to podcasts that explore a wide range of science topics. Some engaging podcasts that may resonate with older students are, "Science for the People" by Desiree Schell, "Brains On!" by American Public Media, and "Science Vs" by Wendy Zukerman.

3D Printing

3D printing technology enhances hands-on learning and can help students better understand abstract ideas. It offers an innovative way to engage students in a variety of science topics. Whether it's exploring a multi-layer cell, building a DNA model, or constructing a geological formation, 3D printing is a great way to boost students' understanding and learning.

Virtual Guest Lectures

Arrange video conferences with experts in the field of science. This will help students gain insight with professionals in specific scientific fields. For example, Skype a Scientist is a popular platform that connects you with thousands of scientists from across the globe. This allows students to have a virtual Q and A session and get their answers straight from an expert.

Getting older students excited about science class can be achieved with a little forethought. By incorporating innovative, hands-on experiences that are both relevant and engaging, you will captivate learners and foster a lifelong love for science. Connecting science to current events and potential careers and utilizing technology will help sustain student interest and equip students with the knowledge and skills they need for the future.

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Getting Older Students Excited About Science Class - TeachHUB

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Have some of your older students lost their passion for science? Explore a few key areas to help your students get excited about science class again.

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Nice video on new tactics for giving students ownership of their science learning.

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Teaching science: we're doing it wrong | Danny Doucette | TEDxRiga

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Good ideas for assessing science.

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Editor's Corner

Inclusive Strategies for the Science Classroom

Welcoming. Listening. Open-mindedness. Common ground. Social identities. Respecting. Suspending judgment. Authenticity. Purposeful. Positionality.

Inclusive strategies in our science classes include all of the above in some form. We strive to make our classroom and our teaching welcoming for all students, regardless of their social identity, gender-identity, ableism, cultural or sexual orientation, race, and a multitude of others.

No student wants to be "othered." To be othered means feeling invisible, having a voice unheard, and an identity undervalued. Teenagers in particular want to fit in, to belong, and to feel accepted. By having inclusive science classrooms, we can strive to reach this goal.

Within STEM fields, many groups have been othered and not welcomed to the profession. A microscope does not care who looks through it, yet the STEM establishment seems to: only 13 percent of STEM professionals are Hispanic. A mere 25 percent are Black. These figures are distressing and prevent a symphony of talent and conversation to occur in these fields of study.

The STEM pipeline is leaky and we, as science teachers, must do all we can to ensure that all of our students know the STEM career door is open to them if they choose to enter. However, once they enter that door, we must do all we can to keep them exploring and engaging in STEM careers in order to reduce the current attrition rate.

In our classrooms, we want our students' authentic voices and selves to be present and expressed. By doing so, they will be more likely to see STEM as a welcoming place for all. Do we provide many opportunities for our students' authenticity to flourish? Do we offer alternative assessments to showcase our students' talents? By doing so, we make our learning spaces more inclusive for all.

Having students provide input into what content they learn and how they learn it is empowering to all students, and can still be done in such a way to ensure that standards and three-dimensional learning are addressed.

When studying gas laws in chemistry, why must students push through one formulaic problem after another without understanding why gas laws are vital to their everyday lives and experiences? These problems do not address the individual or collective needs of the students, and can deter students from even engaging with the problems. Science teachers who respond to the question "Why are we doing these problems?" with "They are on the test" only serve to alienate students even more.

By providing an inclusive classroom, there will be less need for redirection, consequences, and oppressive strategies, because the students will have greater ownership of their work. The classroom environment also provides space for building meaningful relationships among students, the teacher, and the curriculum, making the entire classroom ecosystem a healthier place for all members.

The time is now for more attention to be paid to providing an inclusive environment for all learners. Our STEM pipeline depends on it. Our future as a progressive scientific country depends on it. Our scientific literacy depends on it. The health and well-being of all members of the educational community depends on it. Our ultimate goal for an inclusive science classroom is to make sure all of our students can bring their authentic selves to school and feel that they belong, while providing engaging, responsive, and stimulating learning environments.

Possible Alternative Assessments to Foster an Inclusive Science Classroom

Podcast creation

Course blog with students writing posts about the phenonomen they are experiencing

Multi-genre project

Social media profiles (centering around the content)

Tying students' identities to the sciences

Sharing, through artwork, how their culture views the science content

Creating a music playlist related to what they are learning

Sharing videos relating to the content; evaluating the videos for misconceptions that are perpetuated in the videos

Creating a "Shark Tank" project that addresses content being uncovered

Getting involved in a citizen science project related to their identities

Shadowing a mentor in a STEM field and creating a project focusing on their findings and experiences

Writing an autobiography addressing how they perceive science in terms of their identities

Researching a BIPOC STEM professional, one with a difference, or one from various cultures, and portraying them in class

Writing a bedtime story focusing on science content in such a way the stories could be read to elementary students.

