In the 21st century, the idea that students should have opportunities to develop powerful knowledge has been influential in educational research. Social realism as an educational philosophy, and a focus on knowledge derived from academic disciplines, have been advanced as an alternative to social constructivism and traditionalism as a basis for…

Inquiry is a promising avenue for providing intellectually rich, meaningful instruction, particularly for elementary social studies. Social studies is an interdisciplinary school subject that demands the interplay of content and skills that can be explicitly taught and demonstrated through inquiry. However, the inquiry approach is challenging in…

Purpose: This study explores the extent to which critical thinking is present in assessment conversations in social studies. Design/methodology/approach: The study builds on data from a Norwegian social studies class in the 9th grade (13-14-year-olds). Students performed student-led assessment conversations in groups of four. The students'…

The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of using Web 2.0 tools in social studies teaching on middle school students' metacognitive awareness levels and academic achievement. The study group of the research consists of a group of sixth grade students studying in a public middle school in Turkey in the fall semester of the 2020 to 2021…

The authors of this self-study set out to examine their own process of developing queer counternarrative lesson plans for use in early elementary social studies classrooms. Having designed and tested a set of kindergarten lesson plans about Bayard Rustin and the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's, we sought to answer the question: As teacher…

This article explores how teaching about passing using high-quality resources aligned to national standards can address both race "and" gender/sexuality, illuminating for students how people with various marginalized identities have been treated across time and place. The authors outline possibilities for addressing National Council for…

Artists have long addressed social injustices within popular music. As teachers consider how to deconstruct and teach the events of 2020 (and beyond) with an eye toward the future, we offer a novel pedagogical approach to incorporating music into the social studies classroom: the set-list. The set-list can be understood as containing temporal…

Elementary-aged children are often positioned as not developmentally ready to learn about race, racism, and injustice. Yet, the classroom materials used in most schools misrepresent history, withhold knowledge about racial injustice, or fail to uplift stories of resilience and resistance. For almost a decade, this groundbreaking resource has been…

The discourse of economic literacy has influenced high school economics instruction for decades. Using Foucauldian genealogy, this study examined the events and circumstances which allowed that discourse to emerge. By mapping the relationships in the discourse through the economic literacy, it is possible to examine the mechanisms and rules which…

This study investigated high school social studies teachers' perceptions of Robert Stahl's decision-making materials within their content area and the relevance of curricular implementation. The primary questions addressed in this study focused on high school social studies teachers' perception of current instructional practices, inquiry-based…

Today, young people are immersed in a complicated media ecology that promotes an infodemic of disinformation and profit-driven spin while simultaneously presenting extraordinary opportunities for participatory engagement. The social studies classroom is a critical platform for preparing the next generation to cope and thrive amid this…

This study aimed to assess social studies teachers' legal literacy levels and their perspectives on legal literacy education. The study was conducted with 160 social studies teachers in the first stage and 10 selected teachers in the second. Instruments were the legal literacy scale and a semi-structured interview form. Quantitative data were…

Until the beginning of the 21st century, the Tulsa Race Massacre was omitted mainly from the social studies curriculum and state-mandated standards in the United States. However, the featured lesson provides a valuable springboard to explore the historical perspectives and injustices against the Black community in Tulsa, Oklahoma, on May 31, 1921.…

The primary purpose of education is preparation for life. But what kind of life, and life for whom? Within the social studies, emphasis has long been placed on preparation for civic life in diverse and democratic societies within an interconnected world. This remains essential. There is an ongoing need for people who are willing and able to…

As preservice teachers navigate the emotional and physical stress that teaching demands, they face new pressures ranging from curriculum disputes to a revolving door of political and social policies that attempt to redefine social studies. As such, social studies educators and methods instructors have struggled to develop a common language and set…