Troy Students Enjoy The Active Learning In Social Studies Program

Photos: Using the district’s new social studies curriculum, Troy Shorewood Elementary School students, here pictured in teacher Kristin McGuire’s class before the state-mandated stay-at-home order, play a game to help them understand what might have happened in the early English settlement of Jamestown, Virginia.

__________________________

Fourth grade students in Kristin McGuire’s class at Troy Shorewood Elementary School recently took a virtual train trip to several American locations, such as Philadelphia, where they “visited” Independence Hall, and to Washington D.C., where they learned about the federal government. They took a trawler and a bus to visit the southeast, including Florida, where they virtually toured the John F. Kennedy Space Center and the Everglades.

The students also played a survival game to give them deeper insight into the fate of the English settlers in Jamestown, Virginia. The activity concluded with the assignment of writing a letter to their “brother John,” advising him whether or not he should sail from England for Jamestown.

It was all part of Troy Community School District 30-C’s new kindergarten through fourth grade social studies curriculum, adopted by the school board last year and put in place this year. It’s a shift in the way the subject is taught, according to Kristin Johnson, Troy Assistant Superintendent of Curriculum.

“Today we’re teaching social studies more through experiential exercises,” Johnson said, “working together to find the answers to questions and making sense of our world. Rather than teachers saying here is what happened, we are putting students in situations that allow them to make these discoveries themselves.”

Johnson said this way of learning empowers students to develop the skills enabling them to seek knowledge themselves, which will help them make better decisions moving forward as children and into adulthood.

Troy’s social studies classes encompass history, geography, government, economics and financial literacy. The new curriculum includes resource books, online resources, an interactive journal and activity-based projects.

The program begins in kindergarten, with students getting a perspective of themselves and where they fit within their school and community. As they move up through elementary school, they begin thinking more globally and about the difference they can make in the world in which they live.

“It helps them understand each other better and how we all live and work together to achieve common goals,” Johnson explained.

Teacher Kristin McGuire was also on the district’s committee that chose the new social studies curriculum.

“It allows students to be able to have more hands-on experiences,” McGuire said. “They’re learning by doing and not just by reading out of a textbook. The students seem to really enjoy it. They look forward to social studies, and they look forward to the adventures. They become engaged, which is what the teachers on the committee really wanted.”