Designing a billboard "selling" concepts, phenomena, or science and engineering processes

Designing a book jacket

Writing a book review on a STEM book

Creating a science-based calendar

Designing a mobile that reflects themselves in science

Drawing a cartoon

Creating stop motion videos of scientific processes

Writing an editorial

Writing a play for the class to perform

Preparing an entry for Wikipedia

Creating a flip book

Creating graffiti sharing about STEM, STEM concepts, or STEM processes

Writing a speech

Engaging in a debate

Creating a job application and completing it for their ideal STEM career

Evaluating hypothetical or actual scientific grant proposals

Sharing myths from various cultural backgrounds that address science

Creating a parody

Designing a poster using Canva or some other technological tool

Creating a questionnaire and gathering data on a particular science topic from friends, family members, and some social media groups

Writing riddles, limericks, jokes, or puns about content or crosscutting concepts

Creating a film, commercial, or other media depicting a NGSS standard

Writing tweets for a mock Twitter account related to the science class

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Inclusive Strategies for the Science Classroom

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Editor's Corner Welcoming. Listening. Open-mindedness. Common ground. Social identities. Respecting. Suspending judgment. Authenticity. Purposeful. Positionality. Inclusive strategies in our science classes include all of the above in some form. We strive to make our classroom and our teaching welcoming for all students, regardless of their social identity, gender-identity, ableism, cultural or sexual orientation, race, and a multitude of others.

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Ways to adapt a science classroom.

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Highly Engaging Science for Students in Special Education

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By integrating age-appropriate modifications, special education teachers can design high-interest, standards-aligned science units.

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Understanding Science - How science REALLY works...

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Understanding Science - How science REALLY works...

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Suggestions for working with EBD Students

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9 Effective Teaching Strategies for Students With Emotional and Behavioral Disorders

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Children are the beacon of hope for our future. Their mental health and emotional well-being are the very foundation upon which future success and happiness are built.

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Resources for science educators.

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The basic concept of the water cycle can be one that is hard for students to connect to larger sociocultural issues. In helping students set a sense of how the water cycle matters to their lives, this lesson uses the issues of The Flint Water Cycle to help students understand how the water cycle is a vital component in providing clean water for everyone. This lesson includes slides, lesson plans, and handouts to be used for instruction. All of the lessons are available in downloadable and accessible in MS Word and Powerpoint formats that you can adjust.

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This website is designed to provide a community for teachers and educators to explore resources, exchange ideas and hear about our new research findings.

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Great resource for all history topics

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Interact with History

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Please check back here as we update our classroom resources page with additional educational materials!

Becoming US

Case studies and lesson plans for secondary teachers and students to support United States history curricula and teach a more accurate and inclusive migration and immigration narrative.
Becoming US
Learning Lab

A collection of our many resources thoughtfully and intentionally created based on social studies themes and topics.
Learning Lab

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Please check back here as we update our classroom resources page with additional educational materials! Case studies and lesson plans for secondary teachers and students to support United States history curricula and teach a more accurate and inclusive migration and immigration narrative.

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Lesson plans, articles, videos and more to guide the classroom

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NCSS editors present a curated selection of resources from our journals and around the Internet on timely and frequently requested topics.

Browse our collection, or search our full digital library of articles, videos and other resources by term, topic, level, and subject area.

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NCSS editors present a curated selection of resources from our journals and around the Internet on timely and frequently requested topics. Browse our collection, or search our full digital library of articles, videos and other resources by term, topic, level, and subject area.

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Amazing website for a breakdown of all things social studies. Would be super for extra study in all Tiers

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Civics and Government Resources for Grades 6-12 | PBS LearningMedia

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The Civics Collection covers topics taught in middle and high school, including as part of history and civics and government curricula. Find video and interactive resources covering real-life civics topics and skills. Students will learn how historical and present-day U.S. citizens have engaged with our democracy.

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Timelines and info

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Great online exhibits - World War 2, Lincoln, Kennedy, plus more!

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Website that explains current events and the civic conversations around them. A site I may use myself.

