Category Archives: Social Studies

Lesson plans that use the high school social studies curriculum to build literacy and learning skills.

Menarche and Menstrual Cycle

Posted on August 15, 2019 | Leave a comment

Okay, health teachers, perhaps you need a pair of readings on women’s reproductive health.

First, here is a reading on menarche and the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that attends it.

Second, here is a quite short reading on the menstrual cycle and its attendant vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Social Studies, Worksheets

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Historical Terms: Action Francaise

Posted on August 15, 2019 | Leave a comment

“action francaise: Right-wing political movement founded in France by the journalist and poet Charles Maurras (1868-1952), which was royalist, nationalistic, and anti-Semitic and which criticized the Third French Republic for decadence. Although a freethinker, Maurras approved of Roman Catholicism, believing that its traditions were a counterforce to democratic republicanism. In 1908 he and Leon Daudet (1867-1942), a pamphleteer and essayist, began joint editorship of the movement’s newspaper, Action Francaise. The Vatican became estranged from the movement after 1926 and it drew increasingly close to fascism. Between 1940 and 1944, it gave strong support to the Vichy government and was accordingly suppressed after France was liberated; Maurras was sentenced to life imprisonment for collaboration with the Germans.”

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

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Posted in Essays/Readings, Quotes, Reference Materials, Social Studies

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Cultural Literacy: Red Scare

Posted on August 15, 2019 | Leave a comment

Moving right along on a gorgeous August morning in Vermont, here is a Cultural Literacy worksheet on the Red Scare of 1919 and 1920 in the United States.

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.

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E.H. Gombrich on the Neanderthals

Posted on August 11, 2019 | Leave a comment

“The Neanderthals lived in a period that comes before history. That is why we call it ‘prehistory,’ because we only have a rough idea of when it all happened. But we still know something about the people whom we call prehistoric. At the time when real history begins, which we will come to in future readings, people already had all the things we have today: clothes, houses, and tools, plows to plow with, grains to make bread with cows for milking, sheep for shearing, dogs for hunting and for company, bows and arrows for shooting and helmets and shields for protection.”

Excerpted from: Gombrich, E.H. Trans. Caroline Mustill. A Little History of the World. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2005.

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Posted in Quotes, Reference Materials, Social Studies

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Cultural Literacy: Semite

Posted on August 11, 2019 | Leave a comment

Here’s a Cultural Literacy worksheet explaining the Semites, their origins, and their modern ethnicity.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Social Studies, Worksheets

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Depression

Posted on August 11, 2019 | Leave a comment

OK, health teachers, maybe you can use this reading on depression and the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that attends it.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Essays/Readings, Independent Practice, Social Studies, Worksheets

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Monopoly

Posted on August 10, 2019 | Leave a comment

I played it quite a bit as a child and an adolescent, and I can still be tempted by a round of it today. If I infer correctly from the student interest I’ve seen in my classrooms in this reading on the board game Monopoly, young people remain interested in it. Here is the vocabulary-building and comprehension worksheet that accompanies the reading.

There is an argument to be made for this game as a learning activity, which is why I have tagged it as differentiated instruction.

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.

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Posted in English Language Arts, Independent Practice, Social Studies, Worksheets

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