KCSS Sunflower
March 2017
As social studies educators, you are responsible for teaching students the content knowledge, discipline specific thinking skills, and civic values that are vital for fulfilling the duties of citizenship in a participatory democracy. Our task at the Kansas Council for the Social Studies is to provide leadership, service, and support to make your job easier.
Use the resources and information below as you continue to hone your instructional skills. Feel free to pass the newsletter on to others!
We're Giving Away Money!
Are budget cuts hampering your creative ideas? If so, a KCSS classroom mini-grant just might be the answer to helping you put those ideas into practice. This year KCSS will award two $250 grants - one each to a K-6 and a 7-12 social studies teacher.
Projects that are eligible for the grant include materials and resources needed to improve instruction or to carry out special projects. We're especially looking for mini-grant proposals that will act like a Kickstarter campaign - funding projects and instruction that can be used multiple times with multiple classes rather than a one-time project or event. (And while we believe in the power of field trips, KCSS mini-grants are not designed for that type of teaching activity.)
To apply for a grant, complete the online application. The application deadline is April 13. Check out these suggestions and tips for a successful proposal. The application deadline is April 13.
Have some questions about the process? Contact Darla Mallein at: darlam@esu.edu
Nominate the 2018 Teacher of the Year
The KCSS Judy Cromwell Excellence in Teaching Award is intended to reward and encourage high quality instruction in the social studies. Winners of the award exhibit innovative and effective instructional strategies, utilize state and national standards, foster a spirit of inquiry, develop democratic beliefs and values, and participate in professional organizations.
Nominations for the 2018 KCSS Teacher of the Year are now being accepted for both the elementary (K-6) and secondary (7-12) levels. Winners will be announced at the fall state social studies conference and are awarded $250, conference registration, and travel expenses. Both winners are automatically considered for the Kansas State Combined Teaching Award and are also eligible for the National Council of the Social Studies Teacher of the Year.
Click here to learn more about the process and to nominate another teacher or yourself.
Questions about the process? Contact Cassie.
Professional Learning Opportunities
- National Council for the Social Studies Webinars
Spring 2018
NCSS brings some of the best educational programming available to the social studies professional in the NCSS Spring Webinar Series and NCSS Summer Workshops. Head over and explore the many different options. - Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Seminar
June 21 - July 25, 2018This seminar is open to secondary teachers to enhance professional competence in Culturally Relevant Pedagogy. It will enrich your curriculum by developing interdisciplinary curriculum aligned with Kansas standards. The four-week academic seminar will consist of presentations by American Studies/Culturally Relevant Pedagogy specialists, group discussions, visits to cultural events and scholarly research needed to develop curricular units of study. Expenses paid with stipends available upon completion. Apply online.
- Civic Engagement and the 2018 Election Conference
July 18 - 20
Designed for Kansas government, history, and social studies teachers, this conference is sponsored by the Dole Institute of Politics. It will bring secondary teachers to discuss and debate the significance of getting young people involved in civic engagement, public service, and in local, state and national elections. Up to 25 teachers will be selected with the Dole Institute providing a $300 stipend, two nights’ lodging, meals, and reimbursement for mileage/tolls up to $250. To apply for the conference, download and complete this PDF.
Save the Date!
The annual Kansas Social Studies conference is scheduled for October 28 & 29, 2018. The conference will be held in Emporia, Kansas on the campus of Emporia State University. You don’t want to miss this – make plans now to attend.
The conference theme targets the teaching and learning of historical thinking skills and assessments with a special focus on creating civically engaged students. You’ll walk away smarter with new details about civic engagement strategies, tech integration tools, and current best practice.
Our conference keynote speaker is Joel Breakstone, executive director of the Stanford History Education Group. Yup. That Stanford History Education Group. The one with the very cool lessons and the brand new Online Civic Literacy activities designed specifically to help you build engaged and informed citizens. So tell your friends – this is gonna be awesome!
Full conference details including registration and the session schedule will be available soon. We’ll be asking for breakout session proposals later this spring so be thinking about what you might be able to share. Get the latest info at the conference website.
We’ll see you in October! Have questions right now? Contact Darla.
