Next week is our final meeting! I am going to miss both of these classes of future teachers!

And of course I made a plug for the Michigan Council for the Social Studies, which offers FREE membership to pre-service teachers.

Since TikTok is so huge, they recommended good accounts to follow of teachers they see on that app. Now I’ll need an account I guess!

AI came up with some good ideas for activities but couldn’t link them to Michigan Social Studies standards or inquiry questions. We talked about the fact that teachers still have to do the hard thinking—even if AI can make some things easier

We read “Pinning with Pause” which has a great checklist for vetting online resources. I also walked them through a ChatGPT generated lesson and vetted it with them together

Yet inquiry-based social studies with multiple perspectives, rich diversity, and critical thinking incorporates ELA without even trying.

Yes we still talked about children’s books. Yes we still talked about writing. But I wanted them to realize that the argument of “just integrate” SS into our regularly scheduled Science of Reading scripted program isn’t doing SS justice

The centers mixed literacy (comprehension, graphic organizers, and vocabulary) with social studies (timelines, primary sources)

Maybe we are doing something right guys!

Our favorite were Arthur’s Park, City Island’s Adventure, and anything Molly of Denali. However, I was bummed to see that PBS removed the social studies collection of games. They had Science, Math, Art, and many others— no SS. It was there in November…

We talked about cultural universals and how we shared many similar experiences but HOW we experienced them differ.

It was maybe 4 people! Then I had them bring an artifact to share that represents their family and we did a good old fashioned show and tell. 😀