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The Freedom Forum's mission is to foster First Amendment freedoms for all.

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The crash course is a YouTube channel that explains all subjects in short videos. Great explanations and lots on Social Studies but can be used across the board

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In 2 seasons, John Green, Hank Green, and Emily Graslie teach you about, well, everything. It’s Big History! This course will take you on a whirlwind journey from the creation to the death of the universe and is based on the Big History Project social studies curriculum.

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Ways to use technology to help struggling readers

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Overview

Complex content-area texts are likely to present unique challenges for your struggling students and those with disabilities.

The Common Core State Standards for English Language Arts (ELA) represent a shift in the way we approach reading instruction, particularly with regard to content-area reading in history, social studies, and science. Students are expected to read primary and secondary sources closely, analyze text, determine central ideas, and distinguish among fact, fiction, and reasoned judgments in text. With these shifts, all of your students, both with and without disabilities, could benefit from explicit instruction in strategies for reading and making meaning of nonfiction texts. As students move through middle and high school, they must acquire a different set of skills and strategies to understand dense primary source documents.

Explicit instruction that activates background knowledge, scaffolds summary skills, and facilitates the development of academic vocabulary can provide students with the supports they need to access the standards. Technology tools that provide reading supports (e.g., text-to-speech, built-in resources) and multimedia that encourage inquiry-based history learning are a great way to build your students' content-specific vocabulary and comprehension.

Using in your classroom

Social studies instruction that is solely text-based tends to emphasize learning about history, while rich, inquiry-based instruction emphasizes learning how to think like a historian.

To think like a historian, your students need to be able to evaluate , corroborate, and synthesize multiple, often-conflicting, sources. These sources may include newspaper articles, paintings, political cartoons, songs, diary entries, depositions, and speeches. Each of these sources requires vocabulary and comprehension strategies that may be vastly different from those used in your students' other classes.

Although exposure to multiple media and sources is a critical component of providing your students with rich, inquiry-based history instruction, you can make your lessons even more powerful through the use of digital multimedia.

Research into effective practices for inquiry-based history instruction has supported the use of:

Engaging questions to facilitate active learning

Multiple sources to increase learning

Scaffolding to develop analytical skills

Technology tools and supports can be an excellent way to help students engage with social studies texts in a meaningful way, and build deeper understanding through guided inquiry.

Consider employing rich multimedia resources to help students explore engaging questions about history, rather than simply describing an event. For example, the website Picturing Modern America encourages students to analyze primary source documents and images; explore the interpretations of students, teachers, and historians; and, create digital slide shows that present their own historical arguments.

Learning from multiple sources facilitates a deeper historical understanding. Students should explore historical topics through paintings, diary entries, newspaper articles, and period music. Many of these primary sources are available online in digital format. Consider using digital materials wherever possible so that struggling readers have access to text-to-speech, online references, and dictionaries and glossaries.

A key component of thinking like a historian involves the ability to evaluate and analyze multiple, sometimes contradictory, sources. This is a challenging skill for many students and one that requires significant scaffolding and explicit instruction. Cooperative learning activities can be a great way to help students understand how historians construct narratives about the past. Consider having students work together to analyze historical documents and create a classroom wiki page, giving students the opportunity to discuss different perspectives and construct meaning.

Many websites and software programs are available that can help your students explore the past in an exciting and engaging way. Look for programs that embed tools to facilitate students' comprehension, evaluation, and corroboration of sources, such as questioning strategies, models of think-alouds, and tools that allow students to record and organize their responses. For example, the website Investigating the First Thanksgiving includes a glossary, audio interviews with experts, guidance for analyzing historical evidence, prompting questions, and an opportunity for students to create their own museum exhibits.

What the research says

Although research on using digital multimedia environments to improve student understanding in history is in the early stages, significant research exists on best practices for history instruction. These research-based strategies for building background knowledge, vocabulary, and deep content understanding can be supported and strengthened through the use of carefully selected technology tools.

Research on inquiry-based learning has pointed out how engaging this approach is for students. In a combined fourth- and fifth-grade classroom, Barton (1997) observed students engaged in analyzing conflicting sources to determine if the British or the Colonists started the Battle of Lexington. VanSledright (2002) observed fifth graders intrigued by the prospect of solving the "starving time" mystery that plagued colonial Jamestown in the early 1600s. Similar observations have been made in classrooms where students with special needs were included in the research sample. For instance, Ferretti, MacArthur, and Okolo (2001) observed students in four upper elementary classrooms research Westward Expansion from diverse perspectives. In this study, they found that the inquiry-based approach had a positive effect on students with disabilities, giving them a higher sense of self-efficacy.

