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=Welcome to the Woodring College of Education Elementary Education Social Studies Education Wiki=

Preservice teachers enrolled in the WCE Elementary Education Social Studies for Elementary School course (ElEd 425) are responsible for most of the contributions contained on the pages of this wiki. The objectives of this project are to: familiarize future teachers with user-friendly technologies that may be applied to their classroom practice to enhance teaching and learning; provide opportunities for preservice teachers to research and explore social studies, place-based, social justice, and sustainability education themes and pedagogies; and to provide students an opportunity to contribute to the scholarship of teaching and learning. The menu of pages contained in this wiki are labeled on the left side of this home page. Please point and click on your desired destination.



Lesson Plans Page
The Lesson Plans page provides a wide range of K-8 lesson plans focused on two of the social studies strands, civics and geography (map-making), and incorporating place-based education themes. Students were asked to develop civics and geography lessons, utilizing a WCE Elementary Education Department adopted instructional plan template for the grade level of students where they had been placed in their current preservice practicum experience. Contributors have provided detailed instructional plans for K-8 students utilizing the Washington State Social Studies Frameworks, incorporating Essential Academic Learning Requirements (EALRs) and Grade Level Expectations (GLEs) adopted by Washington State, and implementing an //Understanding by Design// (Wiggins and McTighe, 2005) model for instructional design and assessment.

Annotated Bibliographies Page
The Annotated Bibliographies page contains student reviews and ratings of journal articles. Students were asked to locate and select five (5) articles, //one each// for the following categories: Whatcom County, Washington State, the Pacific Northwest, the U.S. and the world. Four (4) of the five (5) articles would have a specific focus on the social studies strands of Civics, History, Geography, and Economics. The fifth article would have a focus on Place-Based Education. Students were asked to select, read, provide a brief summary, and rate each of the articles based on how helpful they found the article to be in their quest for understanding social studies education and/or place-based education applications.

Web Resource Guide Page
The Web Resource Guide page contains helpful links to social studies, sustainability education, and place-based sites for professional educators. In the fall 2007 students were asked to locate and select five (5) websites, //one each// for the following categories: Whatcom County, Washington State, the Pacific Northwest, the U.S., and the world. Four (4) of the five (5) websites would have a focus specific to the four social studies strands, Civics, History, Geography, and Economics. The fifth website website would focus on Place-based Education. Students were asked to locate, select, and rate websites on a scale of one to four (1-4) asterisks based on whether they found the site to be (*) OK, (* ***)** Good, **(*** * *) Must See, or (* * * *) Dynamite, based on how helpful they found the site to be in their quest for understanding social studies education and/or place-based education applications. In the fall of 2008 students were asked to locate websites that focused on sustainability education. They were not asked to rate the sites, but rather make selections that they thought would be beneficial to K-12 educators.



Funding Sources Page
The Funding Sources page contains links to funding sources which may open up opportunities for teachers to receive financial support for special projects for which there might otherwise not be funding.

Children's Literature With Social Studies Themes
This page was added fall '08. Contributors will be asked to add to our repository of resources by submitting short annotated bibliographies, and grade level appropriateness, of children's literature with social studies themes.

Social Justice Themed Articles
This page was added fall '09. Contributors are asked to add to our repository of resources by submitting short annotated bibliographies of social justice related articles that might serve as resources for teachers wanting to integrate social justice themes in their k-12 classrooms.

Social Justice Web Links
This page was added fall '09. Contributors are asked to submit links to internet sights that contain information and resources for K-12 teachers regarding social justice issues.