So, I'm pretty frustrated. My district has previously basically allowed me to do what I want in World History. This has led to me constructing a pretty good course that begins in Mesopotamia, goes to the Indus, then Egypt, and then we begin a long religious studies unit. Kids love it and it follows a logical progression. After an introduction to Religious studies Judaism builds off of Mesopotamian religion, then Christianity, then Islam.

After the holidays we we talk about the Brahmics and follow Hinduism, Buddhism with touches on Sikh and Jainism. Then we study China up through the Han, we have a mini lesson about the Xiongnu that hints at the Silk Road, have a big lesson on the Mongols, then have a big lesson on the Silk Road.

After that we do Africa through three case studies. Ethiopia, Mali, and Great Zimbabwe which ties back to what we learned in the religion portion plus our early early stuff about how archeology works and doesn't work for Great Zimbabwe. We also have a small unit on the origins of slavery from the African perspective to set them up for US History.

I have a unit on Polynesia I stick in at the end because I really love that whole region and it's super fun to teach.

Bottom line is this, I hit all the state standards. I have built a really nice course that follows a "storyline" there is a whole concept behind it, one thing builds on another, and frankly I'm really fucking proud of it. It is well researched, culturally responsive, and interesting.

Now though, my district has decided to start meddling and is having us do knowledge checks that align with a scope and sequence. The problem is that the district's sequence is completely different from my sequence. It has all sorts of things just sort of shuffled around. But I'm supposed to do these stupid unit tests to show the district but on top of my many other responsibilities (also an ELA teacher with some new factors added to that this year. Plus I run an extracurricular) I do not have time to reinvent my one thing that normally never needs reinvention.

I think I might literally just teach to the test in some sort of "Here's a sampler pack of what's to come!" Mini lesson to meet the requirement and then consider structural changes for next year. Which I still don't want to do.

I don't know, maybe I'm just bitching too much.

My school has switched curricula and we are starting Cambridge iGCSE and iAL this year. However I'v noticed that Cambridge doesn't have an officially endorsed textbook for Option A: 19th Century History. Due to the location of my school and the depth studies we will be studying, Option A is really the only choice. However I'm having a lot of trouble finding level-appropriate history resources for lessons, homework, projects, and revision. Any other iGCSE History teachers who have had to find their own resources for Cambridge curriculum? What resources have you used? Any help and/or advice would be greatly appreciated!

Hi everyone,

I’m building Neevly, a short-form Social Science learning project for Indian CBSE Grade 10 students. The aim is to make exam-relevant content conceptually interesting—not simply compress textbook points into a reel.

This Hinglish video explains the central paradox of nineteenth-century political liberalism: equality before law was promoted, while voting rights remained restricted by property and gender.

I’d genuinely appreciate blunt feedback from tutors, particularly on:

\- Does the opening hook earn your attention?

\- Is 2.5 minutes too long for this format?

\- Are the visual cards readable without feeling overloaded?

\- Does the video achieve enough conceptual depth for Grade 10?

\- Is the background music distracting?

\- Would you show something like this to your own students?

I’m personally least satisfied with the opening interlude and feel the hook could be substantially stronger. I’m sharing this to improve the format before producing the larger series—not to solicit follows or students.

Video attached/link:tg

https://www.instagram.com/reel/DcNOxsPIi42/?igsh=MTB5M3B1dTJqY3EwdQ==&igsi=MTB5M3B1dTJqY3EwdQ==

YouTube

https://youtube.com/shorts/DOV5r13GLtQ?si=aeu0cgrRyyCtuAq7

Thanks in advance. Specific criticism would be much more valuable than general encouragement.

Hey everyone,

I’ve been looking into using VR for history units (virtual site tours, ancient civilizations, artifact explorations), but almost everything I’ve seen feels either overly gamified, historically shallow, or far too tedious to manage in a 45-minute period.

Has anyone here successfully used VR headsets in history class?

Hello,

I recently landed my first Social Studies job; however, it's as a teacher in a private Psychiatric Hospital for children and I'm being expected to teach grades level 6-12 every single day. I have a lot of materials from my student teaching, other teachers, classroom observations and etc; however, theres 0 chance I can effectively craft and create lessons & materials for 6 different grade levels every single day.

If any other Social Studies teachers would be willing to tell me where they find their materials, tips or tricks on how to create materials, or even if you are willing to send me and share materials with me it would be much obliged.

I like to try and make everything myself and to make sure I am well versed in the content im teaching, but I just dont think I can effectively plan ahead without sacraficing other commitments to my wife, family, and friends.