In the studies mentioned above (Barton, 1997; Feretti et al., 2001; VanSledright, 2002), the researchers continually point out how presenting students with multiple sources furthered their learning of the topic. In another study, Gabella (1994) interviewed a class of high school students who studied topics using multiple sources, including works of art, and concludes that this approach resulted in more sophisticated understanding and analyses of history. These students, Gabella contends, not only recognized the aesthetic qualities of the various media, but also connected these qualities to the social and political contexts of the topics they were studying.

Scaffolds are an effective way to highlight critical features of a source and support demonstration of learning. De La Paz (2005) tested the effects of scaffolding students' analyses of conflicting sources and developing an argument by comparing two groups of eighth-grade students. The 70 students in the experimental group - 12 of whom were students with learning disabilities - received explicit instruction for these analytic and persuasive writing skills. The control group of 63 students did not receive these supports. Results indicate that the experimental group's essays received higher average scores for length, persuasiveness, strength of argument, and accuracy.

Brush and Saye (2001) observed 36 eleventh-grade students in a nonhonors track history classroom use the computer program Decision Point! Their observational data reveal that students did not always use the analytical scaffolds made available. When they did use them, the authors conclude, the students' abilities to summarize documents improved whereas their abilities to critically analyze them did not. In another study (Saye & Brush, 2002), these researchers worked with the same classroom. In this observational study, the focus was on the scaffolds designed to help students structure and present an argument. Results reveal that a storyboard scaffold with prompts for citing evidence and conflicting viewpoints were helpful for students.

Britt and Aglinskas (2002) collected the work that 60 eleventh graders and 49 undergraduate psychology majors created when using the computer program, Sourcer's Apprentice, which provides a series of questions that help students analyze the authors of sources, their bias, their intended audience, and the potential impact of these factors on their representation of a topic. After analyzing the students' use of multiple sources they deemed reliable and significant to defend an argument, the researchers concluded that the program "supports students in the use of expert sourcing heuristics [e.g., evaluating the reliability of a source by examining the background of the person who created the source], and...such scaffolding improves learning in multiple-source learning environments" ( p. 378 ).

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Technology tools and supports can be an excellent way to help struggling students engage with social studies texts in a meaningful way, and build deeper understanding through guided inquiry.

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Interactive games to help students learn. Not free but an interesting idea.

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Play Mission Us

1848 the antebellum era

Flight to Freedom

Teach mission us

Mission US includes extensive teaching materials for each mission. The educator guides feature:

What people are saying about Mission US

About mission us

Mission US is an award-winning educational media project that immerses young people in transformational moments from U.S. history.

Developed for use by middle school students in the classroom and beyond, Mission US is a deeply-researched, award-winning educational media project with proven positive impact on history learning. To date, more than three million registered users across the country have played and learned from Mission US.

Mission US is committed to teaching complicated and sensitive topics in American history. We recommend that teachers/parents preview game content to make sure it is appropriate for their students/children.

Go to about

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Play Mission Us 1848 the antebellum era Teach mission us Mission US includes extensive teaching materials for each mission. The educator guides feature: What people are saying about Mission US About mission us Mission US is an award-winning educational media project that immerses young people in transformational moments from U.S.

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Article on how to make social studies engaging and interesting

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When high school history teacher Alex Brouhard mentions his job to other adults, he often hears a similar response: "I disliked the subject in school, but now I find it interesting."

This left Brouhard with a nagging question: If people tend to enjoy history as adults, why do so many middle and high school students report feeling bored and uninterested in the topic?

Students often say that history lessons are full of "dates, people, and places which often require rote memorization," Brouhard writes in an article for EdSurge. But "if taught with the intent to inspire and engage, history is far from boring or monotone."

Over time, Brouhard developed strategies in his high school classroom to connect his students more deeply to the topic-such as starting units at dramatic moments in history and finding ways to bring family and local history into lessons.

Building on the approaches Brouhard lays out-and several others shared by educators-these subtle tweaks to existing lesson plans can help make your history classes more engaging to students.

FOCUS ON INDIVIDUALS TO BUILD CONNECTION

History teachers too often focus on the big picture, says Brouhard, but the stories of individuals are typically more engrossing and "can help students feel more emotionally invested in the history they're learning."

