This site is a great starting off point for links to anthropological resources that you could use in your classroom. It contains an easy-to-use navigation bar, which you can use to search many different areas in anthropology.
This site has a very comprehensive database of information on all the countries in the world. It includes definitions of and information on types of government, bordering countries, maritime claims, location, infectious diseases, and much more. The site also has all flags of the world and a great set of reference maps, including a political map of the world, a time zone map, as well as a map of the continents and more.
Cobblestone Publishing produces several nonfiction magazines that deal with various areas of social studies, including American history, African American heritage, general social studies, and world cultures. Cobblestone magazine was developed by two teachers in 1979, who were looking for ways to promote reading and history to children. This website contains a listing of all of the magazines they publish divided up by the appropriate grade level and a description of each, samples of free articles from their various magazines, both for kids and teachers, teachers’ guides for how to use the various magazines in the classroom, including ideas for lesson plans, and finally, activities for both children and teachers that cover a range of social studies topics from archaeology to inventions. Even if you are not planning no purchasing the magazines, I still recommend the website because of its access to some free articles as well as the activities that cover all aspects of social studies, including archaeology.
This is a great resource for teachers. The site contains lesson plans on various areas, including many social studies topics, such as “Geography A to Z” and “Visiting Historical Places.” The site also has many informative resources for teachers on professional development. Topics here include classroom management tips, dealing with students with low self esteem, etc. In addition, there is an interesting section on school issues, which explores hot topics in education from NCLB to looping. Finally, there is a section called “From the Administrator’s Desk” which covers areas such as what principles look for in hiring teachers as well as information on home visits.
This site has great resources for both ESL students and their teachers. It includes activities that students can do on-line. It also contains lesson plans, thematic units, and a great list of references for ESL teaching techniques. In addition, this site has specific resources for teaching social studies to ESL students. If you want to go straight there, click http://home.earthlink.net/~eslhome/reference/socstud.html and find various readings with vocabulary support embedded in hyperlinks as well as links to other great sites with information on various social studies topics.
This is a site where you can search for all types of educational resources. You can browse by subject (there is a social studies category!), by type of resource you are looking for, whether it is an activity, lesson plan, best practice, abstract, etc. You can also search by grade level or key word as well as several other ways. If you search by key word, there is a glossary menu from which to choose, and I saw that geography and government were just two of the many key word choices.
This is an extensive site on history. It has information on topics including America’s wars, railroad history, aviation history, biographies for influential people, a 20 th century almanac. There are also text versions of primary source documents.
This is a site that presents 3,000 years of world history with an interactive combination of synchronoptic lifelines, timelines, and maps. The major sections of this site are People, History, Events, and Maps. People reaches from 1 000 BC to the present. It displays lifelines for over 1000 persons in science, culture, religion, and politics. There are also special expanded sections for scientists, artists, writers, composers, famous women, and politicians. The History section displays timelines for the major civilizations with many text links.. The Events section reaches back from 2004 to 1790 and depicts events on a year to year basis. Finally, the Maps section displays seven Periods of World History with many links to dozens of regional maps. This is a very interesting, but very large and comprehensive site. However, it is organized and broken down in such a way that it is easily navigable.
This site is a good resource containing a wealth of information on how to work effectively with students with disabilities. The information compiled here has been summarized from scores of research articles about teaching techniques for exceptional learners by students studying special education at the University of Virginia Curry School of Education and East Tennessee State University College of Education. As described by the site, “To be included in this data base, the articles had to describe research-validated methods for teaching specific skills to individuals with disabilities. The contributions are edited for quality (content and clarity), use of contemporary terminology, and people-first language on an on-going basis (i.e., this site is always ‘under construction’ for new additions and improvements).” The techniques are divided by the following subject areas: reading spelling, handwriting, writing, mathematics, content instruction, behavioral problems, and language, social, vocational, and functional skills.
