[00:00:00] Kirsten: This is the Social Studies Teacher Podcast, a show for busy elementary teachers looking for fun and engaging ways to easily add social studies into their classroom schedule without feeling overwhelmed or pressed for time. I'm Kirsten of the Southern Teach, an educator and mom who is passionate about all things social studies.

[00:00:30] I love sharing ideas and strategies that are low prep and easy to implement, so let's dive in together.

[00:00:47] Hi there, and welcome to another episode of the Social Studies Teacher podcast. As always, I'm so glad you're here and I hope that you're doing well so far in the school year. I know this time of year, it's [00:01:00] October, there's likely some type of fall break that is happening or has. Happened in the last week or so, and I know things can get overwhelming with grades and meetings and all kinds of stuff that you usually don't really experience at the beginning of the year because there's that really big high of like, oh, hey, it's back to school.

[00:01:24] I'm so glad you're here. All that great stuff. And it starts to get into the nitty gritty. And so I know this time of year can be a little challenging, but I believe in you. I know that you're doing an amazing job already as a teacher, and I am going to just give a little bit of a repost, if you will. This is something I've posted as a podcast episode last year, and it was my audio only version.

[00:01:52] And so this time I wanted to do a video version with. Some examples that I didn't previously discuss in that episode. [00:02:00] So this is already up on the blog. This is a blog post and podcast episode already, but I just wanted to, because it was popular last year, ref feature it as a great refresher on. Five key components of a social studies lesson.

[00:02:15] Before we get into everything, I did want to make sure that you are subscribed. You can always click that button below this video, and I would love it if you could like this video, comment, interact with me, anything you'd like to do to make sure that I can see it and I can respond back because I do respond back too.

[00:02:35] All comments I get. I also would love it if you could share this with a fellow friend or educator that would benefit from this episode. I truly appreciate being able to get the word out and spread out the word of this. Particular podcast. Also, if you haven't heard already, I do have bite-sized social studies.

[00:02:54] These are videos for kids on specific topics. I recently, in the last [00:03:00] month, have posted two new videos. One is on Map and Globe skills, and the other is about Celebrate Freedom Week. And I know Celebrate Freedom Week has already passed, but I think it's a really great refresher on. Anytime you're talking about the Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution and good citizenship, so it's really something you can use at any time of the year.

[00:03:22] But this one is specifically on Celebrate Freedom Week because I know certain states have that as a requirement to teach for social studies, and I really want to know what kind of topics. You would want to hear next. I'm currently in the works of putting up something related to primary versus secondary sources for kids, and also I have one related to regions of the world and also regions of Texas because I am based in Texas.

[00:03:54] But I wanna know what videos you would like to see because I've noticed these [00:04:00] kid only videos, the ones that are specifically for kids. Have gotten a lot of views and they gained traction very quickly. So I know it's something you guys are loving and I want to know what you want to hear more of and what to see more of what topics you want me to cover.

[00:04:16] List them below or email me however you want to share that information with me and I will make sure I get it on my list of ideas for this to happen. That is something that is just so that you know, it's like a FYI. I also again have a podcast that is audio only, so you can listen to this wherever you love to listen to podcasts and you just type in the Social Studies teacher podcast.

[00:04:43] And there's always going to be a blog post version of this episode, so you just have to head over to the southern teach.com/blog and you'll see all of the backlog of episodes there. So like I mentioned earlier, between meetings and [00:05:00] grades that have to be put in, because it's usually going to be the first nine weeks.

[00:05:05] Ending soon. This can be super stressful for a lot of teachers and educators, so it's pretty easy for lesson planning to be pushed to the side because there's just so much going on. But here's the thing, when lessons are not meaningful or engaging, then the focus for students will go down. So we don't want them to lose focus.

[00:05:28] We want them to continue to be engaged. In these meaningful social studies lessons, so that's why I wanted to repost this episode. Five Essential Parts of a Social Studies lesson, and I'm going to be using an example that probably can relate to what you might be teaching. If you're teaching US history, the 13 colonies is commonly taught around this year or sometime in the near future.

[00:05:58] So I wanted to get this [00:06:00] episode up and posted so you can use this 13 colonies example in relation to the five essential components of a great lesson, and you can use it or lose it, as my colleague would say. But these five key components are not just for one particular type of topic. You can use these five steps and five components for virtually any social studies topic, regardless of grade level, regardless of state, regardless of topic that you're going to be talking about.

[00:06:32] So I'm hoping that you can take these five components and use it however you wish. First up is clear learning objectives. Every strong lesson starts with a clear goal. Students need to learn what they're working towards and so do you. When you set a clear objective, you are not only guiding your teaching, you're helping students take ownership of their learning.

[00:06:57] They know exactly what they're aiming for, and then they can [00:07:00] track progress along the way. So for the 13 colonies, your objective might be students will identify the three colonial regions. New England, middle and Southern colonies, and explain how geography influenced their economies. You can put it on a board, like a regular whiteboard.

[00:07:20] You can have it as a slide that you can project to the class. Maybe you've typed it up and you have a cute little template in PowerPoint. You can put that objective up there and discuss the objective. You can also use student friendly statements like I can, and making sure that you're referring to the objective throughout the lesson.

[00:07:42] I also have used learning intention and success criteria, and I also have a resource related to this, so if you're interested in that, I'll make sure to put the link in. But you can essentially use the template in there, and I usually had it on the [00:08:00] board and I would just write out the learning intention and success criteria and.

