Each year, fifth graders at Kamehameha Elementary School produce a play about American history. Students do research, write scripts and songs, design costumes and the stage sets, act, and promote the event. The article explains how the students accomplished this over several months and notes how the activity tied into their schoolwork. (SM)

Describes how a fifth-grade social studies class used poems by Langston Hughes and integrated literature, drama, music, and dance to make history more human and meaningful for students. (SR)

Describes a simulation exercise designed to help students understand the objections of U.S. colonists to the Stamp Act and other taxes. Includes a sample handout, instructions for the teacher in carrying out the simulation, and questions to compare students' and colonists' about feelings being assessed fees unfairly. (DK)

A children's book author explains why she chose to write "Encounter," an accurate story of Christopher Columbus's first meeting with the gentle Taino tribe 500 years ago. The article presents suggestions for using "Encounter" as a springboard for activities to help elementary students interpret history. (SM)

Discusses how to motivate students to learn history. Suggests using primary sources, relating subject matter to what students already know, and avoiding lectures whenever possible. Recommends formulating goals in advance, preparing reading lists, preparing questions for students, and assigning individual projects. Argues that such a course will…

Presents a lesson plan utilizing personal letters of ordinary people to teach U.S. history. Suggests that the lesson can teach about the historical information available in personal letters, develop analytical skills through use of primary sources, and increase students' understanding of minority issues. Includes four letters to use as handouts.…

Presents a teaching unit tracing the last three decades of cultural history in the United States through television programs. Includes objectives, daily routines, questions, and a list of representative shows. Suggests that students compare and contrast situation comedies from each decade and examine new programs for cultural awareness and…

Presents a lesson plan to help students understand that political advertisements often mislead, lie, or appeal to emotion. Suggests that the lesson will enable students to examine political advertisements analytically. Includes a worksheet to be used by students to analyze individual political advertisements. (DK)

Presents an instructive outline for writing a research paper for National History Day. Organizes the process into three steps: (1) select an interesting topic; (2) develop a strong thesis; and (3) write a well-constructed paper. Includes hints on organization, technical matters, editing, and readability. (DK)

Based upon his belief that students tend to view mathematics as a closed and already perfected system, the author contends that the history of mathematics is an appropriate cornerstone from which the classroom teacher can humanize mathematics and, thereby, improve the learning of mathematics. Many examples are given. (JJK)

Explains that students in introductory college history courses were assigned to keep journals and write short, informal pieces on reading assignments. Argues that students found themselves thinking about history in new ways. Includes portions of student writings. Concludes that students grew into active learners, who came to appreciate history as…

Discusses the content of social studies as a discipline. Suggests that the real curriculum of the social studies in actual teaching is history. Argues that the original emphasis on citizenship training needs to be restored or developed as a separate discipline to establish a source of knowledge independent of the social studies. (DK)

Traces the history of the debate over the status of social studies as a discipline. Discusses the events in the battle between a federated curriculum based on history and a fusionist curriculum. Urges that the debate be ended on the grounds that social studies is not, and never has been, a discipline. (DK)

Too often, in the teaching of U.S. history, inclusion of other cultures in the curriculum passes for synthesis. True synthesis incorporates various elements of human experience (events, institutions, groups) into an explanatory narrative. Understanding requires a sense of the differences that mark and make U.S. society. (MSE)

Students at Hunter College Elementary School chose 10 events in the 20th century, 1 per decade, and completed research, art, and writing projects that would represent their viewpoint on each of the events. Students made collages containing photographs and headlines relating to their selected events and wrote autobiographical statements connecting…