Teaching Social Studies: A Methods Book for Methods Teachers, features tasks designed to take preservice teachers deep into schools in general and into social studies education in particular. Organized around Joseph Schwab's commonplaces of education and recognizing the role of inquiry as a preferred pedagogy in social studies, the book offers a series of short chapters that highlight learners and learning, subject matter, teachers and teaching, and school context. The 42 chapters describe tasks that the authors assign to their methods students as either in?class or as outside?of?class assignments. The components of each chapter are: Summary of the task Description of the exercise (i.e., what students are to do, the necessary resources, the timeframe for completion, grading criteria) Description of how students respond to the activity Description of how the task fits into the overall course List of readings and references Appendix that supplements the task description

Measuring History complements the cases presented in Wise Social Studies Practices (Yeager & Davis, 2005). Yeager and Davis highlight the rich and ambitious teaching that can occur in the broad context of state-level testing. In this book, the chapter authors and I bring the particular state history tests more to the fore and examine how teachers are responding to them. At the heart of Measuring History are cases of classroom teachers in seven states (Florida, Kentucky, Michigan, New York, Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) where new social studies standards and new, and generally high-stakes, state-level history tests are prominent. In these chapters, the authors describe and analyze the state's testing efforts and how those efforts are being interpreted in the context of classroom practice. The results both support and challenge prevailing views on the efficacy of testing as a vehicle for educational reform. Catherine Horn (University of Houston) and I lay the groundwork for the case studies through a set of introductory chapters that examine the current environment, the research literature, and the technical qualities of history tests.

In this book S.G. Grant reports his study of how four Michigan elementary school teachers manage a range of reforms (such as new tests, textbooks, and curriculum frameworks) in three different school subjects (reading, writing, and mathematics). Two significant findings emerge from his comparison of these responses: teachers' responses vary across classrooms (even when they teach in the same school building) and also across the reforms (a teacher might embrace reforms in one subject area, but ignore proposed changes in another).
This study of teachers' responses to reading, writing, and mathematics reform and the prospects for systemic reform is part of a growing trend to look at the intersection of curriculum policy and teachers' classroom practice. It is unique in the way the author looks at teachers' responses to multiple subject matter reforms; uses those responses as part of an analysis of the recent move toward systemic reform; and employs empirical findings as a means of examining the current movement toward systemic reform.
"Reforming Reading, Writing, and Mathematics" is important reading for researchers, practitioners, and graduate students of educational policy, teaching and learning in reading, writing, and mathematics, and elementary education, and for policy analysts in universities, foundations, and government.

Novel standards framework offers a set of interlocking and mutually reinforcing elements that move from developing questions and planning inquiries to communicating conclusions and taking informed action. Presents a field-tested model based on work done with nearly 90 classroom teachers, university faculty, and state education department personnel. Makes a signature contribution to the field by appealing to both practitioner and academic audiences through the curricular and pedagogical opportunities evident in the Inquiry Design Model.

Novel standards framework offers a set of interlocking and mutually reinforcing elements that move from developing questions and planning inquiries to communicating conclusions and taking informed action. Presents a field-tested model based on work done with nearly 90 classroom teachers, university faculty, and state education department personnel. Makes a signature contribution to the field by appealing to both practitioner and academic audiences through the curricular and pedagogical opportunities evident in the Inquiry Design Model.

In the case studies that make up the bulk of this book, middle and high school history teachers describe the decisions and plans and the problems and possibilities they encountered as they ratcheted up their instruction through the use of big ideas. Framing a teaching unit around a question such as "Why don't we know anything about Africa?" offers both teacher and students opportunities to explore historical actors, ideas, and events in ways both rich and engaging. Such an approach exemplifies the construct of ambitious teaching, whereby teachers demonstrate their ability to marry their deep knowledge of subject matter, students, and the school context in ways that fundamentally challenge the claim that history is "boring."

In this book, extended case studies of two veteran teachers and their students are combined with the extant research literature to explore current issues of teaching, learning, and testing U.S. history. It is among the first to examine these issues together and in interaction. While the two teachers share several similarities, the teaching practices they construct could not be more different. To explore these differences, the author asks what their teaching practices look like, how their instruction influences their students' understandings of history, and what role statewide exams play in their classroom decisions. "History Lessons: Teaching, Learning, and Testing in U.S. High School Classrooms" is a major contribution to the emerging body of empirical research in the field of social studies education, chiefly in the subject area of history, which asks how U.S. students make sense of history and how teachers construct their classroom practices.
Three case study chapters are paired with three essay review chapters intended to help readers analyze the cases by looking at them in the context of the current research literature. Two concluding chapters extend the cases and analyses: the first looks at how and why the teachers profiled in this book construct their individual teaching practices, in terms of three distinct but interacting sets of influences--personal, organizational, and policy factors; the second explores the prospects for promoting what the author defines as ambitious teaching and learning. Many policymakers assume that standards-based reforms support the efforts of ambitious teachers, but until we better understand how they and the students in their classes think and act, that assumption is hollow at best.
This book is a must have for faculty and students in the field of social studies education, and broadly relevant across the fields of curriculum studies and educational policy.

