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TLT 431, Spring 2012 - Course record

TLT 431, Spring 2012 - Course record

Apr 23, 2012

Navigation short-cut: Session jump by number

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 Session 1 - Monday, 16 Jan

Before class

  • Buy (borrow, rent) a copy of the textbook: A Practical Guide to Middle and Secondary Social Studies (June R. Chapin, 2007; Amazon page -- also available in the LU bookstore)

  • If you can, check out the course resources linked from the main course page: this wiki, the bookmarks list, the Moodle site.

During class (ppt)

  • Introductions

  • Tour of course sites, resources

    • Textbook: A Practical Guide to Middle and Secondary Social Studies (June R. Chapin, 2007; Amazon page -- also available in the LU bookstore)

    • Public face of the course: Wiki

      • Intended curriculum: Map

      • Enacted curriculum: Record, built session-by-session. See previous version of this course for an example.

    • Private face of the course: CourseSite.

      • You're probably familiar with Blackboard; we'll be using a different courseware system called Moodle. Lehigh has named theirs CourseSite.

      • Note that Moodle is a free tool. If you're interested, you can set up your own Moodle and use if for teaching your classes--an example is here.

    • Course bookmarks--some websites that you may find useful during the semester.

    • And in case you don't have one already in front of you: classroom laptops

  • Reviewing syllabus

    • Static copy (pdf) vs. dynamic copy (Google doc)

      • Please flag any corrections or questions as we go along! That's the whole point of the dynamic copy....

    • Part 1: General overview, expectations

    • Part 2: Assignments

  • Conceptual work:

    • What is social studies? (via Jigsaw(-ish) / LGL activity)

      • Form SIX groups

        • Group A: NCSS materials, publications (NCSS website)

        • Group B: PA standards (electronic versions), textbooks

        • Group C: Content-area groups' materials (links to content-area association sites)

        • Group D: "Education market" materials

        • Group E: Teacher materials; high school course catalogs.

        • Group F: Discussion: What do you remember from your middle & secondary social studies experiences? What topics did you address? What did you read? Watch? Discuss? What sorts of tasks, assessments, or projects did you complete?

      • Group work for 10 minutes

      • Report out: Describe what you looked at, what you discussed. Instructor will make a list.

      • Group: Look over the list and create GROUPS or blocks of items that appear (to you) to be similar to one another.

      • Label: Identify each group by a short (1-4 word) label.

  • Instruction presentation: What is social studies? A natural evolution in education? A historical oddity? An ill-defined object? A battlefield?

  • What is a social studies methods course?

    • Content? Techniques? Lesson planning?

    • Significance of model lessons: LGL / Jigsaw, Hilda Taba

  • Why does social studies matter?

    • demo lesson: Civil Rights / non-violent resistance via SmartBoard work with images & graphic organizing.

  • Closure: Discussion of WLT, original instructional materials assignments

After class

 Session 2 - Monday, 23 Jan

Before class

  • Complete reading – take notes! Underline! Be an active reader! Think about your various aspects of your teaching self: content knowledge, knowledge of teaching methods, knowledge of assessment techniques, etc. Be engaged as a reader and you develop these facets of yourself.

  • Start your WTL thread

  • Complete your first instructional material AND BRING IT WITH YOU TO CLASS

  • Start lining up an HTCE participant

During class (ppt)

  • Framing construct for the course: (t)PCK. Along the way, I'll show you my original instructional material, a couple of Google Earth overlays used in a lesson about the Great Wall of China.

    • De-brief of activity: the T..., the P..., the C...; how's your toolbox looking?

  • Pair-and-share of original instructional materials

  • Reporting out on pair-and-share–how did it fit into (t)PCK?

  • Discussion of next original instructional materials product–look at Keeler and Langhorst, 2008

  • Framing for the course: Content areas, subdivided into content schema, disciplinary skills, standards, research findings, current practice, emerging practice, building your toolbox, and pursuing the civic mission of social studies

  • Getting started on history education: 

  • Closure: How's your TPCK coming along?

  • Discussion of HTCE assignment.

After class

  • Reading

    • Chapin, Ch. 1 (review), Ch. 6 (history ed)

    • Shulman, 1986

    • Thornton, 2001

    • Keeler & Langhorst, 2008 (to help plan for original instructional material product #2)

    • Barton & Levstik, 1996 (to prep for HTCE work)

    • Hicks, Doolittle, & Ewing, 2004

  • Assignments

    • WTL: I'd like you to take 20 minutes to WRITE THE HISTORY OF THE WORLD. Seriously. Then read a classmate's post and provide feedback

      • One thing you liked

      • Suggest one resource to help design instruction based on what they wrote

      • One suggestion for improvement: "Given more time to work on this, you might also want to think about..."

