The Social Studies Connection
More than a Newsletter for Secondary Social Studies Teachers
Secondary Social Studies Curriculum Coordinator
Office of Teaching & Learning
Curriculum Division
Southland Center - 3700 South High Street, Columbus, OH
Eric LeMoine, Teacher Created Materials
Session: Inquiry: Using Primary and Secondary Sources to Engage Students
Eric LeMoine spent his 32 year career with the Beaverton School District in Oregon where he taught every single grade. A hands-on educator, Eric is passionate about involving students and their families in the instructional cycle. He's had the opportunity to work with educators in all corners of the globe, most recently in the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates. Frequently presenting for schools and districts and regional, national, and international conferences, Eric strives to learn as much from his audiences as they learn from him. His most recent assignment in Beaverton was as a district Instructional Innovation TOSA, where he worked with admin teams and teachers from all levels helping to incorporate innovative instructional practices.
Cathy Knoop, Population Education
Sessions: Engaging Middle School Students in Global Issues; Engaging High School Students in Global Issues
Cathy Knoop has been an Ohio educator for over 30 years, and a Trainer with PopEd since 2008. Now a retired elementary science teacher from central Ohio, Cathy continues to teach a Natural History course at Ashland University. She and her husband, Paul – both environmental educators – provide programs for adults and children on the natural world. Cathy has received a number of teaching awards including the Walt Disney Company’s American Teacher Award and National Conservation Teacher of the Year from the National Association of Conservation Districts.
Cathy is passionate about the issues of population growth and consumption, and believes they are important to address “if we want future generations to be able to enjoy our planet as we know it.” Cathy has found PopEd materials to be uniquely suited to addressing these issues: “Of any materials that I refer to when presenting workshops, Population Education’s are the most unique, and to me, the most relevant as we strive to prepare more global citizens.”
Brittney Smith, News Literacy Project
Session: Building Sills in Media and News Literacy with Checkology
Brittney Smith is a senior manager of education partnerships (east) at NLP.
Brittney joined NLP in July 2022 after eight years of teaching life science in Cincinnati, Ohio. She was a high school teacher to diverse populations of students, including English Language Learners. In her tenure as science department chair, she focused on building partnerships with community stakeholders to enrich and improve students’ educational experiences.
She holds a bachelor’s degree in biological science from the University of Cincinnati and a master’s degree in teaching science to adolescents and young adults from Mount St. Joseph University. She is currently pursuing her doctorate in educational practice and innovation with a STEM focus at the University of South Carolina.
Ryan Suskey, Ohio Center for Law Related Education
Sessions: Project Citizen; Teaching the Constitution through We the People
Ryan Suskey has been Director Professional Development and Programs at OCLRE since 2014. Ryan leads a team of educators to design and administer civic education programming, plans and delivers professional development for educators, administers grant funding and liaises with funders to ensure satisfactory completion of grant requirements.
Prior to joining OCLRE, Ryan was a classroom teacher in Columbus and Baltimore. Ryan earned a JD from The Ohio State University Moritz College of Law, an MA from The Johns Hopkins University, and a BA from the University of Pittsburgh.
Ohio Revised Code 3313.602(D) requires that each school devote at least one hour or one standard class period on or around Veterans Day, November 11, to an observance that conveys the meaning and significance of the day. Since November 11 is a Saturday, Veterans Day activities can take place on November 10.
As you discuss the significance of Veterans Day with students, consider these talking points:
- Ask students about veterans in their own families and stories they may have heard.
- Discuss how warfare and soldier experiences have changed over time. Technology has changed the nature of warfare in the 21st century (e.g., drone strikes) and communication between the war front and home front.
- Use the K-W-L model to guide discussion of war, military experiences, and postwar life for veterans.
- Discuss the value of the Selective Service System vs. an all-volunteer army. Although the Selective Service System remains in place, the U.S. has relied on all-volunteer armed forces since the end of the Vietnam War.
Teaching resources include:
- Lesson Plan: Veterans Day and the Meaning of Sacrifice (PBS)
- Veterans Day (Library of Congress)
- Veterans Day Facts (The History Channel)
- Celebrating America's Freedom (U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs)
- The Meaning of Veterans Day (What So Proudly We Hail)
- America's Wars Fact Sheet (Department of Veterans Affairs)
- Primary Source Highlights for Veterans Day (Library of Congress)
- Veterans Day Resources (National Archives)
TCI Lessons on military strategies and war:
- Social Studies 6 - Lesson 10. Exploring Four Empires of Mesopotamia
- Social Studies 7 - Lesson 4. Fighting the Greco-Persian Wars; Lesson 10. From Republic to Empire
- Social Studies 8 - Lesson 7. The American Revolution; Lesson 12. Foreign Affairs in the Young Nation
- World History 9 - Lesson 19. Imperialism Throughout the World; Lesson 20. World War I
- American History 10 - Lesson. 19. Foreign Policy: Setting a Course of Expansionism; Lesson 20. The Spanish-American War; Lesson 21. Acquiring and Managing Global Power; Lesson 22. From Neutrality to War; Lesson 23. The Course and Conduct of World War I
- American Government - Lesson 17. Creating American Foreign Policy
- Global Issues - Lesson 14. The New Geopolitics
One way to meet Veterans Day requirement is by scheduling an engaging in-person or virtual field trip to the National Veterans Memorial and Museum (NVMM) in Columbus! As the only museum in America that honors all Veterans from all branches of service, and from all eras of our nation’s proud history of military service, the NVMM can support your educational needs while honoring Veterans.