For example, instead of lecturing students about military tactics used during World War I, have them read about it from the perspective of someone who was there: "Describing what trench warfare entailed is one thing, but reading a firsthand account of a soldier who lived through it-exposed to rats and standing in frigid water amidst piled-up bodies-is another," Brouhard writes.

Making an effort to humanize historical figures-without shying away from discussing their mistakes and flaws-can help students relate to prominent individuals in our past and develop a better understanding of their decisions, says eighth-grade history teacher Lauren Brown in an article for MiddleWeb. "All the famous characters in history had key moments in their childhood or early adulthood that helped shape who they became-tell students about those moments."

To incorporate more first-person accounts into history lessons, educator and author Jennifer Gonzalez recommends presenting oral histories from witnesses of specific events or trends in the past-or even the present.

EXAMINE HISTORY FROM OTHER PERSPECTIVES

When covering a global historical event, showing students how other countries describe that same event-through old newspaper articles, textbooks, or other online sources-can help them broaden their perspective and discover that descriptions of the same event diverge widely depending on who is telling the story.

When teaching about the Vietnam War, John DeRose, a history teacher from Wisconsin, has students compare their textbook's account of the war with that of a Vietnamese textbook or newspaper article. Students can be split into groups to discuss the differences between the accounts-or even debate which they think is more accurate and why, DeRose writes.

During a unit on the Spanish-American war, history teacher William Colglazier has students read excerpts from Cuban and Filipino textbooks, which suggest that the USS Maine was deliberately sunk by an explosion caused by American spies. The controversial claim-sort of like the conspiracy theories that kids may encounter online-tends to interest students, and Colglazier has them practice using the analytical skills of a historian to research the claim and attempt (unsuccessfully) to find credible sources that corroborate it.

START WITH THE JUICY PART

Many history teachers feel that it's most natural to teach a historical era chronologically. But often, the most exciting part of the story is in the middle, or even at the end. So, why not start there?

For example, when teaching World War I, "rather than explaining Balkan nationalism, start with the assassination of Franz Ferdinand, which provides an immediate point of interest and relevance for students," suggests Brouhard. Or, you could start a unit on the civil rights era with Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous March on Washington-then work backward to explore why such a march was necessary in the first place.

"This approach is similar to a TV crime show that reveals the body in the first minute and then spends the rest of the show assembling evidence," Brouhard writes.

TRY AI TO BRING HISTORY TO LIFE

If you've ever wished you could bring Abraham Lincoln or Albert Einstein to class as a guest speaker, artificial intelligence may be able to offer the next best thing, edtech professor Maureen Yoder said in a presentation at ISTE 2023.

AI chatbots like Hello History allow students to have text-based conversations with models trained to imitate historical figures. Students can grill Cleopatra about the specific challenges that women leaders face or ask Gandhi about what it felt like to go on a hunger strike. Hello History has dozens of figures to choose from, but the free version limits users to 20 messages per day. For longer conversations, students can turn to ChatGPT and prompt it: "For the rest of this conversation, please role-play as [historical figure]."

Given that AI-generated responses are far from reliable, historian and history educator Jonathan S. Jones drives students' critical thinking by asking them to scrutinize history-related output from ChatGPT and look for "factual errors and information that was missing crucial context."

GET INTO CHARACTER

To bring history to life, ask students to step in the shoes of the historical figures they're learning about. (Use your best judgment, of course, as some figures and historical events may be inappropriate for classroom reenactment.)

One monthlong project-based learning project -developed in conjunction with Lucas Education Research-has students serve as delegates to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. Through discussions and debates, students develop their understanding of the founders' goals and intentions and how those intentions still shape our lives today.

These activities can be modified for use in individual lessons, too. For example, in one class period, students can take the role of federalists and anti-federalists and debate how much power should be concentrated in the hands of the federal government and how much in the state governments. They can even consider how this debate is still shaping current-day issues like immigration policy.

BRING HISTORY CLOSER TO HOME

When discussing global wars, Brouhard brings his great-grandfather's World War I uniform into class (students are always fascinated by the dent in the metal helmet) and reads excerpts from his other great-grandfather's journal detailing his time as a prisoner of war in Germany during World War II.

To connect his students to the history they're learning about, Brouhard encourages them to bring historical artifacts from their own families to class for show and tell. This might include old photos, diaries, magazines and publications, or, according to educator Rebecca Alber, interesting keepsakes-like an older relative's quinceañera invitation or a military lapel pin from the Vietnam War.

