In just about a month, students around the world (or at least the northern hemisphere) will be asking their social studies teachers, “why do we have to study history?” Of course there are great answers to that question, it’s just a matter of whether teachers spoon feed students the answers […]
I wanted to give you guys a quick update. I’ll be going on radio silence for a little bit. We are about to move from CA to TX and for the first couple of weeks my priorities will be unpacking, settling in, and exploring a new city. That’s […]
Every summer I do some serious reflection and self-criticism on how the school year went and start my initial planning for next school year while everything is fresh in my mind. It’s easy to get complacent and, assuming you’re teaching the same thing the next year, to plan […]
So frequently in education you hear about what students need to learn, what and how teachers should be teaching, which standards need to be met and when, how learning should be assessed, etc. However, every year I find myself learning FROM my kids. I was pretty sure […]
Every once in a while I have a super artistically inclined kid in class (I think we’ve all had the kid who draws on everything at some point), or one who likes making comics out of what we’re learning, or one who turns everything into song lyrics. But this year in […]
Something that always strikes me when I am in other countries is how much history and the present live side by side. I have always been a little jealous of people who get to live their daily lives where the signs say “established 1300” or “offering hospitality since 1411” […]
It’s that time of year again, teacher appreciation week! Rather than sending you all virtual mugs that say “world’s greatest teacher” I thought the heads up about the Teachers Pay Teachers teacher appreciation sale would be a nice way to say you are appreciated! Tomorrow, Wednesday, and in my […]
This post needs a disclaimer. I have admittedly only used this method with high schoolers. The homeschool co-op I’m working with right now has a strict no personal technology policy, and honestly I don’t know if all my students even have a phone, so I haven’t been able […]
It’s always interesting to hear what is and is not taught in various high school history classrooms around the country. One teacher might spend 3 weeks on Civil Rights, another only 1 week. One might discuss the Cambodian Genocide and another might not. I know it is a […]
In a perfect world I’d love to teach at a high school where I could (within reason) create my own classes. At my high school, seniors took 6-week seminar style social studies electives and I LOOOOOOVED it. I chose to take one on the 1920s, another on the […]
Stephanie's History Store 