Social Studies Technology Project Fall 2000 ED 417 Dr. Ronald Helms

Authors Andrea Weser Tracie Welsh Marcie Miller

Introduction The following are websites and activities we have found to be beneficial in teaching social studies in a sixth grade classroom. Included are a total of 30 websites and a useful activity from each site.

Introduction Rationale: This project is created as a resource for teachers interested in teaching social studies through technology. Goal: To provide a list of internet resources that can be used to teach social studies in a sixth grade classroom.

Introduction Objective statement: Students will perform activities that will provide knowledge about American Heritage, People in Societies, World Interactions, Decision Making & Resources, Democratic Processes, and Citizenship Rights & Responsibilities.

World Interactions www.gsn.org/ www.usgs.gov.education/ Activity: Students will create a newspaper where they write their own articles and post them on the web for the world to see. www.usgs.gov.education/ Activity: Students will read a story about a little girl who takes a balloon ride that gives her different views of the world. Students will relate this to reading maps.

www.kidsvista.com/socialstudies/ geography.html Activity: Students will use maps and compasses to find their way around the school. www.lonelyplanet.com.au/1p.html Activity: Students will read articles about happenings in other countries then report them to the class.

www.kidsat..jpl.nasa.gov/ Activity: Students will become penpals with students from another country.

Decision Making & Resources www.nesa.uiuc.edu/edu/RSE/RSE/ yellow/gnb.html Activity: Students will work with an interactive stock market. www.landmark-project.com/ecomarket/ Activity: Students will try an sell an imaginative new product over the internet.

www.cochran.com/theodore www.frbchi.org/ Activity: Students will read interactive stories about a boy named Theodore and help him to make the right decisions. www.frbchi.org/ Activity: Students will examine the role of money in history and use it to buy goods. www.eced.web.unomaha.edu/teach.htm Activity: Students will read a story dealing with unlimited wants, goods and services.

American Heritage www.geneologytoday.com Activity: Build a family tree. www.1.umn.edu Activity: Bring a simple dish from their culture.

www.jefferson.village.virginia.edu Activity: Students will use “The Valley of the Shadow” newspaper abstract to explore causes of death in the late 1850’s and early 1860’s. www.lcwebz.loc.gov Activity: Click on today in history and see what happened in different years on this date.

www.materialreligon.org/objects.html Activity: Students will pick one religious object from the list, click on it and read about it. Then they will create a picture of it and describe it to the class.

People in Societies www.artsednet.getty.edu Activity: Students will investigate some important public building, parks and monuments where they live. Then they will pick someone important to them and design a monument for that person.

www.csuohio.edu/history/japan Activity: Go to the link about Oragami and then design their own Oragami. www.icom.org/vlmp Activity: Pick a country and take a virtual museum tour. Then give short report to the class as if they had been there and tell about what they saw.

www.Ireland.com Activity: Read over the page and write about a couple of things going on in Ireland that day. www.china.com Activity: Post a question about Chinese society.

Democratic Processes www.solanco.k12.pa.us/technology/6-12_lesson_plans.htm A Story of Democracy News Coverage of the Recent Mexican Elections and Why the World Wants to Know In this lesson, students focus on the recent Mexican elections to evaluate how different journalistic accounts can present different aspects of the same event. 

http://www.nytimes.com/learning/teachers/lessons/991220monday.html It's Up for Debate Exploring the Platforms of the Presidential Hopefuls In this lesson, students investigate the different platforms of each of the Presidential hopefuls for the 2000 election. Small groups will each carefully research the platforms of an assigned candidate and then create a political pamphlet supporting their candidate, using persuasive language and images to "influence" their audience of potential voters.

http://www. nytimes. com/learning/teachers/lessons/000412wednesday http://www.nytimes.com/learning/teachers/lessons/000412wednesday.html Taking the Lead Creating a Visual Comparison of Electoral Processes In this lesson, students investigate the election process in several South American countries and create posters to display their knowledge. http://www.congresslink.org/lesson1.html In this lesson, you will direct students to log into the computer and go directly to CongressLink Home Page, to the Table of Contents. Here they will click on Lesson Topics, and for this assignment they will choose Student Research Activities.

http://www.yahooligans.com/tg/constitution.html#stage1 Students will identify the positions of specific states regarding crucial conflicts during the Constitutional Convention, analyze the degree to which compromise was important to the ratification of the Constitution, orally express the viewpoints of the respective states, complete simple keyword and category searches on Yahooligans, and identify sites where information was found.

Citizenship Rights & Responsibilities http://www.pbs.org/wnet/newyork/laic/lessons/e1_t3-lp.html Students research examples of slavery in the world today, and learn about some ways they can help current slaves gain their freedom. After students develop a plan for helping to fight slavery, they take an action and then publish their accomplishments on this Web site. http://www.civiced.org/wtp_ms28_sb.html In this lesson you will learn about one of the most important rights of citizenship. This is the right to participate in governing our nation. The lesson will discuss the different ways you may participate. It will also suggest those things you should think about in deciding whether or not you should participate.

http://ofcn.org/cyber.serv/academy/ace/soc/cecsst/cecsst027.html Using materials from the local library and historical society, the students do research and write reports about how the founding fathers established your city. http://ericir.syr.edu/Virtual/Lessons/Social_St/Civics/ IV0003.html All students will individually list the rights guaranteed by the First Ten Amendments to the Constitution. These will be checked and discussed to insure all students understand these rights.

http://dent.edmonds.wednet.edu/IMD/lessons.html#Civics%20Education It's Up For Debate - In this lesson, students investigate the different platforms of each of the Presidential hopefuls for the 2000 election. Small groups will each carefully research the platforms of an assigned candidate and then create a political pamphlet supporting their candidate, using persuasive language and images to "influence" their audience of potential voters.

Conclusion The previous resources listed in this unit should help teachers develop lessons regarding the different aspects of social studies. All of the addresses listed provide links to various websites concerning social studies lessons that are appropriate in a sixth grade classroom.