Strategies for Common Core and Social Studies

Common Core Standards: Fact and Fiction

Presented by Joy Pullmann Managing Editor of School Reform News and an Education Research Fellow at The Heartland Institute.

Strategies for Common Core and Social Studies

Teachers have a toolbox filled with best practices, strategies, differentiation tips and so forth.  Among the tool collection these days are strategies used to teach the Common Core Standards.

The Mystery Strategy encourages students to be history detectives as they explore a historical question, follow clues, use Bloom’s HOTS (such as analysis and synthesis), to test their hypothesis. Students become actively engaged in the lesson.  Mystery Strategy for Elementary Students provides an excellent overview, goals, and teacher preparation for using this strategy.  It is easily adapted to older students.

Reflective Discussion is a strategy that helps students process what they have seen, read, or heard in the classroom.  Through the use of the Reflective Discussion strategy, students challenge their own thinking by sharing with others through summarizing and evaluating conclusions contributed by others.  It is good to draw upon students’ personal experiences when using this strategy.

The Compare and Contrast strategy is one used often in classrooms across the globe.  Many different charts are used for this strategy as well as various software programs, like Inspiration.  There are also interactive tools available on the Verizon Thinkfinity web page.  The Cinderella Trilogy is an activity that asks students to compare three  cross-cultural Cinderella stories.  ArtsEdge provides an interactive Venn Diagram for this lesson.

http://fcit.usf.edu/startingpoints/social-studies/757/strategies-for-common-core-and-social-studies