PHILOSOPHY OF THE SECONDARY SOCIAL STUDIES CURRICULUM

The 2005 secondary Social Studies curriculum was written according to an inquiry-based framework. Inquiry—a process of asking and refining questions, of debating ideas and making predictions, and of collecting data from multiple sources and asking new questions that organize teaching and learning—focuses on information processing (“how’s” and “why’s,” not simply “what’s”) and promotes a three-tiered continuum: a) teachers constructing goals and objectives linked to national, state, and local standards; b) students and teachers creating answerable and compelling essential questions that form the focus of inquiry, specific subject content providing multiple responses; c) students examining initial questions, searching for relationships and patterns among data, analyzing and evaluating information against initial hypotheses, and concluding research with post-instruction assessments and/or performance tasks. Given the variety of inquiry approaches, Stamford Public Schools has chosen the “Understanding by Design” model in which Wiggins and McTighe (1998) promote “backwards design.” [1] In this model, a teacher forms an essential question based on a given topic, gathers a variety of primary and secondary print and non-print resources, and chooses specific instructional methods to ensure that students’ learning meets a given standard. This inquiry approach differs from traditional, programmed approaches by beginning with a consideration of desired outcomes, not necessarily with a page in a textbook, incorporating a variety of appropriate evidence of students’ learning, and by allowing for differentiated instructional experiences relative to process and product while integrating significant process skills.

In the spring and summer of 2004, Social Studies teachers met to determine the Social Studies content essentials and then developed essential questions around the “biggest ideas” of study: ideas that recur naturally; that raise other important questions; and that serve as overarching guidelines for curriculum, the essential questions being engaging, having multiple responses, and springing from the content itself. Teachers chose twelve (12) questions that would form the basis of inquiry for secondary Social Studies instruction and later devised specific essential questions for each subject followed by more specific focus questions for respective units; teachers also created “performance tasks,” assignments that focus on one or more objectives from a given unit, with accompanying rubrics. Two performance tasks for each full-year course (and one task for Civics) were selected as assured experiences by a quorum of middle school Social Studies teachers and by the high school Social Studies department heads in collaboration with their departments (These tasks have been printed in a separate color in the curriculum).

In developing questions and the accompanying curricula, teachers were mindful to focus on questions that are challenging and debatable with the understanding that individual teachers will structure more detailed lessons providing opportunities for students to access information crucial to their inquiries and activities that will involve students in deriving individual and collective standards for performance. It is expected that teachers will also collaborate with various building personnel, particularly information literacy specialists, in developing archives of information sources, using online databases, and teaching students to organize and cite information appropriately. Further, students should be taught to pose queries that address their own lack of understanding, specific gaps in their knowledge, and their own particular misconceptions.

In sum, a broad inquiry cycle represents a nonlinear process, the entry point being what learners know and what interests them, the teacher inviting engagement through the exploration of resources. While students focus on meaningful and intriguing topics, the teacher facilitates students’ locating answers to essential questions, guides students to ask other questions from varying perspectives, and prompts learners to form and test hypotheses regarding their inquiries. Never concluding, this process is a cycle of investigating, conversing, struggling, transforming, presenting, reflecting, and repositioning. Otherwise stated as a metaphor, one decides to begin a journey, wonders about the route, asks others’ opinions regarding potential pathways, plans the trip, takes the trek with friends (considering their roadway directives), and reflects on when and where he/she finally arrives.