This is an excellent site with a multitude of primary source documents, including maps, essays, photographs, pamphlets, and more. There is a great icon on the homepage called “American History.” Click on this to search through a broad range of topics from sports to maps to women’s history. Another great feature on this page is the “Today in History” that tells what happened on this particular day in our history-a useful tool for teachers to highlight history in their classrooms on a daily basis. Another highlight is the collection highlights, which featured reactions to September 11, 2001 collected by the American Folklife Centre and “The James Madison Papers: Insight into the Father of the Constitution.” Finally, t his site contains a great resource for teachers. It has history lesson plans categorized by topic and activities.
This site tells the story of the detainment of Japanese Americans in concentration camps in the United States during World War II. There are pictures as well as accompanying music and first person accounts of what took place. There is a really interesting pat of the site called “Reflections” where people who have viewed the site can post memories, reactions, links to other sites on this topic, thoughts to questions such as, “Why did this happen?” “Could it ever happen again?” “What do you think it means to be an American Citizen?” questions about balancing freedom and security, and comparisons between this and September 11, 2001. Very moving and informative.
This site contains a lot of information, including a letter to parents on what geography is, the importance of geographic literacy, tips for how to help their kids become geographically literate such as having maps and globes in their homes, relating current events to maps in the home, using maps to locate family and to plan vacations, and much more. In addition, the site gives the geography standards, including a tutorial of them, which gives the history of the standards and a breakdown of their components. Another interesting part of the website is addressed to educators and decision-makers of school curriculum. It includes a pamphlet that explains the importance of geography education in schools as well as ways to improve geography education.
To help us think, talk and teach about the rights and responsibilities of citizens in our democracy, this site was designed to explore 100 milestone documents of American history. These documents reflect our diversity and our unity, our past and our future, and mostly our commitment as a nation to continue to “form a more perfect union.” This site gives a list of the 100 documents, a summary of each, and a downloadable copy of each of the documents! In addition, there is a great “tools for educators” link. This page contains a downloadable teacher resource book with information on working with the documents in the classroom as well as a great link called “ Numerous, Various, Revealing, Ubiquitous, and Teachable Documents.” This page gives links to other corresponding documents to the original 100. Unlike the 100, which are textual records, related materials come in a variety of formats. They can include photographs, posters, maps, cartoons, motion pictures, sound recordings, and additional textual records. According to the site, these materials often reveal the social and economic causes and effects of the milestone documents, which tend to be more political in nature. Finally, the “ Integrating OurDocuments.gov into the Classroom” link under “tools for educators” gives suggestions and lesson ideas for all grades on how to integrate OurDocuments.gov into the social studies classroom
The Resource Room is a website with links and resources, including articles, lesson plans, and practical tips for working with people who learn differently or who have "learning difficulties" or specific "learning disabilities."
This site has tons of primary sources! Go to “Research Room” and click on ‘Archival Research Catalog (ARC)” where you can search for historical documents online or by subtopic. This site also has a great link specifically designed for teachers called “Digital Classroom.” In this section of the site, there is a link called “Teaching with Documents.” This link provides lesson plans that are correlated with downloadable primary source documents. The lesson plans are also correlated to National History Standards and National Standards for Civics and Government. The lessons contain suggested activities as well as a document analysis worksheet. The lesson plans are divided up into 8 major periods in U.S. History, starting with “ Revolution and the New Nation (1754-1820s)” and ending with “Contemporary United States (1968 to the present).” The “Digital Classroom” also contains information on tips for how to grow professionally and on locating publications relevant to teaching.
This is a comprehensive site all about the United States. There is information on any area one could think of, including government, the fifty states, national symbols, American culture, famous speeches (including inaugural addresses, George Washington’s farewell address, the Gettysburg address, Patrick Henry’s “Give me liberty or give me death!” speech). In short, a great reference manual for any social studies teacher!
Wikipedia is an on-line encyclopedia that can be edited by anyone. I think it is a good site to use as a quick reference for information on just about any topic. It has several specific subcategories of links specific to social studies, including culture, geography, history, and society.