In this book S.G. Grant reports his study of how four Michigan elementary school teachers manage a range of reforms (such as new tests, textbooks, and curriculum frameworks) in three different school subjects (reading, writing, and mathematics). Two significant findings emerge from his comparison of these responses: teachers' responses vary across classrooms (even when they teach in the same school building) and also across the reforms (a teacher might embrace reforms in one subject area, but ignore proposed changes in another).
This study of teachers' responses to reading, writing, and mathematics reform and the prospects for systemic reform is part of a growing trend to look at the intersection of curriculum policy and teachers' classroom practice. It is unique in the way the author looks at teachers' responses to multiple subject matter reforms; uses those responses as part of an analysis of the recent move toward systemic reform; and employs empirical findings as a means of examining the current movement toward systemic reform.
"Reforming Reading, Writing, and Mathematics" is important reading for researchers, practitioners, and graduate students of educational policy, teaching and learning in reading, writing, and mathematics, and elementary education, and for policy analysts in universities, foundations, and government.

In this book, extended case studies of two veteran teachers and their students are combined with the extant research literature to explore current issues of teaching, learning, and testing U.S. history. It is among the first to examine these issues together and in interaction. While the two teachers share several similarities, the teaching practices they construct could not be more different. To explore these differences, the author asks what their teaching practices look like, how their instruction influences their students' understandings of history, and what role statewide exams play in their classroom decisions. "History Lessons: Teaching, Learning, and Testing in U.S. High School Classrooms" is a major contribution to the emerging body of empirical research in the field of social studies education, chiefly in the subject area of history, which asks how U.S. students make sense of history and how teachers construct their classroom practices.
Three case study chapters are paired with three essay review chapters intended to help readers analyze the cases by looking at them in the context of the current research literature. Two concluding chapters extend the cases and analyses: the first looks at how and why the teachers profiled in this book construct their individual teaching practices, in terms of three distinct but interacting sets of influences--personal, organizational, and policy factors; the second explores the prospects for promoting what the author defines as ambitious teaching and learning. Many policymakers assume that standards-based reforms support the efforts of ambitious teachers, but until we better understand how they and the students in their classes think and act, that assumption is hollow at best.
This book is a must have for faculty and students in the field of social studies education, and broadly relevant across the fields of curriculum studies and educational policy.

Teaching Social Studies: A Methods Book for Methods Teachers, features tasks designed to take preservice teachers deep into schools in general and into social studies education in particular. Organized around Joseph Schwab's commonplaces of education and recognizing the role of inquiry as a preferred pedagogy in social studies, the book offers a series of short chapters that highlight learners and learning, subject matter, teachers and teaching, and school context. The 42 chapters describe tasks that the authors assign to their methods students as either in?class or as outside?of?class assignments. The components of each chapter are: Summary of the task Description of the exercise (i.e., what students are to do, the necessary resources, the timeframe for completion, grading criteria) Description of how students respond to the activity Description of how the task fits into the overall course List of readings and references Appendix that supplements the task description

Measuring History complements the cases presented in Wise Social Studies Practices (Yeager & Davis, 2005). Yeager and Davis highlight the rich and ambitious teaching that can occur in the broad context of state-level testing. In this book, the chapter authors and I bring the particular state history tests more to the fore and examine how teachers are responding to them. At the heart of Measuring History are cases of classroom teachers in seven states (Florida, Kentucky, Michigan, New York, Texas, Mississippi, and Virginia) where new social studies standards and new, and generally high-stakes, state-level history tests are prominent. In these chapters, the authors describe and analyze the state's testing efforts and how those efforts are being interpreted in the context of classroom practice. The results both support and challenge prevailing views on the efficacy of testing as a vehicle for educational reform. Catherine Horn (University of Houston) and I lay the groundwork for the case studies through a set of introductory chapters that examine the current environment, the research literature, and the technical qualities of history tests.

In the case studies that make up the bulk of this book, middle and high school history teachers describe the decisions and plans and the problems and possibilities they encountered as they ratcheted up their instruction through the use of big ideas. Framing a teaching unit around a question such as 'Why don't we know anything about Africa?' offers both teacher and students opportunities to explore historical actors, ideas, and events in ways both rich and engaging. Such an approach exemplifies the construct of ambitious teaching, whereby teachers demonstrate their ability to marry their deep knowledge of subject matter, students, and the school context in ways that fundamentally challenge the claim that history is 'boring.'