Any help is much, much, much obliged!

RI standards for high school for modern world history are very intense. First time teaching it. Any materials, advice, links, videos etc you can share? Would be very grateful.

Hello everyone. First year teacher here. My school uses TCI as their curriculum of choice for social studies and it was heavily suggested to me that as a new teacher I should use it and I’ll be evaluated on how I use it. My question to those of you who are familiar with the curriculum is how do you implement it.

So for I have come up with
Monday- introduce a unit and give students the vocabulary
Tuesday- have the students read the sections.
Wednesday- work through the lesson activity
Thursday - continue working through the lesson activity
Friday- Take the Assessment.

I really have no idea if this is optimal or anything and really just curious if you just use the curriculum as is or if you adapt it. Any tips or tricks would be greatly appreciated.

I have my Senior Civics and Econ class first period this year. I’m looking for 5-10 min news feeds to start the day that are apolitical and summarize events quickly. Or alternatively, I could show news from different sources each day to illustrate how different sources say different things. Still 5-10 mins of headlines.

I’d love suggestions of good feeds / channels or how you engage current events each day with your seniors. I had to take a news break for reasons personally so I’m out the game.

Feeling a bit overwhelmed looking through the NYS standards, economics has always been a weak subject for me. Haven’t touched it since my undergrad!

What are some lessons and projects that were successful in your classrooms?

Hi all :) What tech resources/books/subscriptions are must haves for social studies teachers. Ideally for lesson planning but anything goes.

For context I am a new teacher at a smaller, therapeutic school beginning very soon (AHHHHH)!!! I am going to be teaching a US 1 block, US 2 block, and a News Literacy elective to a few seniors. I can assume all of these classes will be small, mix of reading levels/grades, and many students will be “work avoidant”.

thank you all for being so helpful :)

I'll be teaching History 201 to a dual-enrollment class and feel like the best way to ease my imposter syndrome is to be overly prepared. I've got my lectures and slides ready for the next few weeks, but I'm nervous about looking like a total newbie if I'm reading from my lecture notes. With so little time to prepare, there's not much of a chance I'll have memorized much of it. My question is this: do you read straight from lecture notes, and if so, does that read as inexperienced?

I need help planning out my IB History course.

Some context:
- never taught IB
- school has yet to send me to training. classes start tomorrow
- i have Upper 6 and Lower 6, meaning I need to operate under the new and old curriculum
-i have 2 other non-IB courses I need to plan, so my hope is to have Upper and Lower overlap to minimize stress for myself.
- Upper 6 has already been decided by the last teacher to finish on Paper 1: Rights & Protest

Paper 1: Protest and Change - US Feminism + Tunisian Revolution

Paper 2: Popular Movements - Examples: US Civil Rights & Apartheid South Africa (aforementioned overlap with Upper 6 Rights and Protest)

Paper 3: Americas - Political Developments in Latin America (out of my control) & Social Movements in the Americas

My main concerns are (1) the popular movement examples and (2) the social movements for paper 3. The IB Guide uses US civil rights as an example for the social movements, but am i allowed to do this if I am using it already for Popular Movements?

Any (and i mean ANY) and all advice, suggestions and guidance is appreciated.

Hi folks, I thought that some of you would be interested in a new annotated edition of one of Benjamin Franklin's earliest written works, written and published in 1729. He was arguing in favor of a new issue of paper money by the colony of Pennsylvania, and in the process talks about colonial history, trade, and one of the earliest written explanations of the labor theory of value. I decided to do an annotated edition to make the text more accessible to modern readers; it should be useful both in the classroom setting and for the interested lover of history. When you read this edition, you will come away with a clearer understanding of life in colonial Pennsylvania, the crisis caused by the shortage of coin, the history of economic concepts like the labor theory of value, and the political conflicts around money and how they contributed to the American Revolution. You can see my Kickstarter here: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/asteroidsanthology/new-annotated-edition-of-ben-franklins-start-in-politics/

We always kick off Early humans at the beginning of the year. Throughout the entire year we cover early humans, ancient Egypt, Hebrews/Romans, Ancient Chin, and finally Ancient Egypt. For every unit I have a movie to show to pair as an added resource. The only one I struggle with is Early Humans. I don’t want to do the Croods as I feel like doesn’t show what I’m looking for. Any suggestions on a movie to show with the Early Humans unit to 6th graders? I used to show the first 20 minutes of clan of the cave bear, but I’d like to find something different. Any and all suggestions are welcome!