Educator and director of technology Kevin Brookhouser says students can also create their own oral histories by writing up questions and interviewing elders in their family or community to gain their perspective on important events and issues they might be studying in class. "This is not just about sharing family stories; it's the academic work of a historian, creating primary sources," Brookhouser writes.

Teaching students about the history in their own backyard can also make topics more personal, says high school history and government teacher Benjamin Barbour. There are a variety of local sites that can make for interesting history-oriented field trips, such as nonprofits and civic organizations, nearby colleges and universities, long-standing local businesses, and even cemeteries. Primary sources from the library or local historical societies are useful too. In a unit on slavery, Katie Durkin's eighth-grade students in Wilton, Connecticut, visited the library to deepen their understanding of slavery in their town by "reading letters from townspeople, looking at paintings and images, and piecing together the role townspeople played as both enslavers and abolitionists."

GAMIFY YOUR HISTORY LESSON

There are several free, online platforms that offer a wide variety of history and social studies games that can help enliven lessons.

Mission US: Mission US offers seven detailed, story-driven games based on different eras in American history. Each game takes an hour or two to finish, but they save players' progress and can be completed in multiple sittings. For example, in " For Crown or Colony?" students play as a printer's apprentice in 1770 Boston and interact with both patriots and loyalists to decide where their loyalties lie. "Along the way, they engage in empathy and explore issues of liberty, equality, and perspective," writes educator Rebecca Rufo-Tepper.

iCivics: iCivics offers about 20 games with modern, animated graphics designed to teach kids about U.S. governance-such as " Do I Have a Right?," a game that simulates running a civil rights law firm, and " LawCraft," which challenges students to craft a bill and try to get it through Congress. The games boost interest in subject matter "that might otherwise be boring to 12- and 13-year-olds," writes educator Matthew Farber.
History teachers, if you have a method for bringing historical subjects to life and boosting classroom engagement, please let fellow educators know in the comments.

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7 Strategies to Captivate Students in History Class

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These subtle tweaks to lessons can tap into the drama of historical moments and ignite student curiosity.

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Great article about assisting students with EBD in Social Studies

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Teaching students to engage with history and civics is important in a democratic society. The critical thinking and communication skills taught in social studies classes are all the more essential to students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders (EBD) because they equip them to overcome difficulties interacting with and relating to peers. Unfortunately, special education teachers are rarely trained in social studies content, and a large majority of young adults with EBD self-report low or no civic engagement. This led Justin D. Garwood, John W. McKenna, Garret J. Roberts, Stephen Ciullo, and Mikyung Shin to conduct a meta-analysis published in Behavior Modification on the impact of interventions in social studies for students with EBD. Their findings underscore the need for teachers to apply simple, well-known intervention techniques for these children.

The authors looked at peer-reviewed analyses of social studies interventions that included students with EBD and met What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) research standards. This yielded sixteen peer-reviewed articles and one dissertation. In all, the combined research included 656 students, 111 of which had EBD. Most pupils were in grades six through twelve, and a little less than half were minorities.

The authors then determined the effect size, i.e., across multiple studies, the average difference in outcomes between the control groups and groups receiving interventions. The larger the effect size in a study, the greater the improvement in students' ability to recall social studies facts compared to improvements in the control group. With the measure used by the authors, effect sizes usually fall between 0 (insignificant difference, any improvements likely due to chance) and 1 (significant difference, any improvements likely due to intervention).

The two most common interventions were, one, a form of peer-tutoring that required students to memorize social studies facts and summarize them to peers, and two, giving students computer-made charts-as opposed to teacher- or student-drawn ones-with social studies content to use while studying. The third most common intervention was a method called cover, copy, and compare, where students study facts for a set period on the left side of a paper, then cover the facts, reproduce what they remember on the right side of the paper, and compare it to the originals. This continues until the student succeeds without errors for a few consecutive trials.

The authors found that these social studies interventions were effective-especially in studies that applied them exclusively to students with EBD-but they also stress the need for more engaging ones. For studies that combined EBD and non-EBD students, the effect size was 0.48, indicating a significant difference between control groups and intervention groups, but not a large one. But for studies that had only EBD students, the effect size was 1.05, indicating a large and significant difference between the two groups and a strong, causal relationship between the interventions and improved outcomes in knowledge tests. However, the interventions did not test complex reasoning and textual analysis skills, and were, frankly, unengaging. The authors recommend that future studies design more rigorous interventions that have students debate historical controversies, take uncommon perspectives, or analyze source texts. It is not enough to teach students history or geography facts; social studies demands the excitement of engaging with the past and with institutions we take for granted, and the skills to think and talk through the human experience.

