I imagine most of us have been in this situation before: you plan a great lesson, it is engaging, challenging, and every student completes the work. Then you look at the clock and there’s 15 minutes left to class. Well that happened to me not too long ago; the […]
One of my favorite first week of school discussions is about perspective. Because of this particular map (which I found at a map store in Seattle a few years ago), it always ends up being a student generated conversation (which I love!!!). After about 3-4 days in class, […]
Starting the year off organized is key to many teachers’ sanity. For me, that includes planning ahead. With those two things in mind, this right here is one of my FAVORITE teacher organization tips/tricks/tools/methods (NOT an affiliate link). It has worked for me no matter how many students/preps/periods I have because […]
Every year it seems like I find a new set of favorite activities/resources for the coming school year. Well, this year I have 4 amazing resources to share with you guys for #BestResourceEver for the Back to School 2016 season. I wanted a “top 3” list but couldn’t narrow […]
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 […]
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 […]
I’ve always heard mixed reviews over the years about the value, or lack thereof, in showing videos in class. Teachers (and parents even!) have said it’s a cop-out, it’s the teacher being lazy, or even that it’s a sign of the teacher not knowing enough about the topic […]
If you have spent time on Pinterest in the last year or so it’s likely you’ve come across something called “Gallery Walks.” I had seen them starting last summer but hadn’t really had a good opportunity to utilize them last semester (plus there was the huge lapbooking push […]
As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, I like to keep myself and my students on our toes by not getting into an activities rut. Today I’m sharing 3 of my favorite ways to review a topic. You can read about some of my other go-to “get students engaged” strategies and […]
Stephanie's History Store 