Final Thoughts

Teaching social studies is often placed on the backburner in the classroom. It should not be this way. Social studies needs to be taught more because it is important for students to know the history of their country. During my sixty-hour field placement, I saw social studies being taught probably four times. By being taught, I mean popcorn reading straight of out the book. The students were definitely bored with it and not actually learning the content. It is important, especially when teaching social studies, to have an active environment. Activities that would be included in an active environment would be a living history museum, putting on plays, using websites, bringing in artifacts, block city, and establishing a democratic classroom. Allowing students to be involved in the classroom will teach them the responsibilities as citizens, community involvement, and help them build relationships.
My curriculum ideology is learner centered. I think it is important to keep students the main focus of the classroom. I want to have an active environment in my classroom with every subject. I want my students to feel comfortable in my classroom and not be afraid to speak out. I want to teach my students how to think. I want them to be able to develop critical thinking skills so they can explore on their own and establish individual ideas about what they are learning. I do not agree with sugar coating the past and teaching the myths that we have all been taught. I think we need to wait until the students are older and can handle what really happened on Thanksgiving or how Christopher Columbus really was instead of teaching the wrong content at a young age.
I plan on moving to New York City and becoming a teacher there for my first few years. I think teaching and living in a big city instead of staying around here will give me more exposure to various cultures. My classroom is going to be more culturally diverse than most of my peers and I am going to learn a lot. I will have culturally responsive classroom and allow my students to be themselves. We will all learn about each other and it will be more than a tourist model because these students will actually know what they are presenting and live it everyday. I am excited to expand my cultural knapsack in New York City and I know it will be a change from here and it is exactly what I want.
Integrating social studies is the best way to teach it more. We’ve learned about various literature books that can be used to teach social studies. Literature is the best and easy way to integrate. We can also use block city to touch on various subjects. There are so many websites we have discovered that gives us ways to teach social studies in an active environment and make it fun. Most students are used to the textbook way of social studies but I plan on changing up the routine. I want to make social studies a favorite subject of my students and do it by “doing history”