Shifting to an inquiry-based practice can be challenging. How should teachers get started? How many times should teachers plan for inquiry? What do teachers do when students struggle with inquiry? How long does it take for students to buy in to the inquiry process? These kinds of questions, and the concerns that underlie them, can create an…

This article provides a brief history of the development of the 1984 National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) scope and sequence document and introduces the series of articles in this issue. (JDH)

Presents an alternative scope and sequence for the social studies. Offers an integrated social science and humanities approach, placing history and geography at the center of the curriculum. Scrapping the prevailing pattern of repeated history surveys, the proposed alternative emphasizes a different historical period at each grade level to give…

Provides the recommended scope and sequence for social studies from the National Council for the Social Studies Task Force on Scope and Sequence. Outlines the knowledge base and skills which undergird social studies education, and gives grade level examples of the substantive content from K-12. Offers a chart which gives optional sequences for…

Contends that decisions about scope and sequence are most appropriately made by local curriculum committees and teachers. Provides guidance for this work by identifying four goals for the K-12 social studies curriculum, along with seven major themes, including social history, cultural heritage, and development of a global perspective. Key…

Contends that the freedom to discover and debate the past is essential to a democratic society. Presents a high school lesson in historical methodology to illustrate how historians search for what happened in the past. Includes seven classroom activities to help students examine historical evidence. (CFR)

Offers a thematic approach for social studies scope and sequence. Outlines 10 themes which are offered at each grade level K-12 providing the scope for the curriculum. Illustrates how higher-order thinking and inquiry can be incorporated into the program and outlines the content for grades K-12. (SLM)

Offers a conception of the K-12 social studies curriculum based upon a probing treatment of problems, ideas, and values of democracy. Maintains that democracy must be practiced in the schools if effective democratic citizenship is expected. Offers four guidelines for curriculum development, and identifies seven curriculum strands. (JDH)