Sweet Teaching Tools & Helpful Articles
- Dollar Street
Imagine the world as a street. All the houses are lined up by income, the poor living to the left and the rich to the right. Everybody else somewhere in between. Where on the street do you live? How is your life the same and different than your neighbors from other parts of the world who share the same income level? With different income levels? Dollar Street highlights 240 homes from around the world in a easy to use, searchable, visual database that gives you the tools to take students around the world.
- Teaching Civics
Teachingcivics.org supports educators with an ever-growing repository of current, professionally vetted, and unbiased civics, law-related education, and government lesson plans and materials. These lessons include materials developed by Learning Law and Democracy Foundation. Download 67,000 Historic Maps from the Wonderful David Rumsey Map Collection
You do not need to be a Stanford student or faculty or staff member to access the vast treasures of the Rumsey Map collection, nor do you need to visit the university or its new Center. Since 1996, the Rumsey collection’s online database has offered anyone with an internet connection access to 67,000 maps from all over the globe, spanning five centuries of cartography.- Green Card Voices
Launched in 2013, Green Card Voices’ mission is to share various stories of our nation’s 40 million immigrants and put a human face to the current immigration debate. Simply, we hope to introduce immigrants to their neighbors. We want to show that immigrants work on our farms, serve our food, teach our children, create our technologies, and start our Fortune 500 companies. The chronicles of those whose stories we capture are both awe-inspiring and thought provoking, portraying the diversity of the immigrant experience in the United States. - 4 EdTech Ways to Differentiate in a Student-Centered Classroom
Digital Learning has revolutionized the way teachers do business in education. Teachers now have the ability to communicate, plan, and teach more efficiently than ever before. One advancement that has allowed this type of change is Google Classroom. If you’ve never used Classroom, here are eight things you probably didn’t know about this powerhouse tool.
What We're Reading
- You're More Powerful Than You Think: A Citizen's Guide to Making Change Happen
People across the country and across the political spectrum are reclaiming power. Are you ready for this age of bottom-up citizen power? Do you understand what power truly is, how it flows, who has it, and how you can claim and exercise it? Eric Liu, who has spent a career practicing and teaching civic power, lays out the answers in this incisive, inspiring, and provocative book. Using examples from the left and the right, past and present, he reveals the core laws of power. He shows that all of us can generate power-and then, step by step, he shows us how.
- Ditch That Textbook: Free Your Teaching & Revolutionize Your Classroom
You know potential exists for innovative, engaging, revolutionary education if you get the right ideas, right tools, and right people, all in the right order. Packed with practical advice, specific recommendations for tools, and the encouragement you need to revolutionize your classes, Ditch That Textbook will inspire you to create relevant teaching that gets student buy-in so they'l enjoy learning
- The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History
Over the last half billion years there have been five mass extinctions when the diversity of life on earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs. - The Google Infused Classroom
EdTech experts Holly Clark and Tanya Avrith provide a guidebook to help you use technology to engage your learners and amplify the learning experience in your classroom—with Google Apps and other online tools. Start with 20 Simple Tools - This book focuses on 20 essential tools that will help teachers to easily make student thinking visible, give every student a voice and allow them to share their work.
Need some state assessment info?
The 2017-18 is a KSDE social studies assessment year. Don Gifford, KSDE social studies consultant, says that this year's assessment will be the same as 2016. Your students will be asked to interact with:
- 10 or 11 vignettes (depending on grade level) with a single multiple choice or multiple select question for each vignette
- 1 document excerpt with 3 multiple choice or multiple select questions focusing on content, context, and process
- 1 performance task 2 document excerpts with three guiding questions and an on-demand writing prompt
KSDE has also released the topics for each grade level writing prompt:
- For 6th grade, the performance task is over the unit Ancient Greece
- For 8th grade, the performance task is over the unit Establishing America
- For 11th grade, the performance task is over the unit Civil Rights and Social Change
According to Don, "It would be helpful for your students to have some background in this unit prior to the assessment. If you are teaching chronologically, you may need to rearrange your sequence to get the specific topic in before the testing window."
For more information, head over to the KSDE Social Studies page or contact Don directly.
Doing Social Studies Blog
Doing Social Studies is a place for a variety of voices to discuss what high-quality social studies looks like in the 21st century. KCSS board members and other educators from around the state share ideas, resources, and materials about how we can all do social studies better. We'd love for you to join the conversation by stopping by and leaving your own ideas and suggestions.
Membership
If you're already a member, be sure to follow our Twitter feed and Facebook group for the latest updates.