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Making History: Educators Weave Social Studies, English and Common Core

Educators from across the metropolitan region are at Putnam/Northern Westchester BOCES this week designing a new social studies curriculum for seventh grade that integrates social studies, English Language Arts, Common Core principles and technology.

The work builds on the SS/ELA program for students in grades K through six that was designed by PNW BOCES and area teachers and is now in use in more than 100 school districts across the state. The SS/ELA program provides teachers with everything they need – except Read-alouds -- to effectively teach social studies including lesson plans, step by step instructions, resources, assessments and worksheets.

“Teachers are really excited about this opportunity as is evident from the fact that we have people coming from Long Island to Yorktown to collaborate,” said Lisa Steiner, social studies chairperson for grades five through eight in the Carmel School District. “Social studies is the forgotten child because we are not assessed but it is still important to have a rigorous and relevant social studies curriculum. Our students need to know what is going on in the world.”

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Social studies teachers from 14 school districts in five BOCES’ regions will work on curriculum design Monday and Tuesday. On Wednesday and Thursday, they will be joined by English Language Arts teachers who will add a literary dimension to the lessons, so that the final product is truly integrated, said Mirla Morrison, a consultant to BOCES who coordinates the SS/ELA program.

At the end of April, New York State adopted a new framework for social studies that updated the curriculum for the first time since 1995. Morrison said the new framework “raised the bar to more higher ordered thinking, with more emphasis on reading primary sources” such as original letters, newspaper articles and legal documents. What’s more, the new framework emphasizes more student-directed learning, with students finding evidence in texts and analyzing documents, rather than solely getting information through lecture.

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