    • Complete HTCE image set, annotations

 Session 3 - Monday, 30 Jan

Before class

  • Complete reading

  • Create your image set for your HTCE, make annotations, upload to CourseSite

  • Do WTL – remember that I have that crazy request about writing the history of the world

During class (ppt)

  • Stances: Traditional, disciplinary, progressive. This week, we're focusing on traditional and disciplinary

  • Demo lesson: GIS for early American history. How is this both traditional and disciplinary? 

  • Digging into disciplinary, focusing on King Phillip's War (see 'Metacomet')

  • Research on history as discipline

    • Wineburg on historians vs. high school students

    • (A look at primary source heuristics. See more here.)

    • Problems K-12 students (and also adults!) have in thinking about history

  • Teaching history well (regardless of stance): Bransford's framework for instruction, Wiggins & McTighe's design on instructional planning.

After class

  • Reading

    • Chapin, Ch. 3

    • Smith & Niemi, 2001

    • Alibrandi & Sarnoff, 2006

    • Yeager & Davis, 1995, 1996

    • Barton & Levstik, 2003

    • Wineburg, 2004

    • Nash, Crabtee, & Dunn, 200 – read Ch. 1 excerpt. 

  • Assignments

    • Complete original instructional materials assignment #2. Don't forget the reflection–read the syllabus to see what's required. 

    • WTL

 Session 4 - Monday, 6 Feb

Before class

  • Complete your second original instructional product and come to class ready to share it

  • Complete reading

During class (ppt)

  • Going deeper with 'three stances' of history ed

  • A method that a traditionalist would love: Timelines. We'll do them several different ways

  • A method that a disciplinarian would love: the (open) fishbowl discussion of a set of primary sources.

  • And a crazy experiment in a method that this civics-oriented history educator loves: using WP as a frame for history / history ed

  • More on WP & civics-in-history

  • Discussion of course plan assignment

  • Time permitting: Pair-and-share

After class

  • Reading

    • Chapin, Ch. 2 and 4

    • Lepore, 2010

    • Hammond, 2010

  • Assignments

    • WTL: Pick a history topic and frame out THREE different ways to teach it, highlighting the three different stances we've explored

    • Complete your first course plan.

      • Here's a (partial) sample of one for an AP Macro course.

      • And note that the assignment says, "Begin by perusing the course catalog or department listing for a middle school or high school." To make life slightly easier, here's links to the course catalogs for Freedom HS, Liberty HS, Dieruff & William Allen. Keep in mind that you're looking for core curriculum classes (e.g., history, geography, civics, economics), not electives ("War Through Film"). Among the core curriculum classes, pick whichever is easiest / most appealing.

 Session 5 - Monday, 13 Feb

Before class

  • Complete your first course plan (see sample linked from above) and turn it in via CourseSite

  • Do your best to complete the second pair-and-share of your original instructional materials.

During class (ppt)

  • Guest presentation: The Cuban Missile Crisis via a simulation (created and presented by Melanie McBride)

  • Gratuitous plug for my geospatial tools course, via my Google Earth overlay of the Cuban Missile Crisis (see my geospatial social studies page)

  • Wrapping up history, transitioning into civics

    • (Some topic-shuffling: we're focusing on CIVICS next, not geography)

  • And speaking of civics work, here's a little activity to get us started: Taking a look at some images from the most recent State of the Union address 

  • Relevant standards: PDE standards for Civics (old, new – see CourseSite for links); Center for Civics Education (we'll use the 9-12 standards, as the 5-8 standards are just a chopped-down version of the same)

  • Taking a critical lens to civic education: What kind of citizen? Drawing from research by Westheimer & Kahne.

  • Something to aspire to: the Center for Civics Education's Project Citizen (Level 1) – skip to p. 30 to walk through the portfolio display concept.

    • Note that Level 2 exists; they just don't make it fully available online (at the moment)

    • Other lesson plans from CCE.

  • Our own Questions Time, re assignments

    • Organizing our microteaching

    • Discussing fieldwork

After class

  • Reading

    • Chapin, Ch. 7 (3rd ed.) or Ch. 8 (2nd ed)

    • Westheimer & Kahne, 2004

    • Smith, 2004

    • optional: Hammond & Manfra, 2009

  • Assignments

    • WTL: Take 15 minutes and write how the American government works. Next, take 10 minutes to explain what democracy is. How much overlap is there between your explanation of the two topics?

