Page 29 - Powerful Social Studies for Elementary Students 4th Edition

CHAPTER 1
ELEMENTARY SOCIAL STUDIES: What Is It? What Might It Become?
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Dominic Knighten, Teaching Intern
In order to support my claim on how this textbook has opened my eyes to not only teaching but the art of successfully teaching social studies, I have to first paint the picture of my approach to teacher education course textbooks prior to this one. The books were—well, let’s just say books. They were required text- books on the course syllabus that I would purchase and place to the side, with no anticipation to crack open, unless the dreaded word “quiz” was to arise. I assumed that any information I needed to retain would be provided during class discussion. With this mentality I began my senior year with this “social studies” course as the first on my agenda. Social Studies? How am I supposed to teach social studies, I would ask myself, as I looked at my course schedule, dreading that first session. Our first meeting came and we talked about how the term “social studies” encompasses so much more than I initially believed. I found out it included history, economics, geography, psychology, anthropology, political science, and so forth. My mind raced with concern about my ability to
teach social studies as the professor described the range of instructional strategies that will be addressed in the course. How can I do this? Is teaching really the career for me? I was constantly asking myself such questions those first few weeks of class. There is more to it than having kids read out of their textbook.
Admittedly, I was glad to see that Brophy, Alleman, and Halvorsen validated my dissatis- faction with the traditional social studies text- book as the sole informational source. While reading about the various curricular and instruc- tional approaches make much more sense than
© Keith Knighton
TEACHER VOICE