The most interesting findings of this study were how rapidly the EBD students saw improvement in their content knowledge when separated from non-EBD students for the intervention. It is rare to find such improved outcomes resulting from interventions, especially since the studies with one or few EBD students had much smaller improvements in outcomes with the same interventions. Furthermore, it's interesting that no unique interventions were designed for the studies. Nearly every teacher uses computer-made charts, and teachers who have students with learning disabilities have been training their peers to help them memorize and summarize facts for years. So the techniques have been present all along, but they have yet to be widely applied in the area of social studies.

It comes as no surprise that students with EBD respond well to the social studies interventions. Well-structured peer-tutoring and well-designed charts are a natural way to help these children lower their anxiety levels and build confidence in the classroom. What is surprising is how, for the last decades, schools could have helped these students by applying these simple strategies, but too many didn't because of their narrow focus on math and reading. Furthermore, future studies should design more engaging strategies or risk making learning a chore for EBD students. With the notable gains we've made in improving other achievement gaps, it's time our schools do more for social studies education and make sure students with EBD don't get left behind.

SOURCE: Justin D. Garwood, John W. McKenna, Garrett J. Roberts, Stephen Cuillo, and Mikyung Shin, " Social Studies Content Knowledge Interventions for Students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders: A Meta-Analysis," Behavior Modification (March 2019).

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Effective social studies interventions for students with emotional and behavioral disorders

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Teaching students to engage with history and civics is important in a democratic society. The critical thinking and communication skills taught in social studies classes are all the more essential to students with Emotional and Behavioral Disorders (EBD) because they equip them to overcome difficulties interacting with and relating to peers.

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Social Studies and Social Skills article

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Article on differentiation instruction in social studies

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Sites to copy graphic organizers

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Great templates

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Free Downloadable Graphic Organizer Templates

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Use these free graphic organizer templates to help your students communicate more effectively by classifying ideas, structuring writing projects, and more.

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Amazing video on how students with disabiities struggle in the classroom and what we can do as teachers to assist them.

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How Difficult Can This be? The F.A.T. City Workshop

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Reading for Older Students with Tricia Millar

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The Science of Special Education · Episode

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Teaching, Reading, and Learning: The Reading League Podcast

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Teaching, Reading, and Learning: The Reading League Podcast · Episode

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Listen to this episode from Sold a Story on Spotify. Corinne Adams watches her son's lessons during Zoom school and discovers a dismaying truth: He can't read. Little Charlie isn't the only one. Sixty-five percent of fourth graders in the United States are not proficient readers.

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Leveled reading, leveled lives, with Tim Shanahan, Ph.D.

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Science of Reading: The Podcast · Episode

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How to Help Students with Dyslexia Be Successful!

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Effective K-3 Reading Strategies with Lindsay Kemeny

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Dyslexia and Other Reading Challenges: Evidence Based Reading Instruction

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Lindsay
Kemeny
Teacher * Author * Literacy Advocate
Lindsay Kemeny, MS, is an elementary school teacher, speaker, writer, and podcast co-host with a passion for literacy and applying research to practice. After her son was diagnosed with dyslexia and depression, she began her deep dive into effective literacy instruction for all children. She loves being in the classroom every day, teaching kids to read.

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Lindsay Kemeny - Teacher * Author * Literacy Advocate

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LindsayKemeny Teacher * Author * Literacy Advocate Lindsay Kemeny, MS, is an elementary school teacher, speaker, writer, and podcast co-host with a passion for literacy and applying research to practice. After her son was diagnosed with dyslexia and depression, she began her deep dive into effective literacy instruction for all children.

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The Science of Reading is a free professional learning community that helps bring knowledge about the science of reading and the plethora of data, information, and products that Lexia Learning provides supporting the evidence.

The science of reading provides proven, evidence-based practices about how to best teach reading and support students of all abilities. Teaching students to read is complex. Some students seem to pick it up intuitively, while others struggle, and it can be difficult to identify why. The science of reading can help every student learn to read, but it is a large body of evidence that can be difficult to understand without proper guidance. That's why learning to teach reading is a complex process.

The good news is we know more today about the essential components of effective reading instruction than ever before-how children learn to read, the causes of reading difficulties and how to prevent them. The science of reading incorporates decades of research into how students learn and how reading should be taught for a wide range of learners. Despite the overwhelming data, the science of reading was not part of many educators' training.