If you’re not able to visit us, consider joining the national conversation around the Veteran experience. As a class or individually, ask your students to come up with five questions they would like to ask a Veteran and send them to Education@nationalvmm.org. Our Education Team will present your questions within our network of Veterans and share their answers with your class!
To schedule your visit or learn more, go to https://nationalvmm.org/education/field-trips/ or email us at Education@nationalvmm.org.
This year we are in Year 3 of the TCI program adoption for core secondary social studies classes. In Years 1 and 2, we provided extensive professional development on the TCI platform and pedagogy. Year 3 begins our directed efforts at building internal capacity to transition to implementation with fidelity in Year 4.
Before we address the activities to help build internal capacity, it is important to begin with the end in mind by asking ourselves what implementation with fidelity looks like. In other words, what does it mean to do and use the TCI approach with fidelity?
First, we need to establish that using the TCI approach is not about outsourcing our curriculum and instruction to a publishing company/vendor. The TCI approach is about effective teaching practices in the social studies classroom. While the strategies in TCI may have unique proprietary names, these strategies are a collection of best practices that can be found in many other resources. The advantage of using TCI is that all these practices are collated together in a common language that can be used across all secondary social studies courses. Moreover, these practices are supported by a full suite of model lessons with accompanying materials necessary to teach the lessons.
Implementation with fidelity isn’t about using the right platform or even following everything exactly as written. Implementation is about utilizing an inquiry-based approach (preview, engagement, processing) with active learning/ engagement strategies. The TCI approach also incorporates best practices of backward design, UDL (multiple means of representation, engagement, and expression), and performance-based assessments (processing assignments). Teachers will adapt TCI practices and lessons to meet the needs of their classrooms and students, but the core philosophy and pedagogy can and should remain.
The digital teacher platform provides the model lessons with accompanying customizable presentations and downloadable materials to implement the strategies. The TCI approach can be used in digital, paper, or hybrid format. There are advantages and disadvantages of all three approaches. The online student textbook, for example, provides an array of tools to support reading and understanding of the text, including highlighting, note taking, Lexile adjustment, and read aloud. But there are some aspects of the online notebook, the drawing canvas, for example that can be a bit cumbersome. These tasks may be better suited on paper or an external digital tool. The key message is this: Don’t get hung up on the nuances of the digital platform or on pieces of parts that don’t work well for you or your students. Those are not the priorities. Make the approach and materials work for your students in ways that maintain fidelity.
CCS Curriculum documents show the alignment between state standards and TCI lessons. For middle school, the CCS units and TCI units are the same units and lessons are presented in the same order. For high school, the TCI lesson correlations are indicated in the Adopted Textbook Resources section of each unit.
The TCI Implementation Resource Center is your one-stop shop for learning the best practices of TCI and how these practices align with CCS Curriculum.
The Implementation Resource Center provide information about:
- On-Demand PD
- TCI Digital Platform Introduction
- Theory and Research-Based Active Instruction
- TCI Lesson Elements and Cycle
- Activities/Engagement Strategies
- TCI Programs for CCS Middle School Courses
- TCI Programs for CCS High School Courses
- Digging Deeper with TCI Ten PD Videos.
This page is also accessible from the CCS Social Studies Homepage.
The Columbus City School District occupies the historic lands of the Shawnee, Delaware, Seneca-Cayuga, and Wyandotte peoples.
In 1990 President George H. W. Bush approved a joint resolution designating November 1990 “National American Indian Heritage Month.” Similar proclamations (“Native American Heritage Month” and “National American Indian and Alaska Native Heritage Month”) have been issued each year since 1994.
The following teaching resources are available for Native American Heritage Month:
- National Museum of the American Indian Lessons and Resources
- American Indians Primary Sources (National Archives)
- American Indian History and Heritage Teachers Guide (EDSITEment)
- Carlisle Indian Industrial School (Reading Like a Historian)
- Native American Boarding Schools (Library of Congress)
- Native Americans and the American Revolution (EDSITEment)
- The Indian Removal Act of 1830 Lesson (C-SPAN)
- American Indians (Ohio History Central)
- Native Americans in Central Ohio (Teaching Columbus)
The Council for Economic Education offers free professional development development, live and on-demand. Watch a webinar for a minimum of 45 minutes and you will receive a certificate of completion within 24 hours.
Create a free account and register for sessions of your choice or view the on-demand library.
Echoes & Reflections offers professional development designed to empower educators with the necessary tools and knowledge to teach about the Holocaust effectively.
Echoes & Reflections offers a range of one-hour webinar offerings throughout the year. View the November offerings here.
Teachers can also participate in Echoes & Reflections online courses. Courses are asynchronous, with built-in opportunities for discussion and guidance with an expert facilitator, as well as other educator participants. Explore the course catalog here.