    • Work on fieldwork, prepare first installment

 Session 6 - Monday, 20 Feb

Before class

  • Update me on your fieldwork – just write up whatever you have (notes...nothing formal required) and submit it via CourseSite as 'Fieldwork, initial installment'

  • Complete your time-shifted pair-and-share

During class (ppt)

  • Getting our microteaching organized

  • Getting us aware of the NAEP and Praxis 2, be ready to take a (diagnostic!! Not high-stakes!) content assessment

After class

  • Reading

    • NAEP, Praxis materials linked from CourseSite – espec the last one that goes to this pdf.

    • Chapin, Ch. 5

    • Reich, 2009

    • Wineberg, 2004

  • Assignments

    • HOLD OFF on second course plan, turn it in after spring break

    • (No grade attached, but complete the test – 60 minutes, single session, no outside help – and give your answers via this online form.)

 Session 7 - Monday, 27 Feb

Before class

  • ...

During class (ppt)

  • Microteaching

    • Jeni (Library of Congress - American Memory collection of materials, lessons)

    • Nick (National Archives and Records Administration's DocsTeach database)

  • Conceptual work: Going further with assessment

    • Playing with the standardized assessment from last week: Spreadsheet here.

    • Thinking back on Reich, 2009....

    • Looking for a thicker slice of student schema?

      • Essays  – we'll be looking at some questions, student work, and rubrics from the College Board (specifically, my beloved AP Euro)

      • Other approaches: A digital documentary? (This was made using PrimaryAccess.) Other tools: Glogster, Prezi, good ol' powerpoint (albeit perhaps used non-traditionally), a discussion board, etc. 

  • Closure: Comments on course plans, taking the next steps in instructional planning.

After class

  • Reading

    • Get started on geography chapter in the textbook. In the second edition, it's Ch. 7; in the 3rd edition, it's Ch. 8

  • Assignments

    • Complete second course plan

    • Complete HTCE essay. If you need an extension, let me know!

    • If you didn't already do the 50-item content test, please do so!!

Spring break - Monday, 5 Mar -- no class

 Session 8 - Monday, 12 Mar

Before class

  • Complete HTCE or email me to ask for an extension

  • Complete second course plan (remember, this was delayed from the last class before spring break)

  • Complete readings

  • If you didn't already, please complete the 50-item content test. 

During class (ppt)

  • Microteaching

    • Erica (Bring History Alive! and/or Barton & Levstik's Doing History)

    • Dana (Project Citizen from the Center for Civic Ed)

  • Conceptual work: Geography ed.

    • Geography is...

    • Tools of geography

      • Sketchmaps

      • 'Weaving the Globe': Input your data; look at others' output.

      • User-generated media

    • Aims of geography

      • Families and food

        • Captions -- match these with the images in the ppt; Countries -- locate these countries on the map. 

        • Family food images taken from TIME magazine photo essay about the book, Hungry Planet. Note the parallel to the book Material World. Both seem like great resources

        • Extensions: 

          • Pop the images onto a map! Someone has done this using Microsoft's Live Maps. I would have done it with Google Maps or as a Google Earth overlay.

          • One of the things I like about this image set is the level of contextualization: We have some info about the family and their location, not just their country. So: Could you locate not just the country but the location (e.g., Tingo, Ecuador)? What resources could you use to do this? 

      • Danger of a single story: We'll watch a TED talk from novelist Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie given at Oxford, July 2009. The title is "The danger of a single story" . We'll just watch the first 4:14; then we'll skip ahead to 10:57-11:57 (thank YOU for the interactive transcript!!!)

        • How did our families and food activity reinforce or reject a Single Story? What additional steps might you want to take when using this material?

    • Closure: Discussion of curriculum map

After class

  • Reading

    • Carano & Berson, 2007

    • Doering & Veletsianos, 2007

  • Assignments

    • WTL

    • Continue fieldwork

    • Complete curriculum map

 Session 9 - Monday, 19 Mar

Before class

  • Turn in curriculum map

  • Do WTL 

During class (no ppt)

  • Microteaching

    • Greg (AP Civics, AP Comp Gov from College Board)

    • Brittney (Echoes and Reflections)

  • Conceptual work – two simple demos of geography ed

    • Weaving the Globe (catching up from something that had been planned earlier)

    • What's in a (place) name

After class

  • Reading

    • (none – just review textbook on geography & econ)

  • Assignments

    • DO NOT do the unit plan outline just yet; I need to digest your curriculum maps.