Category Archives: Social Sciences

You’ll find domain-specific material designed to meet Common Core Standards in social studies, along with adapted and differentiated materials that deal with a broad array of conceptual knowledge in the social sciences. See the Taxonomies page for more about this category.

Serial Art (Serial Imagery)

Serial Art (Serial Imagery): The repetition, with slight variations, of an image in the same work of art, whether a single canvas or related modules of a sculptured work; named in the late 1960s. Andy Warhol and Donald Judd have both worked in the serial image mode. It displays some traits of systemic painting, although it is a distinct movement.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

Cultural Literacy: Stereotype

OK, another day arrives. Here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of stereotype and stereotyping, which seems timely to me.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Workshop

“Workshop: Refers to those artworks produced primarily by assistants from drawings or cartoons by a major artist, usually under his or her supervision. Rubens, for example, would complete the final work, after leaving most of the preliminary details to his workshop. The degree of his intervention was reflected in the cost of the work.”

Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.

Word Root Exercise: Zo, Zoo

Here is a worksheet on the Greek word roots zo and zoo, which mean animal and life–as in zoology.

If you find typos in this document, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Term of Art: Exegesis

“Exegesis: In Roman times the exegetes were professional and official interpreters of charms, omens, dreams, sacred law and oracular pronouncements. Thus the term has come to mean an explanation or interpretation and is often applied to biblical studies. As far as literature is concerned, it covers critical analysis and the elucidation of difficulties in the text. A variorum edition (q.v.), for example, contains a great deal of exegesis.”

Excerpted from: Cuddon, J.A. The Penguin Dictionary of Literary Terms and Literary Theory. New York: Penguin, 1992.

German Measles

Here is a short reading on the German measles, also known as rubella, along with its accompanying vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet. In some respects, this is a short reading on epidemiology as well, which, of course, makes it timely.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Term of Art: Weltanschauung

“Weltanschauung: A German term which refers to the ‘world-view’ or ‘philosophy of life’ of different groups within society. For example, it is sometimes argued that the long-term unemployed have a fatalistic outlook, the middle classes an individualistic approach to life, while members of the working class hold a set of beliefs and attitudes which emphasize collectivism. Sociologists have posed a number of interesting questions around this topic. Do particular social groups actually adhere to identifiable world-views? If so, how do individuals come to hold specific images of society, and what is the relationship between membership of a group and an individual’s subjective representations of it? The major problem confronting sociologists who address these issues is that of defining and describing a world-view itself. What beliefs and values may be said to constitute a world-view? Should we even expect people to hold to consistent world-views, given that (for example) research on class imagery suggests that, more often than not, people’s attitudes and values are inconsistent or ambiguous, and rarely form a coherent whole? In short, use of this term usually points to a certain imprecision in an argument, and almost invariably indicates that data appropriate to the particular case are wanting.”

Excerpted from: Marshall, Gordon, ed. Oxford Dictionary of Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.

A Lesson Plan on the Timelines of World History

I was all but certain that I had previously posted this lesson plan on the timeline of global history, but I can’t find it anywhere on Mark’s Text Terminal. So, here is a context clues worksheet on the noun chronology with which I open this lesson. Here is the reading, which is really a list of significant dates in world history; here also are the questions to answer in worksheet form. Finally, here are is the teacher’s copy of the worksheet, i.e. the answers.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.

Term of Art: Autarky

“Autarky (deriv. Gk autarkeia, self sufficient). In economic terms, a policy aimed at total home-production to the exclusion of imported goods. Pre-World War II Germany’s search for a blockade-proof economy provides a good example of economic autarky.”

Excerpted from: Cook, Chris. Dictionary of Historical Terms. New York: Gramercy, 1998.

A Lesson Plan on the Crime and Puzzlement Case “Casey at the Plate”

Here is a lesson plan on the Crime and Puzzlement case “Casey at the Plate.”

I open this investigation with this Cultural Literacy worksheet on the concept of a “significant other” as a do-now exercise. Here is a scan of the illustrations and questions that drive the case; finally, here is the typescript of the answer key.

If you find typos in these documents, I would appreciate a notification. And, as always, if you find this material useful in your practice, I would be grateful to hear what you think of it. I seek your peer review.