The Digital Broadside
News You Can Use
Award Winning Teachers at the NCSS Conference in New Orleans
Resources on ISIS and Syria
Thanksgiving Idea
Hopefull Gubenatorial Candidate Ralph Northam Visits Hungary Creek
National Council of the Social Studies Election
Beginning this year, elections for the NCSS Board of Directors will begin immediately following the NCSS Annual Conference and closed January 15. For 2015, the ballot will open November 16.
This is a significant change from previous years, so please mark your calendars!
Cell Phones in Class
If student cell phone use is getting in the way of instruction (as it was with me), try this:
1. When the students come in, ask them to put their phones on silent (not vibrate).
2. Require them to then place the phone face down on the upper right hand corner of the desk.
3. Tell them that if the entire class can leave the phones there, without using them for any reason (even to “check the time”) for ten minutes, they will be allowed to use the phone for anything for two minutes.
The rest is on his blog.
What is "history?" Part 2
So there are two reasons I can think of to give a lecture:
- to present students with important, basic information
- to help students better understand a concept
Today, in our Social Studies classes, #1 is nearly useless. Almost everything they need to know is already written down. If not by a historian, writer, journalist, etc... but by you, since you're probably reading off notes as you give the lecture. So why not just GIVE the students the information and then make them USE the information in class?
Lecture #2 can still be valuable because you are probably providing a context or connection that the notes do not present themselves. For example, maybe your students read a section of the textbook for homework. Instead of lecturing the same material, your lecture discusses how what they read connects to prior learning. Or maybe you're providing a point of view that the text doesn't supply.
While #2 has value, it probably loses that value after 20 minutes. At that point, students start needing to USE what they've LEARNED.
So why do we still lecture history instead of having students use history?
Teacher|Student Opportunities
National History Bee
The National History Bee is an exciting social studies competition for students who love learning, competing, and having fun! Participating students progress from the school level to the regional level and finally to the National Finals where one student is crowned the National History Bee Champion!
What makes the National History Bee unique? Unlike other activities, participants in the National History Bee compete head-to-head to be the first to “buzz-in” with the correct answer. What results is a competition that tests a student’s knowledge in a fun and exciting way! For more information about the specific stages of the National History Bee, click here.
This year, the regional competition will be at Fairfield Middle School.
Let me know if you create a team!
NEH Summer Programs in the Humanities for School and College Educators
For example:
The Chinese Exclusion Act and Immigration in America
Deadline: March 1, 2016
Dates: July 10 – July 22, 2016 (2 weeks)
Project Director(s): Jack (John Kuo Wei) Tchen and Joy Liu
Location: New York, NY
Gilder Lehrman Summer Institutes
Deadline to submit your application: February 29, 2016.
Instructional Ideas
HSTRY
Tuckahoe Middle School wins the prize because Ashley Kelly because she was the first to check it out after I posted about it last year.
Below is an example of what you can do with it.
You might be a ....
Other ideas:
- #YouMightBeASecessionist
- #YouMightBeABolshevik
- #YouMightBeAWhig
It's endless...
recite.com
Go Formative
The key to a good formative assessment is the data, and Go Formative gives that to you. You get real time results without refreshing and students can see how they're doing.
With Interactive Achievement, you would already have pre-set questions, but if you keep using IA for exit slips or quick questions, you'll use up the pool too fast. With Go Formative, you can create questions on the fly and have a good discussion about answers with your students.
Trivia and Other Balderdash
Trivia 2015 - 2016: Teachers- 5 and Me- 5
Last week:
Who has been guarded every day for the last 94 years?
Hana Hecht won last week with the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
This week:
What text from the middle ages does this describe?
- Still hasn't been translated
- Seems to have 6 chapters: plants, astrology, biology, cosmology, recipes, and drugs.
- It's been sold many times and now sits in an Ivy League school
Contact Information
Email: mjhasley@henrico.k12.va.us
Website: blogs.henrico.k12.va.us/mjhasley
Location: 3820 Nine Mile Road, Richmond, VA, United States
Phone: 804 652-3752
Twitter: @MikeHasley