Problems that students may have because of their unfamiliarity with the passage structures used in many social studies textbooks are discussed. Passage structures are defined as certain rhetorical structures such as compare/constrast, general/specific, and sequence. A teaching strategy for helping students overcome these difficulties is included.…

A unit on medieval religion, monasteries, and convents for seventh-grade students is presented. Students converted the classroom into a monastery and experienced as realistically as possible the life and spirit of medieval religion. (RM)

Teaching about a multinational corporation (MNC) is a powerful way to raise the global awareness of students. Background information on MNC's and teaching suggestions are provided. (RM)

How microcomputers can be used in the elementary social studies classroom to teach and reinforce new concepts, to relieve teachers of a variety of time-consuming chores, and to motivate students to produce creative projects is discussed. (RM)

How to use elementary school children as curators of a classroom museum is described. The teacher decides the concept or unit to be showcased in the museum. As curators students are responsible for many tasks including writing descriptive paragraphs for the artifacts and arranging the artifact display. (RM)

Activities to help senior high students learn about human rights are suggested. The activities include both social studies and language arts skills objectives. Examples of activities include reading and discussing newspapers, magazines, fiction, biographies, and nonfiction; viewing films; conducting research; preparing posters; making maps;…

Classroom-tested strategies for implementing mainstreaming in the secondary social studies classroom are described. These included textbook and lecture strategies; discussion, role-play, and debate strategies; and map, globe, and art projects. (RM)

A rationale and framework for community-based teacher education using social studies as an example is developed. The framework includes three types of community involvement: community service programs, community-based courses and workshops, and internships or experiential programs. (RM)

Learning depends not only on how information is disseminated but on what learners do with the information once it becomes available to them. Procedures that teachers can use to help students identify processing frameworks (approaches to identifying and organizing information) for individual learning tasks are discussed. (RM)

Presented are practical suggestions to help teachers successfully implement an oral history magazine project modelled after "Foxfire." Four major issues are discussed: nature of the project, relationship of project to schools, relationship of project to community, and teacher-student relationship. (RM)

A major goal of the social studies teacher should be to nurture independent reading-thinking habits, including inquisitiveness, critical thinking, and evaluation of ideas presented in information. How this can be done through skillful question planning is discussed. (RM)

Techniques that a social studies teacher can use to help students develop imagination, understanding, and divergent thinking are discussed. Also examined are meanings attached to the creative process and traits of creative people. (RM)

In order to critically read adult information sources, students need to be able to identify external factors which influence the presentation of information. Activities to help students identify these factors are suggested. (RM)

Including both social studies and language skills objectives, this unit of study encourages senior high school students to examine and wrestle with issues concerning nuclear warfare. Activities suggested are many and varied, e.g., students read and discuss fiction and nonfiction, analyze films, do library work, write essays, and conduct surveys.…

Described is a three-day political awareness program held prior to the 1980 election to help secondary students and community members examine the political process from a more holistic viewpoint. The program brought in a variety of speakers, including media persons, sociologists, political scientists, a lawyer, and a mayor, as well as political…