Science of Reading Week April 24-28

This five-day event, April 24th - 28th, is your front row seat to learn from the brightest minds in the national literacy conversation and your key to unlocking literacy learning for every student. Join us for the week to unpack the science and ensure your students learn to read, write, and speak with confidence. Register for the full week.

Monday, April 24 at 12 p.m. Eastern Time
A Fireside Chat with Dr. Louisa Moats
Presented by Dr. Louisa Moats, LETRS Author; and Dr. Liz Brooke, Chief Learning Officer, Lexia Learning
Moderated by Cassandra Wheeler, Senior Manager of LETRS State Success, Lexia Learning

Tuesday, April 25 at 12 p.m. Eastern Time
Ask Me Anything with Donna Hejtmanek
Presented by Donna Hejtmanek, Reading Advocate and Founder of Science of Reading-What I Should Have Learned in College Facebook Group; and fellow group moderator Jennifer Cyr
Moderated by Cassandra Wheeler, Senior Manager of LETRS State Success, Lexia Learning

Wednesday, Apr. 26 at 12 p.m. Eastern Time
Beyond the Brain: What Neuroscience Can Teach Us About Equity
Presented by Horacio Sanchez, President and CEO, Resiliency, Inc.; Maya Goodall, Senior Director of Emergent Bilingual Curriculum, Lexia Learning; and Kerri Larkin, Senior Strategic Partnership Development Manager, Lexia Learning
Moderated by Cassandra Wheeler, Senior Manager of LETRS State Success, Lexia Learning

Thursday, Apr. 27 at 12 p.m. Eastern Time
Empowering Teachers to Reclaim Their Joy: A Rejuvenation Conversation
Presented by Thomas Anderson, Superintendent of New Bedford Public Schools (CT); Jacqueline Greer, Executive Director, Urban Teachers; Dr. Charlene Evans-Smith, Managing Director of Early Literacy, Instruction Partners; and Kerri Larkin, Senior Strategic Partnership Development Manager, Lexia Learning
Moderated by Cassandra Wheeler, Senior Manager of LETRS State Success, Lexia Learning

Friday, Apr. 28 at 12 p.m. Eastern Time
"The Right to Read": A Conversation with Kareem Weaver
Presented by Kareem Weaver, Co-Founder and Executive Director, FULCRUM; Dr. Liz Brooke, Chief Learning Officer, Lexia Learning; and Andrea Setmeyer, National Chapter Coordinator of The Reading League
Moderated by Cassandra Wheeler, Senior Manager of LETRS State Success, Lexia Learning

Watch Our Most Recent edWebinar
Supporting the Science of Reading for Emergent Bilinguals: Equity in Instruction
Presented by Dr. José Viana, Senior Education Advisor, Lexia Learning

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The Science of Reading is a free professional learning community that helps bring knowledge about the science of reading and the plethora of data, information, and products that Lexia Learning provides supporting the evidence. The science of reading provides proven, evidence-based practices about how to best teach reading and support students of all abilities.

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Why Open Source Phonics - Open Source Phonics

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Many 3rd, 4th, and older grade students are not able to sound out and spell words with enough ease to read and write fluently. They need more practice than their peers to master the phonics patterns. These materials were written with these students in mind.

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For helping with trauma students and for life skills

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These valuable skills are sometimes referred to as "21st Century Skills," "Social Emotional Learning," etc. Schools have endless opportunities across the school day to help students develop these skills . A s one teacher put it, "Learning life skills isn't part of my students' day, it IS their day!" Explore (below) to learn more.

Meaningful conversations about the why and how of essential workplace and life skills

Keeping a cool head in a stressful situation, preventing bullying, digital citizenship, and more

Teachers use evidence-based curriculums to frame these conversations

This website is a collaborative resource shared between the Minnesota school districts of Chisago Lakes, East Central, Hinckley-Finlayson, North Branch, Pine City, Rush City, and the St. Croix River Education District .

This website was originally established in 2020 as a "virtual calming room" to support the wellbeing of students, families, and educators during the COVID-19 pandemic. It is maintained by the St. Croix River Education District with input and support from the aforementioned member school districts. ©202 3 St. Croix River Education District . All rights reserved.

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Essential Life Skills for a 21st Century Workforce Communication, teamwork, problem solving, critical thinking, giving and receiving feedback, self-discipline - every year, skills like these become more sought after by employers and colleges. These skills are included in Minnesota's Career and