Kirsten 0:00

Hi there, I wanted to hop on here and record the first bonus episode of the social studies podcast, I really wanted to highlight some common questions, as well as some reviews of the Smart and Simple Social Studies guided curriculum that I have offered for third grade, fourth grade and fifth grade. And the curriculum for this is communities for third grade Texas history for fourth grade and fifth grade for US history. So if you happen to live in Texas, this aligns perfectly with the courses, but you might be in another state and also teach US history. So this could be a potentially great resource for you. So I'm going to start with some questions that I have received. And I will go ahead and answer them.

One question was if you would be notified when new units appear? So yes, that is a really great question, you will be notified when each unit is released. And I every time I upload each unit, I send a message to all who have purchased the bundle. And the notification should be seen in your my purchases section. If at any time you ever want to know around when I'll be uploading the next unit, you can always go into the preview of the big growing bundle for third grade and fourth grade and fifth grade. And in that preview, you will see the exact dates. At the time of this recording. I have eight out of 12 units already uploaded for third grade, nine out of 13 for fourth grade, and nine out of 14 for fifth grade. And May 2024 is when all of the units will be complete.

The second question I got that I wanted to highlight is this one, I was wondering what resources you are going off of to create these units. We have a couple of different textbooks and studies weekly. And I was wondering if you are aligning these units with any resource in particular. So these units that I've created are not aligned with any particular curriculum or textbook that I know of. I made my own curriculum based on my own experience teaching the subject, as well as my own general expertise of curriculum mapping and backward design. So just a little bit of background, I do have a master's degree in elementary education. So the content itself is thoroughly researched from just mainly a variety of primary and secondary sources. And so I'm not going off of a textbook publisher or curriculum to create these resources. This is purely my own personal research based off of my general knowledge of this information and just how I can curriculum map these units, a couple of questions I've had are related to the new TEKS. So if you're in Texas, so currently the social studies TEKS are from I think they were adopted in 2018. And beginning 2024 2025. school year, there will be new social studies TEKS that go into effect.

And so one question I got was, is this product been aligned to the current TEKS? Or is it aligned to the new TEKS? That will go into effect on August 1 2024? If it is aligned to the current TEKS? Will there be any updates available to us if we purchase the product now? Or will you end up listing it as a new product that would need to be purchased separately? So I thought this was a really good question to answer. And right now, yes, it is currently aligned to the current TEKS that are in effect. And after doing some research, I saw that there are luckily not a huge amount of differences to the current and new standards. I know back a couple of years ago, there was some talk about them completely switching up the courses. So that I think like World Cultures would be in elementary or world history would be an elementary and they basically be swapping a whole lot of stuff. So it would be a complete overhaul. But that was nixed and tabled. So they mainly made some just slight tweaks into some of the standards, which I should definitely try to create an episode for that just to explain how the TEKS changed. But if you ever purchase any of my resources, and they are TEKS, aligned their standards base, they're always going to be updated in that same resource. So unlike big textbook publishers, who usually will have like the third edition, and then something changes and new standards are put into place. And so they create a fourth edition and you have to go and buy all of it. Again, the whole district has to buy all the textbooks again, that is not the case, I am basically going to be making those updates in the current bundle. So if you already purchased it before the changes take effect, you will get those updates for free. Plus, it's a lot of work to have to go in and relist them as separate products, that would be a lot of extra work. So if you purchase, whether it's now or in the future, you'll always receive any future updates, because I will be updating those existing resources.

The last question I wanted to highlight was somebody who was in a different state other than Texas, this person says, I'm interested in purchasing this bundle. But I have a couple of questions. I am in Indiana, do you know of any resources that compare TEKS to other state standards? What I've found is that a lot of the content for let's say US history can overlap. But there are some units that probably wouldn't be very applicable. So and additionally to that, I know that other states might have a greater focus on the lives of indigenous groups before colonization. Whereas in Texas, it's not really that emphasized in fifth grade, it's more emphasized in fourth grade. So that was when I recommended that if you are in another state and you're interested in this curriculum, you can always purchase individually just based off of what you need. So you don't necessarily have to buy the bundle, you can always purchase, like, let's say regions of the US unit, that's a really great one to use for pretty much any state because it's very straightforward. It talks about the five main regions. And the American Revolution is another one, the Civil War and Reconstruction is another one. So you can pick and choose different units, you don't always have to buy the entire bundle. So that's always great. And that's purposely why I decided to break apart this curriculum into units so that any other state whether you're in Texas or not, you can utilize it just based off of your own state's needs.

All right, so it's time to read some reviews of teachers who have purchased these bundles, and units and have some really great things to say about it. I can't wait to share these with you.

Lacey says this has been a great find for me, I doubted myself when I spent the money but it was worth it and more. I could not be more pleased with this resource. Like many teachers, my only classroom resource is studies weekly. And that was not really reaching my students in any way at all. These engaging lessons have made a world of difference in my social studies time. And she is utilizing the third grade community social studies bundle.

Deanna had the Texas Revolution unit and she said this. Thank you for creating this. I have been searching for almost four years for Texas history curriculum. That wasn't just proud Next and could be done in the little time I have for social studies. This is perfect and purchase the European colonization of the US. This is part of the US History fifth grade curriculum. She says this resource has provided me an excellent framework to use in my first year teaching fifth grade, students find the resource is engaging and I find them to be appropriately challenging. Thank you.

The last review I'm going to read is from Dolores. She has the fifth grade US History curriculum and she says Lifesaver Social Studies resource. This is an amazing resource to use beyond a boring textbook. The pictures and visuals for each slideshow are engaging and the project students get to work on for each unit is the perfect extension. The assessments are rigorous and include a fun review. I am so grateful that I get to help other social studies teachers from their first year of teaching and beyond. And I am so glad that the goal to create units for social studies that are easy to implement, and fun and engaging for students is coming to fruition.

If you're interested at all for this resource, I will drop the link in the description you can go to bit dot L y forward slash Social Studies growing bundles and you'll see where you can learn more information about these curricula. So I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. And I hope you enjoyed this first bonus episode of the podcast. I will talk to you again on Tuesday. Bye. 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. I can't wait for you to join me in the next episode for more teacher tips and strategies.