[00:08:05] Change it out each day, and I always had one for each subject. The second component is an engaging hook or introduction. This is the moment at the start of class where you're engaging your students in sparking curiosity. You want to grab that attention because without a hook, students are coming in cold.

[00:08:24] They have no idea what to expect with the lesson. And just starting with, Hey, we're gonna talk about the 13 colonies. All right, let's go. That is not kind of a great way to start a lesson. It is always important to make sure you have some type of hook or introduction with a good hook, it can excite them, it can get them thinking critically and actually get more invested into what you're going to be talking about.

[00:08:49] So a hook idea I have related to the 13 colonies, you can ask them. A hypothetical question. If you moved to America in the 16 hundreds, what would [00:09:00] you need first? Food, land, or a way to make money. So this could lead into how the colonist adapted. In the New England colonies versus the middle colonies versus the southern colonies.

[00:09:17] So just giving them a generic question to think about and ponder can just get them hooked into what you're actually going to be talking about. You could also do a short clip. You can do a role play scenario. You could also do some type of interesting fact. Anything related to that, just super short and sweet that you can get them hooked into the lesson is always beneficial.

[00:09:44] The third component is active learning and student engagement. I truly believe social studies should not. Consist solely of lectures and textbooks. Students need to do something with the information. Active learning helps them [00:10:00] process and remember the material, and it keeps them engaged in a world full of distractions.

[00:10:06] So with the 13 colonies, an example I have here is that you could have students work in small groups to create some type of poster or chart that shows how geography shaped life in each region. So maybe one group might explore ship building in the New England colonies and fishing in the New England colonies.

[00:10:27] And then another group is looking at cash crops like cotton and indigo and tobacco and rice in the southern colonies by working together and presenting their findings. Students not only are learning the information, but they're also learning from each other. This is something I experienced as a student and also did with my students.

[00:10:46] And so I've seen it on both sides and it's kind of one of my favorite ways to teach things is dividing students into groups. They research and make a poster on different things, and then they talk about it as a class, and then of course. [00:11:00] You would go in and add on things or reiterate things so that they get the information, and you can even have them make sure they take notes in interactive notebooks as well.

[00:11:10] All right. Key component number four is incorporating primary sources or real world examples. Primary sources could include firsthand accounts like letters and diaries. And then you also have the real world scenarios like political speeches, news articles, or connections to what is happening today.

[00:11:30] Bringing in sources from firsthand accounts and real world examples makes social studies more tangible. That's just the nature of it entirely. Instead of reading about the past in a textbook. They can really get a hands-on look to see how it is relevant. And real, and it's regarding real people who lived just like they did.

[00:11:53] So the idea for the 13 colonies that I have here is that you could share an excerpt from a colonial [00:12:00] diary, maybe describing daily chores, or you could even show some type of advertisement from a newspaper that promotes some type of good or trade. I always love Library of Congress. You could also look at Wikimedia Commons.

[00:12:17] There are some good sources there to find some really interesting things about how life was in that time period. Then you would ask, what does this tell us about life in the colonies? So this is just a really great way to connect. The past to real human experiences. This is not just something that happened a long time ago.

[00:12:39] It did happen a long time ago, but it also was how life actually was. The fifth key component is all about reflection and assessment. So this part of the lesson is where students are processing the information, and it's a great way to check for understanding, reflection makes learning personal while assessment.

[00:12:58] Helps to see if [00:13:00] those learning objectives that you mentioned at the beginning of the lesson were met. So I always like to incorporate exit tickets. This is super easy to do a quick check for understanding. You could do it on a sticky note and pose a question on the board, such as, which colony region would you choose to live in and why?

[00:13:20] So this requires them to recall some facts and then have some type of. Synthesized opinion related to why they would want to live in a specific region. You don't need to have a big test. You can just do some type of quick check. You could do journal prompt, you could do a class discussion, or even a one minute writeup.

[00:13:41] The key is to just let students think about what they learned and show you what they understand. So there you have it, the five essential components of a Great Social Studies lesson. Number one, starting with clear learning objectives. Number two, engaging hook or introduction. Number three, active [00:14:00] learning.

[00:14:00] Number four, primary sources or real world examples. And number five, checking for understanding with a reflection or assessment. When you include these components in your lesson, students will walk away more engaged with more meaningful insight into the topic and. Walk away with more understanding in general.

[00:14:21] And best of all, this doesn't take much stress added on in your planning if you're looking for even more insight into a really great strong social studies block. If you're looking for ways to amp up your social studies block, I'm gonna put in a link related to my course. Social studies simplified. This is something I promoted earlier in the summer.

[00:14:46] And I'm gonna go ahead and open it for a short window of time if you are really stuck at what to do with more hook ideas, more actual lesson ideas, and also [00:15:00] engaging assessments, just so that it's not something that you're dreading and you want to make social studies something that you really look forward to.

[00:15:09] So it's called Social Studies simplified. I will make sure to add the link in the show notes. If it is not open, you can always go on the wait list and I will let you know when it is going to be available next, but I will open it briefly for the next couple of weeks, likely till the end of October, so you can always check that out in the show notes or in the description.

[00:15:34] Thank you so much again for watching. I hope to see you next time and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. Thanks for listening to the Social Studies Teacher podcast. If you enjoyed listening to this episode, hit that subscribe button and leave a review. I would love to hear your thoughts. You can also find me on Instagram at the Southern Teach.

[00:15:54] I can't wait for you to join me in the next episode for more teacher tips and [00:16:00] strategies.