Mr. Fulton: 8th Grade Social Studies

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Nation Building: Create-A-Country

Social Studies encompasses a wide array of subjects...from history and geography...from sociology  to economics...civics/government, and more.  How do you accommodate a growing subject matter (every second that passes creates more history for example) that is so diverse?  And perhaps more importantly, how do you do it effectively in a relatively short period of time...in a manner that stimulates independent, creative, and original thinking...encourages personal growth and development...and, more importantly to many students, in a way that might be considered fun?

I think we have an answer Cool.  We will attempt to address all these subjects through a nation-building simulation I have titled Create-A-Country (if you have a catchier title, please let me know).  This nation simulation is the primary purpose and focus of this site.

Quotes:

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorius triumphs, even though checkered by failure... than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat. -- Theodore Roosevelt

 

 

For information relating to Silverland Middle School in general, please visit: www.sms.lyon.k12.nv.us

 

For information pertaining to Lyon County School District, please visit: www.lyon.k12.nv.us

 

For Nevada state standards, please visit: www.doe.nv.gov/standards.html

 

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Why a year-long project?

  8th grade Social Studies standards only:
  
           

Benefits of a project such as Create-A-Country:

There are many benefits to such a project. 

1. For one thing, the longevity of it requires students to retain and use information...rather than the traditional learn-cram-regurgitate on an assessment-forget sequence. 

2. It also permits the integration of many standards and topics into one cohesive (and hopefully more understandable) assignment/activity.

3. It creates a false "game" atmosphere that more actively engages the majority of students.  More active engagement obviously increases retention of ideas and key concepts...although sometimes they don't realize they're actually learning Cool.

4. It facilitates higher thinking, critical thinking, and problem solving skills. 

5. It compels students to interact and work with other students, therefor developing essential collaborative/ interpersonal skills.

6. It promotes independent research and encourages initiative. 

7. It promotes the development of short term and long term goals.

8. It adds a high degree of relevance to what students do by paralleling real-world situations and scenarios.

9. It allows for the inclusion of role-playing...an essential component to the development of adolescent minds.

10. Promotes the development of organizational skills.

It is, in fact, nothing short of a miracle that the modern methods of instruction have not entirely strangled the holy curiosity of inquiry. -- Albert Einstein

"It is not the critic who counts: not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who errs and comes up short again and again, because there is no effort without error or shortcoming, but who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions, who spends himself for a worthy cause; who, at the best, knows, in the end, the triumph of high achievement, and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least he fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who knew neither victory nor defeat."

Theodore Roosevelt "Citizenship in a Republic,"
Speech at the Sorbonne, Paris, April 23, 1910