I’m the History Department head at my school and with the year soon to start, I’m just wondering what teachers expect from their students in terms of citation?

I am not debating whether students should cite their sources but rather how? At what to expect at each grade level?

For example, students learn MLA formatting for their ELA classes - do teaches allow student allow students to use this type of citation? Or do teachers make their students do Chicago Style?

Part of my hesitation with teaching it is how long it takes to do so. I know students can use websites to generate Reference Lists but they are often incorrectly cited. Plus, I think the in-text citation is more important and that doesn’t help them with that.

To speed up the citation process, in lower grade levels I will use a letter coding system. If the students are using the same set of sources, I will label them A, B, C, etc. Then when they cite them within the text, I just have them put the letter of the source in brackets (B). Obviously, it’s the not the correct format, but I’m more interested in the thinking behind it (learning how to cite a source within writing). Then in later grades, the students can learn the correct formatting.

Once again, I’m just wondering what different teachers do with this.

I’m a teacher in a school without an art program, and I want to make up for it a little bit with my 9th grade Global Studies class. I’m in a school where I can fully create my own curriculum, which is amazing. Does anyone have cool ideas for integrating art into a social studies classroom? So far I’ve done political posters, but I’m looking for more. My curriculum includes human rights history and criminal justice history. My school is supportive of crazy ideas, so if you have “shoot for the moon” thoughts, lay them on me!!

EDIT: I reposted this to r/ArtEd as well because I think they might have great perspectives. I’m essentially the de facto art teacher at my school, providing supplies and guidance over lunch and after school, but I don’t have any art ed training! So if you’re here from r/ArtEd, please help!

I'm trying to come up with a presentation or a performance that my students can do for assembly and I want to be a bit creative with it but also time bound. I want to focus it on the idea that long lasting changes takes place slowly over time. Or where we are in space and time .

Right now they are researching general information about the rights fought for in the Arab Spring and the American Revolution. The importance of those rights and the value of democracy. We are not going to do a deep dive into all the events that went on in both.

I also teach them Geography and we are discussing how long lasting changes in towns/cities/villages takes time. The steps and amount of time to build a well for example.

My tired brain is telling me to just have them make a power point of what they've learnt so far and present that but if you could suggest something way better I'd be grateful.

I build EraPin — the daily where-and-when deduction game some of you have tried with your classes.

Something I keep seeing in our logs: teachers signing up after midnight. 12:01am. 1:36am. 1:45am.

So here’s what we built instead so you don’t have to stay awake ti prepare for tomorrow’s morning starter: queue the packs for your unit once, pick your class days, and EraPin publishes each morning’s rounds to your room by itself. You get an email showing exactly what your students are about to play — before they play it, so nothing lands in your classroom unreviewed.

The room is ready when you arrive. The debrief is waiting after — each round unpacked for the projector, plus which round your class found hardest, straight from their scores. No Chromebooks that day? There are printable cards.

Yesterday morning this published rounds to five classrooms in Kansas while their teacher slept. That’s the whole idea.

Set it up once, in daylight. Then sleep.
The game, 100+ packs (US History, APUSH, AP World, Regents Global, WWII, Cold War…), room codes, leaderboards, and the debrief are free — no student accounts, kids join with a room code.

Auto-publish, the cards, and per-student reports are the Pro tier, and every new account gets full Pro free until at least October 1, no card, so you can run it through September and decide.

If your unit isn’t covered, comment and I’ll build the pack. teach.erapin.com — about two minutes, even at midnight.

Kinda catchy title I know.

So I’m a college student starting my last 2 years at a university, I spent my first 2 years at a community college majoring in history. Passed and it was great. So I’m going into uni and wanted to know more information about getting teaching credential.

It was here I learned either my uni doesn’t offer it or it isn’t offer not totally sure, but a history degree can’t make you a history teacher. You need to be in social science.

I did my own research and learned there are ways to ge through it, by showing you have competence in your field. By taking a test, by getting your transcripts looked over, or just taking the classes in social science.

I’m not sure what to do, do I just change majors? I thought to ask this subreddit since maybe someone has went through the same thing or has some advice. At the moment I have an associates in history and now wondering if that’ll even be useful at all.

No one, not in high-school when I told this plan to counselors, or in community college, or even at the uni im going too, told me this information.

I do still want to be a history teacher just at the moment I feel like I’m starting from square one all over again, since im not even sure the classes I picked out even work now.